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Post by veronic on Jul 12, 2004 2:11:16 GMT -8
Hello,
I've been in touch with Andrea and DarrenJ about finding gerbils in South Wales, UK,
There does not seem to be any real connaisseurs in our area; I can see that buying from a shop is not ideal but on the other hand, bying from some people who had pups by mistake and at 6 weeks still cannot tell their sex or from somebody who has taken some adult ones from somebody who was not keen after all, but did not bother to ask how old were the gerbils and was probably just after the cage as is now advertising the said gerbils without cage.
At least petshops get them from commercial breeders who probably know what there are doing even if profit is their main priority.
What do you think?
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Post by andrea on Jul 12, 2004 3:11:04 GMT -8
commercial breeders are bad..  they rarely have any kind of care for there animals. to become a commercial breeder for the famous pets at home for example you have to produce a minimum of 100 gerbils per month, thats a huge amount! we have about one litter every 6 weeks out of our current pair, even when all three of our pairs are eventually breeding we will have no way that many per month. so if you take this into account how many gerbils are these breeders owning? also they will buy stock from anyone to breed from they tend to inbreed and are very bad for the gerbil gene pools and as a result you will end up with a bad tempered and/or ill health gerbils. We have in the past had Pets at home gerbils and have found them to be very badly tempered or ill. take Scooby for example hes our only pet shop gerbil now and I have to wear gloves to feed him becuas of his posessive behaviour. He thinks his tank mates and all items in the tank are his and god help you if you want to take it. he body slams and bits. Although if you go to catch him hes fine??. In my opion pet shops should not sell the pets themselves and the public should sort pets from home rearing breeders. This in turn would stamp out impulse buying and hopefully in turn this would have an inpact on the rescues. Please if you are really serious about getting some gerbils please be willing to travel slightly to get from a home rearing breeder. me and darren for example have travelled from surrey to Luton to get a well bred gerbil - (Iceman and Piper) and also to Doncaster - the cheesmans.. baring in mind i work fulltime so had to do this in my spare time, and darrens disabled so we have to be very careful where we travel to due to access issues. As for sexing you shouldn't be breeding if you cannot sex I can usally sex all the pups by about 3 days old, although i cannot put colour to sex till they are a little older (When the fur starts to appear) I can tell sex ratios in the litter. Sorry if I went off on one, or sound a little harse but it makes me so cross how these pet shops and commercial breeders treat there livestock. Andrea |
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Post by penguin on Jul 12, 2004 9:41:58 GMT -8
I don't know if it is different in the UK but we bought some gerbils from a pet store (USA) and they were very friendly. I don't think we would have done that if we had intended to breed them, though. If you are worried about gender I would check them yourself because boys are very obviously different even by five weeks even to an inexperienced person like me. Just don't always assume that because you were told that they are boys/girls that the person is right because I know from experience that is not a good idea and now from our two "males" we have nineteen gerbils. I hope you find what you are looking for.
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Post by sarah on Jul 13, 2004 16:18:00 GMT -8
commercial breeders are bad.. they rarely have any kind of care for there animals. to become a commercial breeder for the famous pets at home for example you have to produce a minimum of 100 gerbils per month, thats a huge amount! we have about one litter every 6 weeks out of our current pair, even when all three of our pairs are eventually breeding we will have no way that many per month. so if you take this into account how many gerbils are these breeders owning? also they will buy stock from anyone to breed from they tend to inbreed and are very bad for the gerbil gene pools and as a result you will end up with a bad tempered and/or ill health gerbils. We have in the past had Pets at home gerbils and have found them to be very badly tempered or ill. take Scooby for example hes our only pet shop gerbil now and I have to wear gloves to feed him becuas of his posessive behaviour. He thinks his tank mates and all items in the tank are his and god help you if you want to take it. he body slams and bits. Although if you go to catch him hes fine??. In my opion pet shops should not sell the pets themselves and the public should sort pets from home rearing breeders. This in turn would stamp out impulse buying and hopefully in turn this would have an inpact on the rescues. Please if you are really serious about getting some gerbils please be willing to travel slightly to get from a home rearing breeder. me and darren for example have travelled from surrey to Luton to get a well bred gerbil - (Iceman and Piper) and also to Doncaster - the cheesmans.. baring in mind i work fulltime so had to do this in my spare time, and darrens disabled so we have to be very careful where we travel to due to access issues. As for sexing you shouldn't be breeding if you cannot sex I can usally sex all the pups by about 3 days old, although i cannot put colour to sex till they are a little older (When the fur starts to appear) I can tell sex ratios in the litter. Sorry if I went off on one, or sound a little harse but it makes me so cross how these pet shops and commercial breeders treat there livestock. Andrea mm i wanted to buy gerbils from a breeder, but theres only one in my whole state [!!] and it would take like 4 hours to get to him..and my parents say that if i don't get them from a pet store i can't get them at all =/ |
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Post by darrenb on Jul 13, 2004 22:36:24 GMT -8
Sarah, the usa pet shops may be totally diferent to the state of affairs they are in the uk. But it is still always best to try to get from a breeder first !!
At the end of the day its your parents fuel money, so youll just have to go buy what they say ?!? But ... Have you actually asked the pet store who and where their breeder is ?? He/She may be more local than you know.
Darren
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Post by j on Jul 16, 2004 2:06:18 GMT -8
I don't know if it is different in the UK but we bought some gerbils from a pet store (USA) and they were very friendly. It's the same here. Same as buying a dog from a petshop..most people know not to do that because they're from puppy farms. Gerbils are from gerbil farms. Petsmart and Petco are the worst..they're known for it. A lot of people are trying to get rid of Petco. Petcosucks.com has a ton of horror stories. I got most of my gerbilss from a local, mom and pop type petshop. They breed their own, but they're as bad as petsmart. They breed rats and mice too.. as snake food. They have breeding pairs in the back and when the pups are 5 weeks old they start selling them. THey don't sex them and they keep them in a 5 gallon tank with nothing but food, water bottle and a thin layer of PINE bedding. And some of their gerbils they get from fake breeders.. so they are usually more freindly because they're used to being handled..But health is another story. Breeders that sell to petshops usually are 14yrold kids trying to make money and/or don't know anything about the health. (If you notice on the AGS site, real breeders won't sell to petshops) I've gotten one 8 week old from Petco. She was a b.itch. I ended up having to leave her alone and she died a few weeks later. Then another time I've gotten an 8 week old from Petsmart and he was friendly. No problems with him..other then it's weird that he seems to keep to himself a little.. Any other small petshop, especially ones in a mall with rodents.. They're horrible. All they'll do is sleep hunched over in a corner on pine bedding. Plus I think most gerbils are "friendly" from petshops, because usually they are young and aren't really old enough to know any better.  |
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Post by lizzy on Jul 16, 2004 10:10:41 GMT -8
I work at pets at home, so of course I'm not supposed to say this, but try to buy gerbils from a breeder if you possibly can. One of my gerbils that I got from PAH, where I work, is suffering from a sore/red/bleedy nose and mites, and has cost me around £25 in vets fees already, not to mention the amount of money I've had to spend on paper towels, because she seems to be allergic to most other beddings, and I've only had her a couple of weeks! But don't worry.. I shall definitely be informing my manager about this.. heh.
Next time I get gerbils I will get them from a breeder. However like you have said, maybe the state of affairs in the USA is better than here.. I sure hope it is!
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Post by crazycritter on Jul 19, 2004 10:53:21 GMT -8
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they rarely have any kind of care for there animals. to become a commercial breeder for the famous pets at home for example you have to produce a minimum of 100 gerbils per month, thats a huge amount! we have about one litter every 6 weeks out of our current pair, even when all three of our pairs are eventually breeding we will have no way that many per month. so if you take this into account how many gerbils are these breeders owning?
