pup update

[cj.morris]

I haven't written in for a while so......... I removed Shy with the last litter of pups I re-homed and she went to live locally with one of her daughters :-) she hasn't had any more pups since.   Blanche had only the one pup (grey agouti/pearl?) in the litter produced at the time I split them up (22nd of April at around five pm again!). however, although the pup (I've named it Titch) is now over six weeks old it is still the same size as a three week old. it seems healthy although it's tail seems to be growing out of proportion.any ideas? (it is growing though.. you should have seen the size of it a four weeks :-)   Blanche had another litter on 21st of may, and surprise surprise she had six of them :-). now here comes the mystery.... they have started to colour up and she has roughly half self coloured babies (they look like slate/colourpoint slates just like shy used to have!!) shy had been removed over four weeks earlier so they are not hers. Blanche has only produced grey agouti/pearl babies so far. I'm thinking she must carry (a) aswell. making her Aa,C[cb/ch?],gg,pp. (Bob is aa,cbcb,gg)   I'm going to build my own aquarium to house a group of males that will include both Bob and Malky and possibly Titch if it turns out to be male (have you ever tried to sex a gerbil that's no bigger than a mouse?!!) how many males could I safely keep in a 4'x18"x18" aquarium?   also in a local pet shop they have some gerbils the appear to be DEH and the red eyed version of DEH they look lovely...could I introduce one of those to me existing males?   thanks Colin