Rat Wrangler

Put the supplied rats inside the Animal Cage. Open the Livestock Feed Dispenser attached to it, put food in "Container" and press "Start". The food is stored as calories, and the rats eat from it at night.

• The Gutterflow Pellet and Industrial Fish Feed are for fish only and do not feed rats. Canned food works once it goes into the Livestock Feed Dispenser.
• Never put in the Rat or rat meat. Rats that eat rats can catch Prion Disease.
• The dispenser blends a whole food item only when all of its calories fit within the 40000 kcal capacity.
• Buy 4× Nutrifruit from the Retired Rat Rancher every Friday, first on day 5. The Hydroponic Farmer can also come once as a random visitor selling 8; Seller Referral Service provides another way to meet that seller.

Every day, hover over each rat and check its age and weight, and whether it shows "Diseased", "Starving" or "Immunocompromised".

• A Diseased rat loses a quarter of its Max Health every night and recovers more often the higher its Immunity; butchering it gives meat for only 75% of its weight. Use the Livestock Immunity Serum (2 uses at the start) on your breeders: each dose raises Immunity for 4 nights but also makes them hungrier.
• Once droppings and carcasses cover a fair part of the cage's cells, filth adds a chance of disease. Low Immunity can also cause disease in a clean cage. Remove droppings every day and take out carcasses at once.
• When rats fill more than 55% of the cage's cells, Fertility drops; above 70%, heavier rats may kill lighter ones.

Mark the young male and female you will breed with the Marking Pen (or name them with the Blue Labeler).

• A mark or a name protects breeders from the Auto Butcher's automatic cage selection.
• Starving, Pregnant and Neutered rats do not mate. Each mating succeeds at the lower Fertility of the two parents, and hunger, old age, disease and crowding all lower Fertility.

Keep your breeding pair and butcher surplus rats with the Meat Cleaver. Choose healthy rats of at least 400 g when you want standard cuts.

• A healthy rat gives one unit of Raw Meat (Standard) per 400 g, then smaller cuts from the remainder. Below 400 g you get smaller cuts only; check the rat's actual weight.
• Take the meat away from the rats so they cannot eat it; eating rat meat can cause Prion Disease.
• The supplied rats usually die of old age on the night they turn 14 days old (a higher "Longevity" pushes this back), so butcher them by the day they are 13 days old.

Put Raw Meat (Standard) in the Display Case. At normal market value, displaying just one brings the Expedition Supplier; from day 14, three or more bring the Upper Level Private Chef. Market changes can change how many pieces you need.

• Display Case customers come in addition to normal customers. None come while attractiveness is under 100, or on day 1 unless you skipped the intro.
• While you display only meat, the Display Case draws at most one customer a day; extra customer slots stay empty unless you also display another category.

Sell meat to the Security Requisition Officer on Thursdays from day 8 (first on day 11), and to Merchant on rent days.

• The Security Requisition Officer comes while your Security reputation is 0 or higher and buys food with a base budget of 300. Its base trade reputation multiplier is 2. When the buyer can pay the full price, a markup accepted in bargaining lowers reputation instead; offering a discount increases the multiplier.
• Merchant buys food before the rent, at a difficulty-dependent discount and without the normal retail markup. You can still bargain over the price.
• The Landlord collects rent every 7 days from day 7. Keep the rent aside before buying feed or equipment.

Buy an Auto Butcher from the Retired Rat Rancher, who comes on Fridays (first on day 5), and install it on the Animal Cage.

• The Retired Rat Rancher also always sells the Animal Cage, Livestock Feed Dispenser, Cleaner Robot, Livestock Immunity Serum and Gene Scanner. When the first cage gets crowded, buy a second Animal Cage and Livestock Feed Dispenser.

On the Auto Butcher's "Cage" page, set "Harvest" to "Weight" and the lower limit to 400 g for standard cuts. Mark your breeders with the Marking Pen.

• Do not leave "Harvest" set to "Off" when you want automatic butchering.
• Check how many males and females "Keep breeders" reserves, and put a mark on the parents you want to keep.
• Check "Spare pregnant", "Cull sick" and "Cull prion carriers" before starting. Diseased rats yield meat for only 75% of their weight.

Every morning, take the meat out of the Auto Butcher's "Output".

• Collect the meat to leave room in "Output" for the next batch.

Put a Cleaner Robot in the Animal Cage so it collects droppings at night.

• It needs no Energy Cell. Upgrade it with Electronic Parts (Common) to add the incinerator, and switch it on to destroy the collected droppings.

Get a Furnace from Dr. Jackson, make the Metal Ingot from two units of Scrap Metal, and use it on the Animal Cage to add one row (up to 8 rows).

• If you play the intro, Dr. Jackson comes on day 6 and sells a Furnace at the new-customer discount, with an Energy Cell. After meeting Dr. Jackson (or from the start if you skipped the intro), the night shop always stocks a Furnace on nights other than Monday while you own none. It needs energy and takes one night.
• Scrap Metal: if you play the intro, the Junker sells 3 on day 2, Scavenger sells 5 on day 5, and the Poor Scav trades 3 for any one food item on day 6. Later, the Junker (3–4 per visit) and the Poor Scav come as normal customers.
• Scrap Metal also repairs the Animal Cage. Below 20 Durability, rats start to escape.

From day 14 (day 2 if you skipped the intro), random normal customers come too; sell meat to the ones who buy food, such as the Food Bank Supplier.

• Raw Meat (Standard) also counts as a Luxury Item, so the Upper Level Visitor, who buys Luxury Items, takes it too.
• If you spare John Smith, he comes back every week to buy food.

From day 14, at normal market value keep three or more units of Raw Meat (Standard) in the Display Case to bring the Upper Level Private Chef. Raise attractiveness with Store Renovation I and Store Renovation II for bigger budgets and one more normal customer.

• With a clean store, Store Renovation I reaches 400 attractiveness (budgets +10%), and Store Renovation II reaches 550 (budgets +25%, and one more normal customer from 500).
• A dirty store loses attractiveness and can drop below these thresholds.

On Fridays, compare the "Growth Rate" and "Expected Litter Size" of each Rat the Retired Rat Rancher sells.

• The four higher-priced rat offers each appear only sometimes. Compare the actual traits before buying, including those of the two normally priced rats.

Buy the male and female you want and mark them with the Marking Pen as parents.

• For each trait, a pup inherits one gene copy from each parent; each copy occasionally mutates. Temporary serum bonuses are not inherited.

Turn on the Gene Scanner, examine the pups' inherited traits and mark those you want as the next parents.

Set "Harvest" on the Auto Butcher to "Weight" with a 400 g lower limit, and protect your parents with names, marks or "Keep breeders". "Spare pregnant" protects pregnant rats only when enabled; for rats without a name or mark, enabled sick or prion culling runs before pregnancy protection and the weight selection.

Replace aging parents with young rats as their Fertility declines. Butcher the old parents with the Meat Cleaver before they die of old age.

• The "Elder" label shows from 11 days old whatever the "Longevity".