>What is Carefresh? I live in Alberta, Canada, and haven't seen anything
>with that name. Just pine, aspen, corncob, cedar, and mixes of these.
It's a brownish-grey recycled paper fiber product.
>Also, I'm not breeding my gerbils, but is interested for the future when I
>have more experience. From your emails, I've gathered that gerbils mate
for
>life. Yet it sounds like many of you seem to bring a pair together just to
>mate, then they're separated again? Or am I misunderstanding?
Most of us keep our breeding pairs in introduced and mated pairs.
It is possible to split pairs and successfully introduce them to another
gerbil, and that is a lot of what you read about in our emails. When
there's been fights or some such, or trying to pair up animals for
them to have a companion or a breeding partner.
A few times, a pair is introduced just for the purpose of a mating
to produce (hopefully) a litter carrying certain genes, and the
two are often returned to cagemates to continue living their little
lives (controlled breeding).
>If the mated pair is actually
>kept together after being mated, what happens to their
>original cagemates?
If they were removed from other cagemates, those cagemates
are often re-paired with other animals.
>And if a mated pair produces an average of 7 litters
>(correct?) during their lifetimes, what do you do with that many gerbils?
Some more, some less.
You work on placing them in homes, finding other outlets
(i.e., petshops that will take them) or keeping them.
>I can't keep that many in my house. How do you find new
>homes for them?
Creativity and diligence. Ads, word of mouth, asking around...
I've had fliers with feed stores that have 'forsale/needs home'
bulletin boards; cards with vets; bulletin boards at grocery
stores, pet stores, etc; a recurring contract with a pet store
or stores to regularly supply them, etc.
>Most of my friends are either allergic, scared of rodents, live
>in places with no pets allowed, or can't afford pets. I've tried
>to look up local breeders, but the pet stores
>won't give them out, and the vets don't keep lists.
In the last year to year and a half, something went through the
major US wholesale breeder suppliers and animals have been
tight for the pet retail industry since then. I have found that if a
petstore can get a reliable healthy source they often guard that
with their life as it's their livelihood. :)
Also the petstores would much rather you bought the animals
from THEM at RETAIL so they can make some $ on the transaction.
Some vets do, depending on. Talk real nice with the staff
behind the desk and leave them a 3x5 card with your name,
address, phone # and that you're looking for gerbils. If they
run across someone they might give you a call.
>In fact, are there anyone on this mailing list who lives in Canada (dare I
>ask Alberta, even around Edmonton?) I'd love to take some new pups
>(thinking first week of August 2001), but you're all in the US so far...
>
>Thanks,
>Amy
:) I'm sure there's somebody a lot closer to you, but they just
don't know you're looking yet.
You could always do a 'reverse blitz'...putting up posters with
pull/numbers with 'Wanted-looking for gerbils-will give them a
loving home-please contact' sort of thing (rather than trying to
get rid of the fruits of an active breeding pair).
Deb
Rebel's Rodent Ranch
