Common myth reasons?

[KatnissUna]

     I’ve been chatting with a few people in person about gerbils, and how I got mine, why I bred some, etc, and I have heard this common myth way too often… people assume that you take out the father gerbil so he doesn’t eat the babies… where would they get that idea? Is there any truth to that?
     Another common thing I notice is that a lot of people don’t actually know what a gerbil is, and stuff along the lines of gerbils being less well known than for example, hamsters. 
     I’ve also had people say that my red-eyed gerbil is scary looking. I get that red eyes can look “evil” but when I tell them red eyed gerbils are usually less common than black eyed ones, that doesn’t change their opinion whatsoever.  Why on earth do people think red eyes are creepy? They’re just eyes!
     Does anyone have answers as to where on earth these ideas come from about gerbils? 
      If anyone has any other funny/interesting things people have said that are clearly not true, I’d love to hear it

[betty]

Interesting for sure - I'll have a go:

The father eating the babies most likely is just something to say! I have noticed that people would rather say something opposite to what you say than nothing at all - and as they might have heard sometime that hamsters eat their babies - they combined the two! There is never anything said in gerbil circles that has ever suggested that the male might do that, so this first one is very strange.

Gerbils are certainly less commonly kept than hamsters - and certainly many pet stores that I know in the UK that stock small rodents will always have hamsters - but almost all don't regulalry keep gerbils. Hamsters are a parents go to as well as they dont have tails, 'are kept in small cages' and live in singles (not pairs). So if your parents are in charge of getting your first pet - they are more likely to buy a hamster.

Red eyes are seen as more scary - most likely again - a parent thing. If you already don't share the love for small animals - then one with red eyes is not going to happen (too many old horror movies with red-eyed rodents). CGI didn't exist in the old days so the only way to portray 'creepy' in movies (like rats eating a dead body in a subway (add other likely bedevilled rat spot)) was to give them red eyes - like when old movies are showing something underwater they HAVE to have the submarine sound effect added to be authentically underwater...

[KatnissUna]

Very interesting! That definitely makes sense to me. Thanks for your thoughts betty!

[LilyandDaisy]

I think in most animal species, the father is much less involved with rearing his young than the mother is, often completely uninvolved. People tend to assume that's the case with most animals and often find it quite surprising and sweet when I tell them that gerbil parents raise their babies together, with the father doing everything short of feeding them.

In some species, a male will kill young that aren't his own. Gerbil fathers seemingly don't care whether pups belong to them or not! But people often generalise and think that male animals are always aggressive towards babies and female animals are always nurturing. In reality, females can be just as aggressive as males and in some species, moreso.

Red eyes are relatively unusual among mammals. Maybe people associate them with snakes and insects, which for many people is not a positive association.

I remember when I had gerbils as a child there was an urban legend that gerbils shouldn't have wheels because they get addicted to them and run until they drop dead. I heard that from my brother who heard it from a school friend who heard it from who knows where, and we completely believed it and never used wheels! I occasionally hear of people who have a friend of a friend whose gerbil ran itself to death, but of course, the stories are never firsthand. Does anyone know where that one came from?

[betty]

Ooh yes - I like that 'bad father' theory very much... And you are right - people love to hear that they live as a couple to rasie the young...

I haven't heard about the snakes and insects with red eyes though - but I have heard the wheel running one. And I have no idea where it might have come from - unless it was from some lab experiments where they had highly modified specimens who went awry on some strange mental or 'fungal' experiment?

[Markpd]

Interesting, when Avon was young and when he got the hang of using the wheel, he ran on it nearly continuously for hours on end! To the point that I got worried about it and posted here (in their intro thread IIRC), I removed the wheel for 1 night, and he was a little less obsessed over it after then . Interestingly he always loved his wheel (more so than Blake) and regularly ran on it until his last days.