Here are the directions for making a digging box for your rats. It isn't
difficult, all you need are a few tools and the right materials - all should be
available at your local hardware store.
1 pair snub-nosed wire
cutters to trim sharp edges
1 hacksaw (optional -- you may be able to get the
wood cut to size at the store)
1 screwdriver
1 hammer
Materials
about 10 inches x 20 inches of 1/2 inch x 1/2 inch hardware cloth
1 ten gallon aquarium
1 bag potting soil (I used 1 16 quart bag Black Gold, all
organic potting soil, containing earthworm castings, Canadian sphagnum peat
moss, pumice, and oyster shell)
2 1-inch hinges + screws (sold as package)
8 small corner brackets + screws (sold as package)
4 9.75 inch lengths of 1"x1" wood*
4 7.50 inch lengths of 1"x1" wood*
wood staples
2 small springs
2 S-hooks
several feet of wire
4 small screw-in hooks or eyelets
*Note: Measure the top of your aquarium to get
the exact dimensions needed for the wood frame. My aquarium is 9.75 inches x
19.75 inches and I cut my wood accordingly.
Directions
General idea: this design gives you an aquarium 2/3 full of dirt for rats
to dig in. It also includes a hinged, home-made top made out of wood and
hardware cloth. The top is of course optional: if you have a secure, wire mesh
top already or know where to buy one, you can use that. I chose to make one
because I didn't want to cut holes in the nice top I already had. My rats love
their digging box -- they dive in head first, kick dirt with their hind feet,
shove dirt with their front feet, scoot dirt sideways, hunt for hidden seeds and
get royally dirty!
Clean and disinfect the aquarium.
Fill
the aquarium 2/3 full with potting soil (I used the whole bag).
TO BUILD THE ROOF:
Take 2 of the 9.75 inch lengths of wood, and 2 of the 7.5
inch lengths, and fasten them together with 4 corner brackets to make a square
frame. Make the 9.75 inch lengths parallel to each other, and the 7.5 lengths
parallel to each other and sitting 'inside' the two longer lengths. You should
end up with 2 squares that are 9.75 x 9.5 on a side. The 9.5 sides will abut the
narrow end of the aquarium, the 9.75 sides will abut the long side of the
aquarium.
Cut the hardware cloth into two 9.5 x 9.75 rectangles and
trim all the sharp wire ends with blunt-nosed clippers. Staple to the two square
frames using the wood staples and hammer. The hardware cloth side will be the
bottom of the roof and will face into the aquarium.
Flip the two
squares over so that the staples face the floor. Line up two of the shorter
sides so that they almost touch. Attach the two frames with the two hinges on
these shorter sides. Leave a small gap (e.g. 0.25 inch) between the wood
frames.
TO FASTEN THE ROOF SECURELY TO THE AQUARIUM:
The roof
needs to fit very securely to the aquarium or the rats will push it up and
escape. You can accomplish this by weighting the roof down with bricks or books,
or use a catch or spring system. Here's what I came up with. I screwed hooks
into the wood frame and ran a wire from one hook to the other, under the
aquarium. To keep the wire under tension, I fastened it with a spring. The top
is very secure and can't be lifted by the rats. It is kind of a hack, though,
and not that attractive. Here are the directions.
Place roof
hinge-side up on top of the aquarium.
Decide which panel you want to
be the door, and which one you want to stay put.
On the stay-put side,
drive two screw-hooks into the middle of the 9.75 inch lengths, such that the
hooks come out the outside sides of the frame (and not the top).
Attach an S-hook to a spring with pliers, and hook the S-hook through one of
these screw hooks.
Run a length of wire from the end of the spring,
under the aquarium, to the other screw-hook on the other side. Pull it tight
(make the spring stretch, or unhook the spring for this step) and fasten with a
twist to the other screw-hook.
On the door side, fasten a screw-hook
into the middle of the 7.5 inch length, and another to the far 7.5 inch length
on the stay-put side. (The stay-put side ends up with 3 screw-hooks, the door
side with just one).
Repeat steps #4 and #5 between these two
hooks.
If you want to attach the digging box to a cage, you can cut a
hole in the stay-put side of the roof and run a climbing tower through the hole
(see separate directions for the climbing tower in this Anne's Rats folder).
Note that your rats may not like jumping from the roof level down onto the dirt,
which may be up to 1 foot away (my rats hate to jump more than 6 inches). To
overcome this I hung a ledge under the hole in the roof (aluminum flashing panel
hung by 4 corners and stabilized with a vertical strip of hardware cloth so it
doesn't swing). The rats jump from the climbing tower to the intermediate ledge,
and from there to the dirt. Alternatively, you can run the climbing tower down
into the aquarium so the drop isn't so big.
