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Post by jesster on Apr 26, 2004 10:46:33 GMT -8
Hi!
I just rescued a 3 month old female gerbil from the SPCA. I already have 2 females (nearly 3 years old). Do I have any chance of getting the three of them to live together harmoniously?
Right now I have them in a split tank, but it is clear that the two older ones do NOT like their new little friend. It's been about 3 days so far. I have the pair on one side of the tank and the newcomer on the other side of the tank and I'm switching sides every day. Should I just be patient and continue with this? Or is there a better approach, like splitting up the pair and letting them get used to the newcomer one at a time. I hate to split them up, but if it will help then maybe I should try.
Looking forward to any advice or experience with this!
Jess
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Post by Ritzie/Admin on Apr 27, 2004 1:38:28 GMT -8
Hi Jess, Welcome here and good of you that you rescued a gerbil! I would not recommend you to add the new female to the two you already have! It is always hard if not impossible to introduce a adult gerbil female to an establish group (2 or more). The older they are the harder it gets! After 8-10 weeks of age I would not try it personally. Even with males, which are easier in general, I think it is not possible. Especially not with 3-year-old gerbils. I've tried it once with 3 males. I introduced the one with two that were already together for 3 years, and it went totally wrong! Even with washing them with water with a smell in it (I know some people use this method). I ended up with a failed introduction and the two that were together didn't accept each other also not anymore. So I hade to split them also again. And now a halve year later they started to fight all over again and had I to seperate them, unfortunatelly.  So you can imagine that I would not recommend it. Maybe you can introduce a young female to the rescued female? That would be much better and especially safer!  ;D What do you think you will do? Let us know, and if you decide to introduce them anyway, please keep us updated. We learn from other experiences too. ;D |
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Post by jesster on Apr 30, 2004 8:49:18 GMT -8
Thanks for your reply Peter. I still have the 3 in a split cage. Yesterday I let all 3 of them run around on the floor in my room. One of the two of the pair seems to have mostly accepted the new gerbil, but the other of the pair has not and starts fighting when they get close. I will keep the split cage for a little longer (maybe 2 weeks total), but I have bought a new tank in case it doesn't work out.
An interesting thing is that the gerbil who is not accepting the new gerbil is my "weird" gerbil. About 6 months ago she had a stroke or something (favouring one side, running in circled, falling over, losing balance, sleeping a lot, etc) and I thought she was going to die, but she got better but is still a bit "strange" in how she moves and behaves. I wonder if it's related.
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Post by Ritzie/Admin on Apr 30, 2004 12:07:52 GMT -8
Be always patient! Even with only two gerbil it can take sometime a while before they accept each other! Maybe the split cage method will also work with three gerbils!
I have had also a gerbil who had a stroke! She was paralysed at one side of her face! So I had to open her left eye regularly and her left ear was always down! She didn't have much problems with it and lived for more than a year with it (she was very old, her partner is now 4,5 years old)!
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;D