Main question: Would gerbil babies be closer to rats and mice or closer to squirrels and chipmunks?
I am a surrogate mom to 11 baby gerbils. They are two weeks old. They are composed of two litters borne by a mom (whom had six) and daughter (whom had seven) each litter a day apart from the other.
The Ladies were doing wonderfully at rearing the little ones and we had nice plump babies. Then, last Saturday, I found a baby in the water dish. We've tried water bottles of various kinds but our gerbils eat them. I plucked out the baby and managed to revive it but it died a few minutes later and I wasn't able to revive it again.
I then moved the rocks around in the nesting tank thinking maybe the baby had wandered into the dish using one of these because the sides are too high otherwise. It seemed weird to me that the little one could have wandered that far from the nest without one of the moms noticing too. Then, right in front of me and with full intent, I watched the grandmom/mom bodily collect a baby ...carry it to the water dish and plop it right in! I dried and put the baby back in the nest, then removed the water dish, preferring instead to regularly throughout the day offer the moms water and freshly rinsed lettace. I considered removing this mom but other than this strange behavior, she had been really good with the babies.
Two days later, my daughter's cat got the daughter/mom. Ugh!! Since then, the grandmom/mom has been trying to escape the cage. We've tried putting lots of chew stuff and foods in with her but that entertains her only for a very short while. We have no other females to put with her and the males are permanently seperated from the ladies because we don't want anymore litters.
Finally after nearly a week, I decided to check on how the babies were doing late last night because they had been too quiet for the last couple of days. I found one baby with a distended belly in a lot of discomfort (very possibly the second baby to get dumped in the water dish the week before) and the rest of the babies were low energy skin and bones. The baby with the distended belly died before morning. I have no idea if it was air or liquid causing the swelling but judging from the discoloration under the skin, something burst.
There are obviously many factors for which the mom wasn't being successful. She has an incredibly large litter she is rearing on her own, her companion is gone and the trade off has ceased so she is responsible full time for the whole litter, stress very possibly caused a loss of milk supply or her supply was never large enough for the entire litter. It's not her fault and I'm feeling very sorry for her, but she has settled down and seems more content since the babies have been removed.
Anyway, last night, After consulting with my husband, I realised we had very few choices. Take half the litter and try to handfeed them; Leave them all and let nature take it's course; Or take them all and try to rear them realising that I'll likely lose half even if I do everything right based on how weak they are.
I'm using a glass dropper. It has a computer wire casing minus the wire, in one end of the dropper for a bottle; A heating pad for warmth and a glass fish bowl for a nest/containing unit; A box with a heating pad in the bottom for seperating the fed from unfed ones. Cotton balls and warm water for cleaning faces, front paws, and bottoms;
Formula consists of egg yolk minus any part of the white, distilled water, and evaporated milk. I'm feeding them every two hours but may switch to three since most don't seem to need it that often. It takes one hour and ten miutes to accomplish all eleven.
Advice on the formula anyone?
Thanks,
Raen
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