That's right! A new baby rat. She's between 1.25 oz and 1.5 oz. She's a grey-brown color and has a darker color tail, ears and bottoms of her feet than Tierna. (Tierna has all pink skin).

Her cage is SUPER tall for her... even would be super tall for Tierna, but I put the wooden ladder in it and hung her water bottle from that. She has a few toilet paper tubes and one paper towel tube (which she can fit through!!), a banana nylabone which she hasn't really figured out it's for chewing yet (she's licked it), and a Pop-tarts box. She has so much room to run around in her cage considering she was in a cage with her 2 sisters in about half the base area, 1/3 the height. She likes running up and down her ladder.

She was picked because she was the calmest baby rat I held. She was so calm that she didn't really start squirming until about 5 minutes in! She was very comfortable being held, and I'm very glad I picked her instead of the sister I was holding right before her. She's about 4 weeks old and she's has dark DARK brown eyes that make it seem like she has black eyes. Very pretty offset to her brown-grey fur.

Her name is Malia. Pronounced mah-LEE-ah.

I picked that name right about the time that I figured I was going to get a new rat. I was watching The Price is Right, and a contestant in contestant's row had the name Malia, of which Bob was having a hard time pronouncing. That name seemed really exotic, so I picked it. Turns out it's a Hawaiian word meaning, "perhaps, probably". So much for exotic, but it still makes a cool name.

I'm amazed at how much she runs. She doesn't waddle like Tierna does. She doesn't have a big back end like Tierna does. She doesn't have baby fur though... so she looks just like a rat. After watching her/holding her, I see/pick up Tierna and Tierna feels like a ton of bricks and looks like a giant! It's highly amusing.

Malia has made an impression already, and I'm sure she will make a great addition to Tierna's life as well. I can't wait to get to the introductions. :)

Carisa