He's adorable! And such a little fighter too - I can see how he's completely charmed you.
I'm aware of someone in the UK who raises abandoned wild litters and she finds that the wildies are often much more agile than pet rats. You can have lots of fun creating interesting layouts for him - mine liked pipes and hammocks in particular. Rats also love foraging: hide some food in a toilet roll with the ends folded in, in cupcake cases and similar. I scatter-fed mine, which means that I didn't use a bowl and instead just chucked food in the substrate and they had to nose around for it. They had to work to find their food and they'd get incredibly excited about finding a pumpkin seed.
Rats are really socialable and I think he'd like a couple of friends. A trio is good because it gives them more friends to play with, and in my experience, rats tend not to pair up and will instead fall asleep in a big snuggly heap. Make sure they're all the same gender otherwise you will end up with a LOT of rats!
Thank you! Appreciate all of this.
100%, we have gone the bioactive route for him with ropes and cargo netting, branches and bridges, dig box and foraging toys. Will post a pic when it's all finished. Also decided on a cage that fits) can fit my boyfriend and myself in haha, just to give him more space due to his activeness.
Also only doing scattering feeding. Want to make his environment as wild as possible. We're also doing natural foods. So seeds, flowers, mealworms, etc just to stimulate him more. He will only have his bowls for his pawsicles treats once a weeks and to pea and berry fish.
Now. Our dilemma. I've approached several rescues and all of them have said that wildies and fancies can't be kept together. It's heartbreaking because we'd love to have friends for him. So I've put my name down with them if they have any solo, wild baby rats that come in that we can rear and hopefully they remain tame to join our boy. He is being neutered in July just in case we have anyone come in but happen to be girls (do not want to add to the rat population, people are too awful to them) and to prevent any wildie terroritorial nature.