I�m new on this list and this is the story about my first slate pair of gerbils.
On March 2001 I bought my first gerbil girl from a pet store. She was a baby at
that time. I didn�t have the intention to buy a pet, I just wanted to take a look at
animals from there, but when I saw gerbils, that were new for me, I couldn�t help to
buy one. They looked like little kangaroos, when they were sitting and watching
carefully on their back long feet or boxing with front legs. Especially agouti ones;
but I bought a slate little girl.
I wrote their name on a piece of paper �gerbil� and I started to look from
information about them. After that I read about them on internet that they are social
animals and if they are alone are very sad. After few days I bought to my girl a
little slate boy, from the same pet store; I think they were brothers. She was very
happy when she saw him; she turned with her feet up and offered her belly, and started
to follow him, smell him and play with him. He enjoyed that (although he just arrived
from a crowded place) and they became very good friends.
I watched and handled them as many times as I could; I found they have very
interesting behavior. The girl was more tame and even-tempered than the male. Every
time I handled him he pushes his head on my hand and pinched me easily to leave him
alone; and now, after 8 months he is acting the same with me. Well, I sad to myself
that she (the girl) needed to be compatible with him, it doesn�t matter if he doesn�t
like me. He was a very careful partner for her; every time I put in their aquarium
soft paper, he began to carry in his mouth paper pieces in their nest, while she was
eating food. And then they were mincing together the paper holding it with their front
legs.
I kept the aquarium in my room, and at night when they were jumping or scratching
they woke me up sometimes but it didn�t make my angry; it maked me smile because I
love them. They become calmfull after their first litter. The parents were silent, but
the little babies squeak like a flock of hen chicken :). At that time it was
impossible for 1-2 weeks to sleep with the aquarium in my room.
My pair were 9-10 weeks old (I think) when I tried to introduce with them a cute
and tame agouti male with split cage method; I changed their places from time to time,
for more than a week, and after I removed the glass between them (I know, it should be
a net wire, but I didn�t have something like this) the new one devastate their nest
and bite the female. She hid in a carton tube squeaking and her slate pair came to her
and began to smell and lick her worried. This adult agouti was tame only with me but
not with my pair. I gave him to somebody who loves him now. I liked him, too.
After that I tried to introduce to my pair (they has grown a little since then) an
adult dove male. I didn�t find young gerbils in any pet shop. With his red eyed he
looks scary like that rat Schroeder, from turtles ninja:). After a few days of split
cage method I was holding my slate male in right hand and this dove in left hands; I
was afraid that they would fight if I put them three together. My slate male seems to
hate this dove so much that he began to rub his teeth and when he tried to fly at the
dove I didn�t let him and I hold him tight. He bit me to blood and remained with his
teeth suspended from my finger for few seconds. I forgave him; he is just a little
fighter who is trying to protect his family. I gave up trying to introduce them and
give the dove gerbil away. Maybe I should have kept those 2 males but I was thinking
of the 30 or more babies who will arrive on this world.
My slate pair had their first litter (3girls and 1 boy, all slate) in august 2001.
When babies were growing enough I found their homes. A girl from my neighborhood took
one pair (the little boy and one girl) from me to make her sister a present; they are
ok now and hole family loves them.
His second litter was on 02.10.01, 7 babies.
I was sleeping when I heard the squeak of the first baby. After she gave birth to all
the babies, I separated them with the glass wall again. I decided to put the male
babies with the father and to leave the girl babies with their mother when they will
be weaned. One baby dies after 2 days. He was very skinny. The female was a very
devoted mother; she always rushed to eat something quickly and returned at her babies
to feed them. She began to sleep too much on her babies, and the younger were too
skinny; I think that she didn�t have enough milk to feed them all and maybe she knew
this. The mother became listless and with low body temperature. I put oxirom
(tetracycline for chicken) in water, but too late, in few ours she died. I don�t know
if it was an infectious disease; but the male survived and he was very active. Nothing
in them diet or bedding has changed.
I put the male with the babies together. This happened after almost a week after
the male was separated from the others. The babies were 5 days old and he didn�t
forget them. He began to wash them and keep them warm. And I began to feed them with
droppers and with a syringe (without needle) with natural fatty cow milk. I didn�t
have something else to feed them and I didn�t know anybody who owed a gerbil mother
with babies.
It�s very exhausting to feed 6 babies a few times per day, keeping them near a plastic
bottle filled with warm water. After 10 minutes spent with a baby, I started to feed
another.. and so on. After I fed them all I began to feed the first baby again, until
they were satisfied and didn�t want milk anymore. Back in the cage the father took
care of them. After a few hours they needed to be fed again.
After 2-3 days of hand feed they began to open their mouth and suck in the dropper.
And then they began to die one by one day-by-day. I read an email from this list and I
found out why: �It's possible the pups aspirated some of the liquid when being
hand-fed�. This was what happened; they look like didn�t have enough air and milk
begin to draw out his nose. I know it�s very painful to hear about things like this
and I feel like a murderer, but I didn�t have any choise; if I didn�t try to feed
them, they would have died from hunger anyway. Last baby died when he had 12-13 days;
he already had fur and teeth. His teeth looked like pinpoint and flick to the glass
dropper. After I came back from work and prepared to feed him (he was a boy) I found
him under his father, lukewarm but numb.
And now my �black widower� is alone and bored in a large aquarium (50hx80Lx30l cm)
made especially for them a few months ago by my sister�s boyfriend.
Maybe now if is alone he will accept a new partner. I�m sure he will accept a baby
girl but I will remember this tragedy every time I will see newborn babies again.
Anyway, for the moment, he must wait for a while because I can�t find baby gerbils
anywhere in pet shops from my town�only few dove adults left and I prefer black eyed
ones.
Nicole
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