Post by thebeck on May 13, 2022 17:34:09 GMT -8
So... Every group of gerbils I have gotten in the past 12-14 years, I have gotten from the humane society. From the first pair that were blind, their eye sockets were completely furred over --- the Vet Tech gave them a clean bill of health and the manager had no idea "they had been there for 3 months and all we do is clean them". They were perfect as my first gerbils. The next were a happy healthy trio. The last were another trio, but something was very wrong, they only lived about 18-24 months. Since then I have haunted the Petfinder pages in search of another group of gerbils. (I did see a large group and asked here how much trouble I could get into housing 5 males -- they were gone before I could get them)
They got 6 gerbils dropped off to them: 2 females, 4 males. Although I like keeping trios, I could not bring myself to leave one behind, so resolved to take all 4 males. Admittedly, I was super excited. I updated and made gerbil safe a large housing (40x18x24H), using hardware cloth and suggestions for this forum, bought new toys, huts, bedding, etc. Set it all up and ready for this little group.
I arrived and asked about the gerbils. They must have thought I didnt understand English, I asked the same questions as many different ways as I could think of because I could not quite understand or comprehend what I was hearing. Someone had dropped them off all together, separated males from females, a couple weeks prior, but in the wisdom of the humane society, they separated all the gerbils into separate cages! 6 gerbils, 6 cages! 6 really tiny cages! (critter trail cages ---- my carrier is larger than one of those) Now what?
I know about the split cage method of trying to introduce a gerbil to another, but there is no a guarantee that they will bond and can be introduced. I thought (silly), but if they went into a brand new cage set up....? Someone there said that they believed it was a father/mothers and sons. But the colors did not make any sense: 2 solid large black females, the "sons" were 2 siamese, 1 tan and 1 (dad) kind of golden-ish. i dont beleive that a black female with a cinnamon(?) male would produce tan and siamese male offspring -- I could be wrong about that, but they just didnt match at all.
One of the gerbils was "unavailable", but I dont know why. And "dad", alledgedly, had shown some "aggression", . Well, yeah... a solitary gerbil is generally unhappy and will strike out.
I left without gerbils, feeling a mix of anger, saddness worry and disappointment. Angry because it is too easy to look up and find out the basics, to find out gerbils need to have company. This is the humane society, they should have known better than this. This was completely the wrong way to house them. And sad -- these poor solidary gerbils, their loney lives in such tiny cages. And also worried --- what is going to happen if someone comes in and wants 2 of them... puts them in a box takes them home to a single cage (and well all know what kind of cage they would be put into). Or if the humane society only adopts them out as singles?
Is it me?
They got 6 gerbils dropped off to them: 2 females, 4 males. Although I like keeping trios, I could not bring myself to leave one behind, so resolved to take all 4 males. Admittedly, I was super excited. I updated and made gerbil safe a large housing (40x18x24H), using hardware cloth and suggestions for this forum, bought new toys, huts, bedding, etc. Set it all up and ready for this little group.
I arrived and asked about the gerbils. They must have thought I didnt understand English, I asked the same questions as many different ways as I could think of because I could not quite understand or comprehend what I was hearing. Someone had dropped them off all together, separated males from females, a couple weeks prior, but in the wisdom of the humane society, they separated all the gerbils into separate cages! 6 gerbils, 6 cages! 6 really tiny cages! (critter trail cages ---- my carrier is larger than one of those) Now what?
I know about the split cage method of trying to introduce a gerbil to another, but there is no a guarantee that they will bond and can be introduced. I thought (silly), but if they went into a brand new cage set up....? Someone there said that they believed it was a father/mothers and sons. But the colors did not make any sense: 2 solid large black females, the "sons" were 2 siamese, 1 tan and 1 (dad) kind of golden-ish. i dont beleive that a black female with a cinnamon(?) male would produce tan and siamese male offspring -- I could be wrong about that, but they just didnt match at all.
One of the gerbils was "unavailable", but I dont know why. And "dad", alledgedly, had shown some "aggression", . Well, yeah... a solitary gerbil is generally unhappy and will strike out.
I left without gerbils, feeling a mix of anger, saddness worry and disappointment. Angry because it is too easy to look up and find out the basics, to find out gerbils need to have company. This is the humane society, they should have known better than this. This was completely the wrong way to house them. And sad -- these poor solidary gerbils, their loney lives in such tiny cages. And also worried --- what is going to happen if someone comes in and wants 2 of them... puts them in a box takes them home to a single cage (and well all know what kind of cage they would be put into). Or if the humane society only adopts them out as singles?
Is it me?
.
), late 70s