Goodbye to a Dear Friend

We had to put our baby rat, Shelby, to sleep this evening. She never fully recovered from her surgery and bronchitis in May. She had been stuck on her left side, unable to eat or drink, since Thursday evening. We kept thinking that “it can’t be much longer now,” but she kept hanging on, and on, and on, and on. Dennis finally asked me this afternoon to see what we could do to ease her suffering. I did some research, and found that we could do it at home with Carbon Dioxide. She went peacefully in less than eight minutes from beginning to end. All three of us are teary-eyed and quiet tonight. We are going to give her a “proper burial” tomorrow evening.

Shelby was one of nine babies my rat Belle had on December 5, 2003. We hand-raised them from day one:


We could only keep one of the babies, and Dennis chose this spunky brown-hoodie with a tiny white stripe on top of her head. Here she is at about 25 days old:


Shelby was always a silly, active, cute, and sweet pet. She also had great taste in cars:


She grew into a beautiful, sleek, friendly adult:



Rest in peace, Shelby Jane Doza - 12/5/03 – 7/10/05.