Probably Stolen rat farm guide
Rats are the game’s livestock: keep males and females in an Animal Cage, feed them from a Livestock Feed Dispenser, let them breed, and butcher them for meat before they reach old age. By the numbers in the game’s data, a rat is heaviest around day 11 (about 450 g), so that is the natural slaughter age.
How do you start ranching?
- The Rat Wrangler specialization starts with an Animal Cage, Rats and Food.
- The Ranching network upgrade (750 credits) sends a Rat Rancher to visit once a week and gives you a Rat Ranching Starter Kit.
- A Mouse Trap (50 credits) can catch wild rats, see below.
What does an Animal Cage need?
The Animal Cage (base value 250) is a grid 10 cells wide. It starts 3 rows tall and can grow to 8 rows; each Metal Ingot adds one row and 20 durability. Scrap Metal repairs it. The cage matters because animals are items in the grid: space, mess and crowding all affect them.
| Cage load | Overcrowding | Effect each night |
|---|---|---|
| Animals fill over 55% of the grid | Level 1 | Higher disease and lower fertility |
| Over 70% | Level 2 | 5% chance per rat that a bigger rat kills a smaller one, plus the effects above |
| Over 90% | Level 3 | 15% chance per rat of the same, with stronger effects |
Dead animals and feces also count against cleanliness: once they fill 25% of the grid, rats start catching disease, with higher odds above 35%. A rat that gains 30 g or more in a night leaves feces (Animal Feces (Small) at normal rat weights). Keep the cage clean: a Cleaner Robot (250 credits) collects feces overnight. Remove corpses by hand. Feces are not just waste: dissolved in a container they turn into dirty water you can purify, see the water guide.
How does a rat grow up?
| Age (days) | Stage weight (base) |
|---|---|
| 0 | 5 g |
| 1 | 50 g |
| 3 | 200 g (mature, can breed) |
| 5 | 350 g |
| 11 | 450 g |
| 14 | 400 g (old age begins) |
Weight moves a little each night toward the next stage. A rat that eats well grows at its full rate; below 80% fullness growth slows, and a starving rat loses weight. Past day 14, each night an animal has a 75% chance to die of old age (the threshold scales with each rat’s Longevity gene).
How do you feed rats?
Rats have a hunger meter of 500 that drops by a base of 65 each night. Below 75% they eat: first from a Livestock Feed Dispenser, then from loose food items in the cage. The dispenser (base value 300) stores up to 40,000 kcal and fills each rat up to a target you set (default 85%). A rat at zero hunger is marked Starving; if it is still empty the next night, it dies.
Warning: feeding rats rat meat can give them Prion Disease. The chance is 100 minus the rat’s Immunity (about 70% at the base value of 30), and the disease permanently lowers growth rate, immunity and longevity by 20%. Fish and other foods are safe.
How does breeding work?
- A rat is mature from day 3. It can mate while not pregnant, starving or neutered.
- Each night a rat can pair with up to 3 partners of the opposite sex in the same cage.
- The chance a pairing succeeds equals the lower of the two rats’ current Fertility (base 50%). Fertility drops when a rat is hungry, from day 11 on, sick, or in an overcrowded cage.
- Pregnancy lasts 3 days and gives about 3 pups (plus or minus 1, shifted by the mother’s Litter Size gene). Pups inherit genes from both parents and start at 25% hunger.
- A starving pregnant rat has a 75% nightly chance to miscarry.
A Surgery Toolset can neuter a rat, or end a pregnancy. A Gene Scanner (500 credits) reveals an animal’s full genetics: Growth Rate, Hunger Rate, Fertility, Litter Size, Immunity, Max Health and Longevity.
What are Livestock Steroid and Immunity Serum?
Both cost 100 credits. Steroid Serum slightly boosts growth rate at the cost of more hunger and less immunity. Immunity Serum slightly boosts immunity at the cost of more hunger.
How do rats get sick?
Each night a rat below 50 Immunity can catch disease (the lower the immunity, the higher the 5-25% chance), and mess and crowding add more. A sick rat loses a quarter of its max health nightly and recovers with a chance equal to its Immunity. Healthy rats with immunity above 25 regain health each night.
What is the best time to butcher?
Carcass weight turns into meat pieces: one Raw Meat (Standard) per 400 g, one Raw Meat (Small) per 200 g, one Morsel per 100 g and one Small Morsel per 50 g, rounding the remainder up. Base values: 159, 65, 30 and 15 credits. Diseased rats yield 25% less.
| Weight | Pieces | Base value |
|---|---|---|
| 450 g (day 11) | 1 standard, 1 small morsel | 174 |
| 400 g (day 14) | 1 standard | 159 |
| 350 g (day 5) | 1 small, 1 morsel, 1 small morsel | 110 |
The Auto Butcher (400 credits) installs in an Animal Cage and every night butchers animals that match your settings (weight or age range, optionally keeping breeders). It never touches an animal marked with a Marking Pen (50 credits), so mark your breeding stock.
How does the Mouse Trap work?
Each night an empty Mouse Trap has a 1% chance of catching a wild rat (random sex, age 3 to 7 days). With Processed Cheese inside, the chance is 50%, and the cheese is used up; if nothing is caught, the cheese also has a 25% chance to vanish.
FAQ
Do I need both sexes? Yes. A pair of opposite sex that is mature and fed breeds.
How many rats fit? Keep animals under 55% of the cage grid to avoid overcrowding.
What is the livestock feed dispenser? It blends food into stored calories (up to 40,000 kcal) and feeds the animals itself.
Can rats eat anything? Any non-canned food item with calories works as feed. Only meat from rats triggers the Prion check.