Gerbil Handbook by Swiss Animal Welfare (STS) - translated

[Markpd]

This handbook was either written by, or based on literature by Brigitte Rauth-Widmann (1999) and Eva Waiblinger (2010), the original pdf doesn't specify [edit 9-23. The link listed to it at the bottom no longer works and the pdf or anything about gerbils doesn't seem to exist on their site anymore , if anyone wants the pdf though I have it stored on my PC, some PM me and I'll email it you].

Translated to English from German using mostly DeepL, (some) Google translate and by me (Mark Dorling), I don't speak German, so no guarantees it's error free! But I was very careful, so it should be spot on in meaning (LMK if you do see any errors). I mostly corrected the grammar error orders by the translation engines, along with choosing better words from their lists. This took me many hours! I never knew that German is so complicated! Words meaning different things with different combinations! Wth? (IIRC)). My translation isn't perfect (my English isn't ), but it is easily understandable and much better than either of the translation engines! , 7/20.

I hope you find this interesting (I did, hence translating it), as well as some info here being well known, their are a few eye openers.

If you've never heard of Eva Waiblinger, Google her name and you'll soon see she's an expert on Gerbils (amongst other things ).

[Notes in square brackets are my own comments. Only the bolding of the cage size section was added by me, the rest that is in there is in the original text. Photos not included, to see them download the original pdf linked at the end]

S T S (Swiss Animal Welfare) - Handbook - 9/2019
PETS - GERBILS
Mongolian gerbils Meriones unguiculatus
Gerbil, often also called a Jerboa

[photo]

General information
Origin: steppe areas of Asia, other species also in Africa
Life expectancy: 3 - 4 years
Sexual maturity: At the age of 10 - 12 weeks
Activity time: Gerbils are twilight-active. If they are kept as pets, they are always active during the day. In nature Gerbils live in large families with several generations of young animals. Within the group, gerbils usually live together peacefully. The territory is massively defended against foreign animals. Gerbils inhabit self-dug, huge passage and cave systems in which the young animals are raised, supplies stored, and the animals warm each other in winter. In their area of origin, the Mongolian steppes, it can get as cold as -50 ° C in winter.

Behaviour
Group structure: In gerbil families only the parent pair reproduces. Pups stay with their family far beyond sexual maturity, but do not reproduce, and help to raise younger siblings, defend the common territory, collecting food and creating the common burrow system. The group structure of gerbils is very similar to that of wolves.

[photo]
Gerbil family in their burrow, which they dug themselves in damp sand: Mother (right), older pup from the last litter (left) and young from the newest litter (below), with eyes still closed.

Father (back) and son. In this group, after the age-related death of the father, there was a dispute among the sons.

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Sudden aggression:
Sudden aggression between previously two peaceful family members is problematic in gerbils as it can break out from one day to another. Most advice requests to gerbils at the Swiss animal welfare STS is because of sudden aggression. Gerbils have the scientific name Meriones unguiculatus for a reason [?], little clawed fighter. If gerbils attack each other, it is a matter of life or death, especially in a closed terrarium where the losing animal cannot flee. Disputing animals are constantly chasing each other, typical bites from chases are on the tail and to the tail base. When the persecuted animal turns up, the opponents box with each other's front paws and bite each other, then a fighting ball
arises. Typical combat injuries are bite wounds on the shoulders, neck and throat. The very first measure is to separate fighting animals immediately (attention: it is necessary to wear thick leather gloves, gerbils in a fighting mood bite anything that comes close!) and to keep them separate. It is not enough to just put them in a grid in the terrarium, they can also bite through the grid on the nose and paws. Animals that have fought cannot be put together again! If the group is large enough, two new groups can be formed from it. It is advantageous that there are as large as possible weight differences within the new groups.

Researchers at the University of Halle in Germany have found that such periods of aggression occur regularly in gerbils in naturally grown family groups, roughly every 3-4 years. The aggression often starts from the adult female or mother, and Father (back) and son. In this group, after the age-related death of the father, there was a dispute among the sons.1 - 2 animals are driven out of the group. The reason for this is competition for reproduction and rank disputes.
Why sudden aggression in same-sex groups? This has not yet been investigated, but it can be assumed that this is also a matter of rank disputes. The only way to prevent this is by going through age and weight levels groups (e.g. father & sons) ensures a clear ranking among the animals (usually the higher the weight the higher the rank). Because male aggression is less common in pure male groups, they are generally more peaceful than female groups - in contrast to other rodents where groups of males are not recommended! Although the researchers from Halle have found out that animals that will attack, those that behave neutrally and can remain in the family and those that are driven away, differ in their hormone profile, the researchers also found that the hormone profile of the animals that will be attacked differs from that of those that are driven away.
In practice, however, there is usually no warning when sudden aggression breaks out. However, increased caution is required when making alterations to keeping, for example attaching a second terrarium that could be defended, or if one of the older, heavier (and thus higher-ranking) animals gets sick or dies.
Note: Sudden aggression is not a behavioural disorder, but a normal behaviour of gerbils, that can quickly be fatal under captive conditions because the inferior one cannot flee. In the field, the attacked animals would migrate (which also usually amounts to a death sentence).

Socialization:
According to the Animal Welfare Ordinance, animals of social species, such as gerbils, must have the opportunity for adequate social contacts. Specifically, this means that gerbils must not be kept alone, but kept in groups. But it always happens from one group that an older single animal is left. What then? Adult gerbils are, because of their group smell and their imperceptibly combative nature, notorious towards strangers, difficult to socialize again. It is generally recommended to create new groups with animals aged 5 to max. 8 weeks, so before the abdominal gland develops and the animals marking and territorial behaviour begin to show.
Different socialization methods are recommended [by others]: cage exchange, small space method, neutral terrain. There is no systematic research into what works best, it also depends on which animals are to be socialized and what social experiences they have.

When exchanging cages, the animals that are to be socialised are transferred every day for several weeks to the terrarium of the other animal set. The idea is that they will remember the smell of the future partner and accept it. However, it is also possible after weeks, that when you put them together confrontations will still ensue. Not recommended is a large terrarium simply with a grid in the middle and the animals on each half. Serious bites can occur through the grille.

With the small space method the animals to be socialised are placed in a transport cage small enough so that they can't stand up[!]. The idea is they can't fight each other either when they can't stand up. From an animal welfare point of view, this method is highly problematic, because the animals are exposed to massive, inevitable and completely unnatural stress.

In the neutral terrain method, they are all spread out over a large area that has a lot of distractions, occupations and many shelters, but no dead ends. There they are observed for several hours, and one must always be ready to intervene and separate in case of disputes. As soon as one animal is a little too interested in another, it gets distracted. Positive signs of integration are when the smaller / younger animals squeaks (high [or loud?]), or nudge their head under the chin of the larger animal, or are turned on their backs and (often quite snappishly) groomed. The group "resting in one heap" is the best sign that the socialization has worked.
Warning signs however are, teeth chattering, tail whipping (shows high arousal) and chasing. Then attempts must be made to distract the pursuing animal, for example by holding out sought-after food, briefly blowing on it, spray with a few drops of water, or drizzle 2 - 3 drops of cooking oil on the fur – the distracted animals then deal with eating or grooming first and do not care as much about the “opponent”.
A good distraction strategy from the start, is not to have just one adult socializing with a lone pup, but add 3 - 4 pups. Because they scurry around so much, the adult animal can hardly concentrate on one.
A typical situation is when the young animals withdraw into tubes, the adult animal sticks its head in and excitedly whips its tail, the pups squeak (a gesture of submission, which usually leads to inhibition of an attack), the adult animal turns and instead either begins to gnaw off branches or cardboard, or violently throws litter into the corner with his head (skipping behaviour and reduction of excitation).
Sometimes it is also recommended [by others] to catch the animals before socialization, and powder them with dry shampoo to mask their own smell, for the same reason, other recommendations are to put the animals in a chilled mint tea bath. Since gerbils have an extremely good nose and also risk of catching a cold when getting wet, such measures should be discouraged, since they are likely to achieve little or nothing [other than making them ill?].

Because when trying to socialize there is always a great risk of bite injuries or even deaths, this should be treated pragmatically when socializing adult gerbils. A re-association with adult males is most likely to succeed with several male pups under 8 weeks of age, or an adult male, an adult female in oestrus (however difficult to determine without a smear and microscope), and with unpleasant consequences of unwanted offspring ...
It is better to try to socialize animals from a shelter (which you can return if necessary if it does not work) and not animals from the pet store (no return option)[?]. If it does not work, it should not be tried again, because the next time you try the affected animal, which has already had bad experiences, maybe even was bitten or has bitten on the first attempt, will react aggressively even faster. In addition, socialization experiments are an enormous stress load for the animals. If the animals are 3 years and older, socialization experiments are no longer appropriate due to their advanced age.

Recommended groups for pets: Same sex groups are recommended, either males or females, between 2 and 6 animals (depending on the space available) - although even with same-sex groups you must be prepared for sudden aggression. Couples are unsuitable, because then every 4 - 5 weeks there will be 4 - 10 pupils. The castrated males in a mixed sex couple is not recommended. Researchers of the University of Halle have found that one third of the castrated males from such pairs is suddenly and inexplicably dead in the enclosure one day. It is suspected that the female puts the infertile male under so much stress that he dies from it.

[photo]

Stereotypical digging, a behavioural disorder, occurs when young gerbils are not kept in the parental burrow system.

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Communication:
Gerbils communicate with scent marks. They excrete a greasy secretion from the abdominal gland onto objects in their territory, but also on fellow Gerbils, so that a group smell arises. You can recognize marking behaviour by when gerbils crawl over the object to be marked and flatten their stomach. The Abdominal secretion for some people is almost pleasant, a slightly sweet-bitter smell.
Because gerbils, unlike house mice and rats don't mark with urine, and also urinate little, as desert animals they release highly concentrated urine, and so smells from Gerbil terrariums do not get uncomfortable too quickly. The bedding stays dry for a long time.
Gerbils also communicate with ultrasound, but this is especially the case with conflicts and reproduction. Young, still blind and naked gerbils that fall out of the nest, call for their mother in the ultrasound range.

Burrow system
In the wild, a gerbil without a burrow will very soon be a dead, eaten gerbil, because they are preyed on by different predators: Corsican foxes, Manul wildcats, birds of prey, and snakes. The family and the common burrow are absolutely necessary for survival. So it is not surprising that gerbils that grow up without a burrow, suffer from a behavioural disorder, developing "stereotypical digging" a minute-by-minute, mindless scratching in the corners of the cage, that takes up to a quarter of their active time. This behavioural disorder arises because of the burrow-less gerbil pups in a cage with little bedding, are trying to dig a burrow, but they have no success and so continue digging in frustration and there is never a burrow, and thus they get stuck in a kind of behavioural loop. But as soon as you find them a burrow, even if they didn't dig it themselves, the digging behaviour will [mostly!] return to normal. These research results have now led the Swiss animal welfare legislation for gerbils to require deep bedding so that they can dig a burrow system. The Animal Welfare Ordinance provides for 25 cm [9.8”] bedding, but more stable and more complex burrow systems can be dug with 40 cm [15.8”] deep bedding. In laboratory animal husbandry, the use of artificial burrow systems instead of deep litter is allowed, but not for pet keeping. It is better for the animals, if they can dig themselves, firstly this is a good occupation, secondly they change the burrow continually. Old passages and nests collapse, new ones are dug, the animals change their nesting location every 3-5 days. In the field, this is probably an adapted measure, so that not too many parasites accumulate in the nest.

Housing

Enclosure: Gerbils should be in spacious enclosures with deep litter, in which they have a burrow system which can hold. Rodent wired cages, as offered commercially are too small and unsuitable for the animal-friendly keeping of gerbils because they are not deep enough. Rodent terrariums or aquariums are possible, if necessary with a mesh top.

Also multi-storey enclosures such as the Gerbil villa (provider of small animal stables, see links), whose lower levels can have deep bedding are appropriate. A living space of several square meters would be ideal, which with a minimum of 40 cm [15.8”], better still 70 - 80 cm [27.6 – 31.5”] deep litter is provided for burrows. From an animal welfare point of view the minimum would be a terrarium of 140 x 60 x 60 cm [~4.6' x 2' x 2'] for 2 - 4 animals, but bigger is always better. That in larger terrariums it can cause sudden aggression is not proven.
The enclosure should be located so that a small part of it is in the sun for a few hours or so a day, because gerbils like to lie in the warm sun. However, the terrarium should be in a draft-free location. Rooms in which smoking occurs is not suitable for animal husbandry.

[photo]

120 cm long terrarium with deep litter for digging a burrow system. Extendable free running possibilities on the lid of the terrarium [topper?].

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Setup and cleaning of the terrarium:
The Terrarium is provided with suitable bedding, e.g. a mixture of de-dusted wood shavings, hay, and straw at least 40 cm deep, along with branches. In addition, the gerbils are offered a sand bath. The sand bath and water bowl/water bottle are attached on the side wall or placed on raised surfaces, because otherwise they will be buried.
For furnishings, cardboard or cork tubes are suitable, wooden shelters and branches. However, it is important to be aware that the Gerbils will create their own "apartment" by digging tunnels and nests. In the cardboard boxes and the litter however, branches make the entire structure more stable. Moist sand or earth would also be suitable as a substrate, however they are extremely heavy and smell faster than the absorbent wood chip litter. Inverted tiles or stones on the bottom of the terrarium help to wear down the claws.
Warning: Stones and other heavy furnishings must be placed stably on the enclosure floor before the bedding is filled. Otherwise it could happen that the gerbils undermine the stone and be crushed.
Since gerbils are very small and have highly concentrated urine, and mark their territory with the abdominal gland (instead of with urine), they make little odour, the cleaning effort for the terrarium is very low. Depending upon the number of animals and the size of the terrarium, it is usually only necessary after 2 - 3 months to change the litter completely. The cleaning of the terrarium is a stressful event for the animals, and should therefore not happen too often. To reduce the burden, you should move some of the old nesting material into the freshly filled terrarium. Many gerbils use the sandbath as a place to defecate, so you can simply change the sand regularly. Bathing for coat care is only done in fresh sand.

[Swiss] Minimum legal requirements: The minimum legal requirements are in the Animal Welfare Ordinance (TSchV) regulated and online on the homepage of the Federal Food Safety Agency and veterinary services (BLV). It should be noted that the information in this paragraph is the legally prescribed minimum and by no means optimal animal husbandry! Whoever falls below legal minimum regulations, is punishable. According to Appendix 1, Number 43 TSchV an enclosure must have a minimum area of 0.5 m2. The furnishing regulations state suitable litter for digging (at least 25 cm deep), retreat options, suitable nest material, roughly structured feed (hay, straw), grain addition, a sand bath and gnawing objects like softwood and fresh branches. Single keeping is prohibited.

Feeding:
Fresh water must always be available. The commercially available grain mixes, some of which also contain animal proteins, should be served with small pieces of fruit every day and vegetables such as apples and carrots, fresh wild seeds, seedlings, cat grass, or oat sprigs can be added. If the gerbils get too fat, the grain feed, in particular the sunflower seeds, ration it to one teaspoon per animal per day. So the animals can forage, you should spread the grain feed on the bedding, burying in a clean dry sand, or offering whole panicles and ears of corn from which they are made, so they have to first peel the grains out. Gerbils like to eat seeds and outside green parts of wormwood plants, that's why they seem to like bitter salads ...
Gerbils, despite the lack of cheek pouches, store 'tons' of food, which they put in special store feed chambers in the burrow system, sometimes several kilos per gerbil family!

[photo]
Gerbils are true bio-shredders. They shred everything except ceramics and glass [or hard metals!] - therefore to always keep them occupied, sufficient fresh, non-toxic branches, unprinted cardboard and cosmetic tissues that can gnaw them to pieces should be provided.

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Gnawing material:
For the enrichment of everyday life, several times a week fresh gnawing and building material can be offered. Suitable examples are, twigs of hazel, beech, birch, willow, unsprayed fruit trees or red fir, long-fiber hay and undyed household paper, as well as all types of unprinted carton, such as toilet and household paper rolls, egg cartons and cardboard boxes. As nesting material, paper tissues or kitchen paper are suitable. The animals shred the material quickly, and use it for nest building or work it into the bedding. In this way the bedding also makes for a more stable construction of a tunnel system.

Health
Healthy gerbils are active, curious and have shiny eyes. Their droppings consist of solid little beans. Abdominal ulcers are relatively common in gerbils. It could be that they are lipomas that disappear suddenly, benign or malignant tumours. It is important to check the abdominal gland regularly. If an ulcer develops, it can lead to a vicious circle, because the animal bites the disturbing ulcer again and again or it is chafed by the marking activity and starts to bleed. It's best to show Abdominal ulcers to the veterinarian who will decide which treatment is necessary.

Gerbils are also prone to epilepsy. Particularly shy animals not used to humans, can get epileptic seizures by stressing them, for example by catching and holding them. This can be prevented by careful taming (see handling). Epilepsy can be recognized by short-term absences ("petit mal"), during which the animal briefly looks unresponsive, twitching or jerky body movements, or in extreme cases epileptic seizures ("grand mal"), in which the animal has uncontrolled twitches and convulsions. The only thing you can do about it is to pad the animal well so that it doesn't get hurt.
If you grab a gerbil by the tail tip instead of the tail root, it could happen that they try to free themselves by violent kicking movements and to get away peel the skin off their own tails. What remains is a bloody remnant of bones and muscles. If this happens, you have to take the animal to a vet urgently. For prevention only, hold on to the base of the tail or, even better, loosely with both hands around the body, hold tight! [Not too tight!]

The high-performance kidneys of the steppe gerbil can fail in older animals. If an animal drinks a lot, it urinates in large quantities, its fur is dull, and if its flanks sink in so that it looks like a tent from behind, you should go to the vet. Treatment is not possible for kidney failure, but the veterinarian can relieve the animal, before it suffers too much.

[photo]
There are different colour variations. Here, from the left: Pied Agouti (wild, white spotted), Agouti (wild) and Grey Agouti (wild grey).

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Handling
Gerbils are not petting animals. Researchers have found that they massively suffer from stress when trapped and held without getting used to it beforehand. Shy animals can be captured with a cardboard tube, which they accept as shelter. With a little patience Gerbils can be tamed to the extent that they take food out of your hand, or even voluntarily come to your hand. Good rewards for taming gerbils by hand, are the most sought after Sunflower seeds or pumpkin seeds, however, some gerbils also like pine nuts or nuts. For example, you can remove the sunflower seeds from the grain feed and then hand them out separately as an offer. In the beginning it takes patience: one must have the hand with the sunflower seeds held immobile in the terrarium for a long time until a gerbil dares to take the treat, but once you have overcome its shyness, it will learn quickly that hands are not dangerous. Some gerbils will even climb on your arm and shoulder of their human keeper.
However, it is not recommended to allow the gerbils free run in the apartment. They crawl easily behind furniture and can be hard to capture. For the animals, such actions mean great stress and fear. In a spacious, species-appropriate enclosures, gerbils show an interesting natural behaviour. The attraction of keeping gerbils is to observe the animals as they interact with each other within their group, or how they create their burrows.


Children and gerbils
If gerbils are kept in animal-friendly enclosures, children can observe how the gerbils play with each other, or how an animal lies down on its side in a relaxed manner so that another member of the family can clean the coat. Tamed animals take sunflower seeds from the hand and peel them skilfully with their front paws and teeth.
Gerbils therefore offer, above all, many observation possibilities, but they are not cuddly animals.
However, children can always think of new ways to keep the animals occupied: for example a "play pen". Via a walkway (using wooden slats, which is covered with a mesh to form a complete safe tunnel) the animals can leave the open terrarium on their own (but under the supervision of the child) and climb into a large cardboard box which is filled with either paper shreds, shredded crumpled tissue paper or polystyrene[!, bad idea?] chips, in which sunflower seeds are hidden. The curious, greedy gerbils love it, letting off steam in such a play box and digging, and is rewarded with the coveted food.
The following applies to all animal husbandry: Children must be instructed and supervised by adults. With patience and a few sunflower seeds, the inquisitive gerbils are usually quickly tamed.
They have to learn to treat the animals entrusted to them with respect and to respect needs. Unfortunately, it happens again and again that the animals go unnoticed, and without intention are frightened or that the children cause them pain.

Vacation
Animals should only be purchased when the question of care during the holidays has been clarified.
Since large gerbil terrariums are difficult to transport, on-site support is ideal. The effort is not very great, since only food and water is needed and the animals have to be checked.

Acquisition
Buying: Gerbils can either be bought at the animal shelter or at good pet stores [and breeders]. Frequently young animals from a circle of acquaintances are also given away. Attention for purchasing over the Internet: you should definitely be able to see the animals at the owner / breeder before buying them, so that you can be informed about the keeping and rearing conditions. The important thing here is that the young animals grew up in a terrarium with deep litter in the parental building (so they do not develop stereotypical digging) and were not separated from the parents too early (so that they do not develop stereotypical gnawing).

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Gerbil pups of different fur colours in the nest. Young gerbils come blind, deaf and helpless to the world and suckle for 3 - 4 weeks.

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Breeding:

Gerbils are sexually mature between 10 and 12 weeks old. The females bear 4 - 5, sometimes up to 10 young per litter. A gerbil pair can have up to ten litters per year. As long as adult, mature sons and daughters stay with theirs parents, (mostly) only the parent animals reproduce. However if they are separated from the parents at 7-8 weeks, they must be held in same-sex groups, with both female and male groups living together very peacefully. Because gerbils multiply quickly, it does make it difficult to find really good places for them. Breeding is not advisable! Castration or vasectomy of the male in a pair is discouraged.

Warning: if young gerbils are separated from their parents too early, or before the next litter of younger siblings is born, they develop the behavioural disorder of gnawing bars.

Other species: Sometimes other gerbils are also offered in pet shops, for example the midday gerbil (Meriones meridianus) and the fat-tailed gerbil / Duprasi (Pachyuromys duprasi) from the Middle East and North Africa, as well as the Persian Gerbil (Meriones persicus). While the requirements of the midday gerbil and Duprasi are similar to that of Mongolian gerbil, the larger, more agile Persian gerbil needs a lot more space, in addition, she climbs and jumps well, in contrast to the Mongolian gerbil. Persian gerbils should be kept in very large terrariums (100 x 200 x 180 cm) with a deep burial layer (60 - 80 cm) and many climbing possibilities, similar to Degus. And climbing facilities provided by stably attached roots, branches, boards or piles of stones.

Further information
Links
• Legal basis: http://www.blv.admin.ch> Animals> Legal and enforcement principles> Legislation
> Animal Welfare Legislation> Animal Welfare> Animal Welfare Ordinance
• Brokerage of pet animals: www.adopt-a-pet.ch
• Enclosure: www.kleintiertraum.ch, www.kleintierstaelle.ch
• List of exotic veterinarians: www.tierschutz.com/heimtiere/tierarztliste/index.html
[Original German pdf of this information sheet here - www.tierschutz.com/publikationen/heimtiere/infothek/kleintiere/rennmaus.pdf ]

literature
• Brigitte Rauth-Widmann (1999). Rats, mice and gerbils as pets.
Verlag Oertel & Spörer Munich.
• Eva Waiblinger (2010). The laboratory gerbil. p. 327-347. In: The Care and Management of
Laboratory and Other Research Animals, Eds. R. Hubrecht & J. Kirkwood. Wiley-Blackwell.

Photos
Dr. Eva Waiblinger (unless otherwise stated).

Publisher
Swiss Animal Protection STS, Dornacherstrasse 101, Postfach, 4018 Basel,
Tel. [phone], fax [phone], postal account 40-33680-3,
[e-mail], www.tierschutz.com
This and other information sheets are available at http://www.tierschutz.com> Publications> Pets
ready for download.

[Pim]

This is very helpful in brushing up for my split introduction. Thanks!