Gerbils Suddenly Fighting?

[Rin]

I'd like some input on this one, because I'm fairly worried. I adopted two female gerbils each from different pet stores and and introduced them using the split cage method. They are the same age, and at the time they were not yet sexually mature. After a few weeks of the split cage method, I put them together, and there were no problems. Tilla (the black and white) liked to cuddle more than Rosebud (the tan) and felt the need to check over Rose whenever I would put her back in the cage. Rosebud, the dominant one, would hog the running wheel. But they would sleep together and groom each other and I never caught them fighting, or found any injuries or marks on them. I would commonly hear faint squeaking when they were both curled up together in the house.

It's been four months since I first got them. I came back to my room at midnight, having left them alone for hours, and I found them both bloody. Rosebud was curled up in the house, Tilla was drinking. They both have bites on their left shoulders and chins. I immediately separated them and examined their injuries, which don't look too bad, I think they'll both totally recover.

What are the chances I'll be able to put them together again? I didn't see the fight so I don't know how bad it was, and there's no blood on any of the bedding. It's been about eight hours since I found them, and Rosebud has been up and about with a slight limp, but Tilla still looks pretty ragged. Her left ear is bleeding now too.

Nothing changed recently; I moved out to college three weeks ago, so if there'd been a problem with the car ride or room change I figured it would have happened closer to the move. It's taken me a little longer than usual to clean the cage because I've been so busy, so maybe that was it? Otherwise the only other thing I can think of is that they're both now sexually mature and competing for space.

[johanne]

How big is their tank? Pairs of gerbils don't generally start fighting just because they're sexually mature. More likely they're short on something, perhaps space, food, water bottle jammed, etc. Stress might do it too. Some gerbils need more space than others.

You can try reintroducing them via split tank again. Assuming the split tank is successful, if they have at least 20 gallons space and 6 inches of bedding and lots of everything else, they could be just fine. And either remove the wheel or give them two so there's nothing to fight over.

[MoonstoneGerbils]

I don't recommend putting them back together. It may be possible to put them back together, and get them to live in the space together. However, that does nothing to fix it. It just mediates it. They can very easily have another blow up down the line. You are lucky that you caught them, and had the opportunity to separate them. Take that opportunity and prevent further catastrophe down the line.

Changing their enclosure size is not going to help. A larger tank might make them carve out territories for themselves. A smaller tank might be too close for comfort.

[johanne]

There are many possible reasons for fighting so there's no one size fits all answer to this. There are a number of forum members who have been successful at reuniting their gerbils and had no further issues. But not everyone succeeds. And even if you succeed, there are risks as you'd need to keep a careful eye out for early signs of aggression and separate them promptly. Never wait for a fight as one could be killed or more seriously injured. So it's up to you whether it's something you want to attempt or not. It's perfectly legitimate to decide not to take the chance. Much depends on the temperaments of the gerbils and the reasons for the fight.

I've found tank size to make a big difference to some, but not all gerbils. I've successfully solved all sorts of issues simply by moving gerbils into bigger, plainer homes. It doesn't fix every problem, of course.

[racammann]

De-clans like this tend to rumble on for weeks or even months before it finally blows up into a fight and you see blood.
I had a pair of females that bickered for about a month on-and-off, with occasional biting, until one day they had a bigger fight and more bites and then I put a mesh divider down the middle of the tank and seperated them. I let them see each other face to face every day in the play area so they stayed acquainted with one another, and to start with they could only be together for a few mins before another fight started, but gradually they got better and better and after 2 weeks they were best of friends again and back together in the tank, and never fought again.
I'm not saying this in commonplace, but it's possible that they maybe might go back together and be fine, but the root cause of the de-clan might never go away and they may never get along.
I would try and examine what caused them to not get along in the first place, eliminate the cause and hopefully they can be friends. Possible causes could be:
Not enough space.
Segragated areas in their environment that one of them 'claimed' as their territory, causing disagreements.
Not enough food or water.
One of them being territorial over the food bowl, toys or house.
Stress from change of environment.

I have found that generally gerbil clans are more stable if:
Their tank is on the large side, and one single open space with no seperate 'rooms' that they can claim,
They have a good 10" of substrate to dig in, make burrows and tunnels as their natural behavious is in the wild.
Lots of tunnels - perishable carboard tubes, not plastic or anything permanent.
Plenty of cardboard and paper to shred to keep them busy,
They're scatter-fed so they have to forage - again keeping their minds active so they don't fight out of boredom
They don't have a wheel, toys or a house which they can scent mark and get possessive over

[amski]

I have also reintroduced a pair who fought - males though.

I did a similar thing where I let them play together while I was around to watch and now they are best buddies again. Time will tell if it lasts or not, but I'm hopeful. Mine had problems after I had been away for a while and I think it may have been due to lack of stimulation so my coming home and letting them out to play was the trigger. Although I don't know that for certain.

[abbynormal]

As every one has state above, every gerbil pair is different. It's up to you whether or not you try to reconnect them. In my experience, I would probably go against it.

I had two boys who were brothers. Best of friends. Never once fought or argued, but one day, without any warning sign, they blew up into a huge fight, one of the boys was left utterly terrified and with a large gash in his belly. He's healed today and fine, but when I tryed reintroducing the pair through a split tank method, even after 2 weeks of seperation, there was no chance of them reconnecting. The agressor male continued making dominance clicks through the wire mesh, and the one who recieved the injury was left huddling in the corner on the other side of the tank. So all in all, it really is up to the pair of the gerbils, and whether or not you feel comfortable putting your gerbils at risk. You'd need to be extremely observant. But, even when all seems calm, they could start a fight.

[amski]

I just thought I'd drop by to say my two started bickering again last night and are now separated again.

I would still advocate trying to reintroduce, especially if you can find a potential cause and eliminate that problem. Ultimately it's down to the individual gerbils. Take the path of least stress for them. My two are fine in a split because they don't totally hate each other, they are just a bit unstable as a pair. Abby's sound like they found being in a split stressful. Do what your gerbils need.

[Rin]

I've been keeping them separate, but switching who's in which cage every few hours. They're both back to behaving normally when alone, and when I hold them both at the same time they're happy to see each other. They'll sniff each other, groom a little, and then go exploring together.

When I put them back in the cage together though, that's when Rose, the dominant one, gets kind of possessive. She has to be next to Tilla, and doesn't like her running off. So Tilla just sits quietly and looks very tense and uncomfortable. They started boxing once, too.

I figure I'll keep at it, only put them together when I can watch them and separating them again when things start getting tense. Keep switching them around every few hours. I'll try some of the things you've suggested too; I've never heard of scatter feeding, and it will make it hard for me to know when they've run out of food, but I think it's worth a shot.

[esztershine]

To be honest, it sounds like Rose may be bullying Tilla. Even if you switch them and supervise them when together the stress on Tilla from Rose may not be doing good on her at all.

[Rin]

Oct 1, 2011 11:57:31 GMT -8 esztershine said:

To be honest, it sounds like Rose may be bullying Tilla. Even if you switch them and supervise them when together the stress on Tilla from Rose may not be doing good on her at all.

You may be right. I cleaned out the tank and put in new bedding, but when I put them together in it (for the first time in about a week) it looks like they're both afraid of each other. They're both doing a lot of foot thumping, and when one comes near the other, the other raises her rear end up a little in some weird back-archy thing I've never seen before. The fact that I've never seen it before, combined with how nervously they are both behaving, leads me to believe that they're really not okay with each other.

I think I'll just give up trying to put them back together at this point.

Should I try to find a partner for one or both? I'm inclined to believe that Rose is probably fine on her own, and I also wonder if Tilla is just too clingy to get along with another gerbil; but at the same time, I've been told over and over again that gerbils do better in pairs.

Thoughts?

[esztershine]

How old are they?

[Rin]

I've had them for four months. I got them both from Petco, so I can't be sure how old they were when I bought them, but they have both grown in size since then if that's anything to go on.