Ideas for gerbil science projects for the very young:
1) If the gerbil is still very small, take daily or weekly measurements of
the gerbil's weight and then plot on a graph.
2) Have gerbil races. Make a circle and put one gerbil at a time in the
middle of the circle and time how long it takes for the gerbil to get to the
outside of the circle. Use treats to bait the gerbil. Perhaps see if a
gerbil's individual time increases with each race.
3) Put gerbil in boring boxes of various heights to see how high a gerbil
can jump.
4) Make simple mazes and look at the gerbil's ability to run through a maze.
5) Test various foods on your gerbil to see what gerbils like to eat. (i.e.
hand the gerbil a sunflower seed and he eats it up. Hand him a small piece
of orange and he runs away.)
6) How about a typical animal behavior experiment? You can check on the
gerbils every hour for 12 hours (or more) and record their activity. What
can you conclude? Are they more active in the dark or in the light? How
often do they sleep? Eat? Chew on cardboard?
Hope those ideas help some!
Deb Adams
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