Oxbow is a very good food for rats, but most of us have found that our rats simply don't like it. They dislike it so much that some will lose more weight than is healthy on it.

Harlan/Teklad foods are some of the most complete foods in a block form for rats because of the added vitamins and minerals while being preserved with vitamin e rather than chemicals which might be harmful. Corn is not the primary ingredient, unlike some foods marketed for rats, and even some dog foods.

Corn is not one of the more nutritious grains, but it's not without value. It's just not a complete food and needs to have other foods to complement it. The corn you want to avoid is dried corn since it can have molds and fungus growing in it which can cause illness. Here's what Debbie D has to say about corn:

Personally, I cringe when reading the ingredients to lab blocks (even HT and Mazuri). 

Really, with premium dog foods like Merrick, Wellness, Solid Gold, Evanger's, and many others, although you're paying more, you feed a lot less.  Sub-par brands that are full of fillers like Iams, Purina, and Eukanuba, all tell you to feed twice, sometimes THREE times the amount of higher-end brands.  That's because they have to make up for all those fillers, and you also go through the bag faster and have to buy more quicker. 

My black lab, Chloe, eats Solid Gold's WolfKing.  She's about 60 lbs, and where we're feeding her 2 cups a day of the WolfKing, a dog her size that is being fed lower-quality food is instructed to eat 5-6 cups a day.  Many people don't switch to premium pet foods because of the price, but honestly... they're paying a whole lot more with the "cheaper" brands since they have to buy so much.

For kibble, I always tell people feed grain free to their dogs (grains in any form are not digested or used by a carnivore). For the rats I have become quite attached to the Innova Reduced Fat and I mix in some puffed Kashi, occasional fresh foods and also a flaked wheat cereal with freeze dried berries in it. I'll add some more things later on but I bought these as a starter. All mine eat the dog food FIRST (which is my main concern with mixes as some rats will not eat the dog food, eat only dried fruits, or only cereal, etc) so I feel confident that any ingredients I add will be eaten if liked and left if not. Either way it doesn't matter because their vitamins/minerals are taken care of from each one eating the Innova. I cannot advocate blocks anymore because it's basically cheap filler grains and a vitamineral supplement. It doesn't matter that the rats get fresh foods.. the base of their diet is still cheap.

Not quite a novice and certainly not an expert but here's what I give my rats.
I use Suebee's grain mix, plus Debbie Ducommon's molasses mix, I use Solid Gold for the dog food and they get plenty of fresh foods( veggies and fruit...the good kind, as well as fresh protein sources...lean chicken, some fish and turkey and cooked egg). Funny this thread is about HT blocks as I was going to contact a distributor here in Dener and now think I will just keep doing what has been very successful to date.

Both my girls (Scooter just passed) were rescues and sick when I got them and Peanut will be two in a month. I have fed them this way ever since I got them and I feel that the reason they lasted so long was because of the diet and of course their daily meds and my vet was shocked every time I went to renew their prescriptions. She would say "They're still with you?". Seriously, you are what you eat and so are the rats. Of course they got treats but in very small amounts and in moderation.

At one point, may still be the case, the most common hyped pet food in vet clinics was put out by the same company who paid for the nutritional education that vets got in school.  And gee, I don't know why they recommend x brand.

I'd switch the rats to dog food, but well, the food I feed mostly is Evo (put out by Innova) or Bark at the Moon (put out by Solid Gold) - both WAY too high in protein for the rats.  They don't like the light stuff we have for the Cocker.  The Cocker can't eat the SG line (allergic to fish) and porks up like a balloon on Evo - she's on Ultramix and a) LOVES it, b) isn't allergic to it, and c) is a trim and healthy 22 lbs.  Scout if he was being fed SD's Active would eat 14 (yes 14) cups of food a day to maintain weight.  He gets 33% Evo, 67% BatM (they are roughly the same, and both are ok on their own, I just prefer it this way for some reason, he seems to do better) and he eats 1 - 1 1/2 cups in the am and 2 cups at night - sometimes more if he's looking skinny - he hits 110 and our biggest issue is he's a heavy coated dog (Collie/Lab/Shepherd/Great Pyr) and if he's putting out coat, he'll drop weight - so up his food, he does better.  14 cups for a daily diet vs 3 1/2 cups for a daily diet is a HUGH difference - and 7 cups of grain based food in his gut with his deep chest and huge tuck up is literally just ASKING for GDV - aka bloat with torsion. 

Back on topic here...

Doesn't Wellness have some questionable ingredients next to the higher Innovas/SG foods and their ilk that I don't remember names on?

I feed my 2  Chihuahua's  Merrick kibble and can (for special days) and they LOVE it. It is the only food that they will both eat. My boy chi is allergic to something in conventional dog foods we have tryed and my girl is just darn picky and has hypoglycemia so we have to make sure they BOTH love it. YAY! thanks to merrick! I actually am guilty of giving my rats some of the merrick sometimes. Is that OK? They like the dried fruit and veggies that are in there. HEHE.

I work at a petstore and i also agree that the more natural or holistic you go the better health you will have.

I try to use the same principles with myself

I feed my rats canned dog food about once a week - not a whole lot, just as a treat mixed in with their regular food.  My rats especially like Wysong's Rabbit Au Jus and PetGuard's vegetarian canned food.  As far as Merrick's dry foods, they're a little high on the protein (even the senior food has 20%), but it should be fine as a treat every now and then.


You'll get a lot of different opinions about that.  People say it's "nutritionally complete," but then again apparently low-quality, bad pet foods like Kibbles 'N Bits and Alpo are also "nutritionally complete."  When you feed anything to your animals (and to yourself, really), you have to pay close attention to the ingredients, and HT's are... eh; a whole lot of fillers and not much else.  I prefer feeding Oxbow's Regal Rat and high-quality dog foods/Suebee's.

Here is a link to Oxbow.  Up in the right corner is a store locator.  Possibly a store near you carries it.

  I'm a really indecisive person... So, is Regal Rat a better quality food?  I feel overwhelmed... It's the same deal with FN vs. Martins...

Edit: Wow, that's a long grudge...

It's not RR, it's Oxbow.  My rabbits did poorly on it and they refused to admit to anything that it was related to their product - despite other people at the time having the same problem and finding problems with the food. 

I can't prove anything directly - but well, the 11 y/o rabbit has done VASTLY better once he got off Oxbow.  The first change was to Kaytee brand hay.

I dislike Harlan and Mazuri for their sub-par ingredients. While I usually dislike premade foods, Regal Rat is one of the lesser evils ... but it does have it's downfall, such as rats sometimes disliking the taste. I've been wanting to give it a shot to include in my staple diet mix (which is a bastardized version of Suebee's, with lots of fresh food daily).