Gerbil Zoo exhibit

[teambenji543]

I’ve always thought that it would be such a cool zoo exhibit to have a group of gerbils in a giant tank. People would be able to see the gerbil tunnels and everything. Has anyone ever thought of that? I’m guessing if a zoo actually did this, then it might lead to a Declan but it would still be such a cool thing to see.

[southeastus]

I was thinking today of looking up a film of wild gerbils--wondering if they would be playing around like our pet ones, which would be fun to see.

If they could be seen at a zoo, maybe more people would realize what fun gerbils are. Around here, at least, hamsters are a lot more popular, and I don't understand it. The only hamsters I've known were very dull compared to gerbils. But then I haven't known many hamsters.

[yeti218]

I love my hamsters. They are calmer than gerbils, but they're also a lot easier to handle as a result, which is nice. I like watching them forage around their cage, and they also like to come out to free roam and explore.

I also enjoy that I can set up a really nice looking enclosure for them. The gerbils always rearrange their enclosure into a uniform, brown mess so it's not as visually appealing.

And, with hamsters being solitary, it's nice not to worry about declans.

That said, gerbils have their own set of pros and I enjoy keeping them as well.

A gerbil zoo exhibit would be really cool. Obviously you dont want gerbils breeding non stop so that would need to be addressed. I assume if there was a really good sized space, it would be able to support a large clan with a reduced likelyhood of declan.

I wonder how zoos deal with those social issues that must inevitably arise with some of their animals?

Some animals do better in captivity than others. I'd like to see zoos move in the direction of only keeping animals that can be happy in captivity and that they can actually provide an appropriate habitat for.

[teambenji543]

Yeah, I’ve had many hamsters in the past and they have their pros and cons. I lover gerbils because they’re so much fun to watch, while hamsters tend to be a bit lazy. (At least in my experience.)

[yeti218]

Yeah, someone on here calls it "gerbil tv". I love giving them loads of new cardboard, hay and chew items and watch them rush around for a few hours putting everything in order.

[PipSqueak]

That is a very interesting concept. It would be interesting to see how gerbils act in the wild or in big clans in a zoo that simulates their natural habitat. I never really thought of gerbils being in the wild. I just always think of them only being pets. 

I do think that gerbils have their pros and cons compared to hamsters. Hamsters are a lot calmer and don't mess up the nice setup so it does give you more freedom to create really nice looking setups and they aren't nearly as destructive but what I really like about gerbils is that they are awake during the day. I used to never see my hamster during the day but now my gerbils are up all the time. I do feel like gerbils have bigger personalities but I also have only had one pair of gerbils and one hamster so I can't really judge since I have only had the experience once. 

[teambenji543]

Sept 6, 2021 13:16:28 GMT -8 PipSqueak said:

That is a very interesting concept. It would be interesting to see how gerbils act in the wild or in big clans in a zoo that simulates their natural habitat. I never really thought of gerbils being in the wild. I just always think of them only being pets. 

I do think that gerbils have their pros and cons compared to hamsters. Hamsters are a lot calmer and don't mess up the nice setup so it does give you more freedom to create really nice looking setups and they aren't nearly as destructive but what I really like about gerbils is that they are awake during the day. I used to never see my hamster during the day but now my gerbils are up all the time. I do feel like gerbils have bigger personalities but I also have only had one pair of gerbils and one hamster so I can't really judge since I have only had the experience once. 

I agree, when I had hamsters they would sit in your lap and curl up into a little ball and go back to sleep. My gerbils now are really hard to handle, they’re always moving. I also love how gerbils are so entertaining! I love watching them dig tunnels and discover new things. While hamsters don’t really do much except… well… sleep. I’ve also noticed that hamsters smell more. I don’t know if it was just my hamsters but they stunk! I had to clean out their tank EVERY week, compared to my once a month gerbil tank cleanings. Not to mention the fact that I have 2 gerbils compared to my 1 hamster. 

[Markpd]

I can't remember how I found it now, but there was a zoo that kept Gerbils, I think I found it searching for wild gerbil footage??

And yea I'd love to see how Gerbils got on in a semi-natural environment!

If they had a big enough enclosure, declanning wouldn't be a problem as the ousted gerbil could just setup another nest elsewhere in the enclosure, or maybe join another clan?

Gerbils aren't always hostile to strangers , read this very interesting paper on capturing random wild gerbils, and pairing them up to see how they behave!

A few snippets of it :-

Results

In total, 253 gerbils (137 females and 116 males) from 24 burrow systems were identified during the study period. We captured gerbils 1371 times during the BS and 609 times during the FHS. The distance between 2 burrow systems ranged from 11.6 m to 147.0 m with an average of 66.1 ± 1.6 m. We conducted 249 pairwise behavior tests and about 77.1% (192/249) pairwise encounters were observed aggression. Initially, the gerbils in the pairwise encounters generally sniffed each other (i.e., investigative behavior) or kept away and ignored each other (i.e., neutral behavior). After several investigative and neutral behaviors, the encounters became amicable or agonistic. Amicable and agonistic behaviors did not occur within 10 min in some tests (Table 1 , Figure 1 ). The relatedness between pairs of individuals was relatively low (Table 1).

Effects of relatedness and spatial distance on behavioral traits

The pairwise relatedness had significant effects on investigative, neutral, and amicable behavior. In particular, the durations of investigative behavior (t = 2.869, P = 0.0046) and amicable behavior (t = 5.432, P < 0.0001) increased significantly, whereas the duration of neutral behavior (t = –2.734, P = 0.0071) decreased significantly with increasing relatedness (Figure 1, Table 3 ). We also found a significant negative relationship between the durations of amicable behavior and spatial distance (t = –2.562, P = 0.0111, Table 3), and amicable behavior only occurred between individuals with a spatial distance of less than 40 m (Figure 1f). In addition, the interaction between relatedness and distance had significant negative effects on investigative behavior (t = –2.022, P = 0.0475) and amicable behavior (t = –7.505, P < 0.0001), but positive effects on neutral behavior (t = 4.764, P < 0.0001, Table 3). However, pairwise relatedness (P = 0.1248) or spatial distance (P = 0.5687) had no significant effects on the intensity of agonistic behavior (Figure 1g-h, Table 3).

Discussion

As expected, the social behavior in staged encounters between Mongolian gerbils was influenced by relatedness, spatial distance, and their interactions. Gerbils spent significantly more time sniffing related individuals and behaved more amicably with increasing pairwise genetic relatedness. Thus, gerbils were more indifferent to each other as the pairwise relatedness decreased. However, the significant interaction effects between relatedness and spatial distance on investigative, neutral, and amicable behavior indicate that the effects of kinship on social behavior were constrained by space. In addition, we found that amicable behavior occurred only between individuals with a spatial distance of less than 40 m, which is approximately the active range of Mongolian gerbils (Ågren et al. 1989a). Furthermore, amicable behavior was exhibited by both close relatives and distantly related gerbils. These results imply that familiarity may play a key role in social associations of Mongolian gerbils. It should be noted that a higher level of familiarity does not necessarily indicate closer spatial distance, but it implies a closer social distance based on frequent interactions. For example, female banner-tailed kangaroo rats Dipodomys spectabilis avoid inbreeding via the development of familiarity based on prior associations rather than by using spatial cues, even if males live in familiar spatial locations (Waser et al. 2012). Thus, the relatively low inbreeding coefficient in gerbils may be related to a similar behavioral strategy for inbreeding avoidance, although females commonly copulate with neighboring males (Ågren 1984a, 1984b).

[yeti218]

Sept 7, 2021 18:15:04 GMT -8 teambenji543 said:

Sept 6, 2021 13:16:28 GMT -8 PipSqueak said:

That is a very interesting concept. It would be interesting to see how gerbils act in the wild or in big clans in a zoo that simulates their natural habitat. I never really thought of gerbils being in the wild. I just always think of them only being pets. 

I do think that gerbils have their pros and cons compared to hamsters. Hamsters are a lot calmer and don't mess up the nice setup so it does give you more freedom to create really nice looking setups and they aren't nearly as destructive but what I really like about gerbils is that they are awake during the day. I used to never see my hamster during the day but now my gerbils are up all the time. I do feel like gerbils have bigger personalities but I also have only had one pair of gerbils and one hamster so I can't really judge since I have only had the experience once. 

I agree, when I had hamsters they would sit in your lap and curl up into a little ball and go back to sleep. My gerbils now are really hard to handle, they’re always moving. I also love how gerbils are so entertaining! I love watching them dig tunnels and discover new things. While hamsters don’t really do much except… well… sleep. I’ve also noticed that hamsters smell more. I don’t know if it was just my hamsters but they stunk! I had to clean out their tank EVERY week, compared to my once a month gerbil tank cleanings. Not to mention the fact that I have 2 gerbils compared to my 1 hamster. 

My hamster tanks don’t smell. One of them has an area where he likes to pee, so I clean that daily, and then spot clean some dirty bedding every few weeks, as needed. Ones in a detolf and the other is in a 55 gallon tank. 

Hamsters are definitely a lot more engaging if you are up late somewhat often though. They come out to say hello and get treats during the day, but they’re really active and more fun at night.

[stellamaris]

"40 m, which is approximately the active range of Mongolian gerbils"
Wow! I'll have to get a MUCH bigger tank!

[Markpd]

They natural range is big!

I wish I could remember which zoo it was that had gerbils, for some reason I have vague memories of it being a german zoo....
It might have been the Wilhelma Zoo as the wiki article on Gerbils has a photo of gerbils there from that zoo.