Denis and I help rat wrangle at every event. Sarah (flynsbt) and Denis and I have been to events for a year now starting with experimental, to fun matches, to finally real trials. The rats are extremely well cared for and happy, it actually borders on leaning towards an obedience exercise over an instinct exercise with the hyper vigilance on not allowing the dogs to abuse the rats. We have to work with Sloan on this a lot, I am sure Sarah would as well if her dogs were bigger. Allowing the dogs to lift, shake, grind on, and over stimulate on the rat tubes is frowned upon and up to the judges call as DQable "rat abuse". Most judges at this point realize these dogs are hunting and aren't too hard on them, most are grandfathered from earth dogs where they are encouraged to "work" the rat by biting bars, barking, digging, and are often trained this behavior by real pest control.
Rats [here] always enter the tube without force and we rotate them with each class and sometimes sooner if they've been worked by vigorous hunters.
Shamoo is a great but passive hunter. She bothers the rat lightly with pawing and nosing. She's easy on the rats and wranglers like her style.
Also, many dogs that are activated and crazed by moving prey have trouble with the inactive hunt, relying on the nose. This is why workshops and training are encouraged, to help association for the dogs and help them distinguish between bedding and the rat.
Sloan over stimulates and likes to carry bedding tubes while she hunts or sometimes just plays with them. The challenge is her alert between play and a rat find are not distinguishable. The trick that we have found to work is regular re-association with rats in earth dog boxes helps remind her she's hunting, not playing.
Both girls are 1leg from entering RATS(senior), I'll try for some videos when I get to a computer.