Diana- I have never had that problem with girl groups when they are all related, actually I have had a group of seven closely-clanned, related females for a couple of months (a mother and two of her litters in a large cage) I would suggest separating the two in your case though, once there is fighting they may not clan together again. It is strange though that they sleep in the same nest, yet are still aggressive towards eachother. Are you sure the third gerbil (I'm so sorry she died) passed away because of fighting? Could she have been ill from another cause and then the gerbils tried to...well, um, how to put it, keep their cage clean? I've had that happen before, one of my males in a group got very ill and the others started nibbling his toes and ears, he was too weak to defend himself. Is it a natural instinct for gerbils to do this? Anyways, I would give the females new partners, good luck!
PS. The fatter sister may have been acting dominant over the smaller one, marking her scent and her area in the newly cleaned cage. Are you sure she was biting? Did she draw blood? Just wondering -Rachel >From: Diana <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >Reply-To: Diana <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] >Subject: Fighting girls >Date: Fri, 12 Oct 2001 22:03:19 -0400 > >Until recently I had what seemed to be a fairly well bonded clan of >girls--three sisters (nearly identical agoutis) who had been together since >birth. They slept >together, ran in the wheel together, everything seemed fine. We returned >from the movies one night to discover two gerbils and the remains of a >third. We >decided to clean the cage and then put the two remaining girls back >together. They bulit a nest and went to sleep and in fact were fine until >the next time I >changed the bedding in the tank. Shortly after returning them to the clean >tank, the fatter sister started chasing the smaller sister around and >seemed to be trying >to bite her. We divided the cage and have left them in split cage for >almost a week now, switching sides every night. Is there any hope for >these girls? Are they >doomed to a separate existence for the remainder of their lives? They >aren't quite a year old yet. > >Diana _________________________________________________________________ Get your FREE download of MSN Explorer at http://explorer.msn.com/intl.asp
