Hi List...
It's Pat and Mary Jo...
Maintaining gerbs in a soil habitat requires much work and dedication...we
did it for several years with great success before switching to aspen. We
may do it again for one of our pairs.
This is the readers digest version of what we did....
We housed our gerbs in a mixture of top soil, sand taken from the beach
(literally), medium brown aquarium gravel and "Shred a Nest."
We purchased 50 pounds of (bagged) top soil at a time from a plant/tree
nursery. We carefully went through the top soil to remove any unwanted
debris, such as wood pieces, etc., and generally used about half a bag at a
time.
We then carefully baked the top soil in the oven for about an hour to destroy
any living matter such as insect eggs, etc. We let the top soil cool, then
sifted it through our hands. It had a beautiful earthy aroma and texture
(forgive the pun), and the appearance of a rich black coffee.
We washed the sand and carefully cooked it in the oven for about 20 mins.
(Be careful...it tends to "pop" when heated.) The gravel we simply rinsed
with hot water.
We placed some large stones (3) and branches in the empty aquarium for
support and filled the aquarium approximately 2/3 full with the following
mixture :
90% top soil; (lightly
moistened with water for texture)
10% sand;
2 adult hands full of
gravel;
bits of "Shred a Nest"
here and there.
I have been using the words "we" and "carefully" often. This is because Mary
Jo and I are adults...and this procedure should not be practiced by any
non-adult list members without their parent's carefully supervising them.
RESULTS....Next time....
Pat and Mary Jo
Members AGS...Breeders of...what else? GERBILS!
Owners of The Snooty Agouti http://www.geocities.com/thesnootyagouti
We housed our gerbs in no less than a 29 gallon aquarium
