Boice (1977) https://psycnet.apa.org/doi/10.1037/h0077338 tested if laboratory rats still know how to dig burrows. In an outdoor pen and in glass sided lab cages they dug burrows almost identical in design to those made by wild rats. #AnimalWelfare #behaviour #psychology #ethology

Suggesting some elements of this behaviour are innate & retained by laboratory rats despite lack of use.

In the outdoor pen rats dug burrows & survived the winter: in fact outdoor rats showed better health & lived longer than ones kept indoors in wire cages #AnimalWelfare

In the large pen they had preferred paths, showed thigmotaxis (staying near edges) & made excursions into the middle to visit water sources/burrows. A lot like the behaviour described by Fonio et al in mice https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.0812513106 strange they made burrows in the middle though.