Wet hair around vagina?

[kimmie1985]

Hi, I've been around this forum for some time, but this is my first post. One of my female rats has urine soaked fur around her vagina. She's only about a year old. It looks like wet tail in hamsters, but I've been told that rats cannot get wet tail. She is still eating/drinking/playing, and her droppings are still well formed. She has been to an exotics vet who couldn't figure out what was wrong, even after checking her urine. he placed her on baytril, and she has been receiving it for about a week, however, nothing has changed. There are still 3 more days to go on the meds, but I feel that if there is no change yet, there most likely will not be.

my question to all of you is, have any off you experienced this before? What is it? What should I do about it?

Thank you all so much.

[Tequillasmom]

a few of my girls have this. I've watched them and they squat too low to pee and then the urine gets on them... at least thats the story with my girls, have u watched her urinate? could that be her problem too?

kris

[Heather]

I'm pretty sure it's what tequillasmom says, just squatting too low. Sometimes my girls get it if they're laying down and decide to pee. Wet tail in hamsters I'm pretty sure is just diarrhea. Rats can get diarrhea as well.

[scout]

I have a girl who occasionally gets wet when she's in heat. If your vet can't find anything wrong, I'd just keep it in the back of your mind in case anything does show up on down the road.

[Marybelle]

Sounds like you've done all the right things, but, if antibiotics didn't do anything to change the situation (which they would, usually within a 3 day period, if it was in infection), then likely it's what the others are saying, and she's just not as neat as she could be.  It's also possible she's got a bit of incontinence, I'd think, if she's constantly wet, but I'm not positive if that's something that rats get, even though they get a lot of the same things people do...

[OldsGal]

My advice is to just try to keep her as clean as possible so that she doesn't end up with some kind of infection down there.  Maybe keep baby wipes handy and wipe her down every day or every other day with them.  But my guy is what everyone else has already said.  She is pittling on herself or not holding herself up high enough.

Staci

[kimmie1985]

Thank you all so much! You're words have really eased my mind