Gerbil "Escape from Alcatraz"

We are theorizing two things about the gerbils.

1. They think they are people and should not be penned in.
2. They watched "Escape from Alcatraz" late night a few times and were inspired.

 Anyways, the plain cardboard we had rigged to the top of their play pen was not working out any longer.  Both gerbils had learned the art of getting to the top of the cardboard - fortunately never at the same time.  One seems to have a quick method and the other was more methodical.  In either case, they were mere inches from having free roam of the house and all the delicious wood furniture.  We were fortunate to notice in time to recapture them.  They seem a little fearful of jumping down from their high position which helped us.  They did not go back without a "fight" though - they tried to go hide in an area in the corner which was hard to get to but in the end we got them.

Since this was not really how I wanted to spend my evenings, I decided to make a better "guard" for the top of the pen.  I had some thin luan plywood (5/32" ?) and some chunks of 1x2 lumber laying around the garage along with a box of 1 5/8" drywall screws.  That along with my table saw, miter saw, drill press and cordless drill and piece of sand paper and I had all I needed to better secure our talented and very gymnastic gerbils.

The basic idea was to:

• Cut the luan into strips roughly 4.5" x 60" on the table saw
• cut each luan strip into about 13" lengths (based it on the panels in the pen and made nearly the same length). 
• sand the edges of the luan a bit since it tends to splinter a lot
• Cut the 1x2 lumber into 2" length blocks.
• Pre-drill the 2" blocks through the small edge since they are prone to splitting with the drywall screws. I drilled 2 holes in each but only really needed 1 on the second inner piece. 
• Locate the first block on the edge of a luan rectangle and drill through original hole and the luan.  That allowed locating where to screw from the top.  Repeat that basic process for both blocks and the remaining screws.  I left about 1/8" gap between them for the fence. And just to note, I probably could have done things differently/faster (pre-drill and  locate hole from top of luan in one step but I didn't think about it until I had already done most of the blocks).

Below is a complete panel.

 

Here is my daughter placing a panel back on the fench.

 

And this is what the whole thing looks like afterwards.  The only real change I might make is rounding the corners of the panels.  I'll try and make time for that soon.

The gerbils tried it out tonight and so far were not able to effectively use their existing tricks.  I think it will make them try harder.  I'll start planning for the next tactic to keep them contained and safe.

Below is a video of what we were trying to prevent.

Enjoy!


[2016/02/02] aka, the day after.  Ok, so even though the overhang is pretty big - more than 3.5 inches, I found "Thumper" wandering around on top of the new wood panels when I went to check email.  I thought I had them.  Joke is on me. Now I need to find "the next level".  I'm going to have to setup a webcam or something to figure out how they are doing this now.

Gerbil info for parents

It has been about 8 months since we purchased our 2 gerbils.  This post is just a bit of a parents perspective to go along with the pretty large amount of information on the internet by kids and young adults.  These comments are based on our 2 gerbils alone.

This post isn't really for or against gerbils - it is just things we learned about gerbils or in having a child taking care of gerbils.

Each gerbil can definitely have a different personality.  If compared to cartoon characters from Scooby Doo, one of ours is like Fred while our other gerbil is more like Scooby Doo.  One isn't as easily startled and tends to be more active (runs on the wheel) while the other is a little more skittish but quite quick and agile. 

This is pretty much a brain dump of thoughts.

• They are pretty easy to care for.  Given food, water, regular cage cleaning and some attention - they seem pretty content.  There are a few other things noted below too though.
• Pet stores carry food which works well for them.  We use Oxbox Essentials Hamster & Gerbil food as the primary food.  As a treat/supplement we give them All living Things hamster & gerbil daily diet.  Over time, we started looking for more things to treat them with (yes, you start to spoil them) - they seem to like eCotrition Yogies which are a cheese flavor like thing.   
• They do like some hay to eat and nest with.  
• They can have distinct likes and dislikes regarding other treats (given in small quantities) like raisins, grapes, strawberries, blue berries, hard cheeses, and even bits of egg.
• They like to chew is an understatement of epic proportions.  They NEED to chew and you must keep them in constant supply of things to chew. The small wood huts from the pet store will quickly grow new entrances, exits and enlargement of the initial openings.  Plan on adding a new hut every ~6 months or so based on what we saw so far.  Plan on providing new wooden play things on a regular basis. I was building little wooden play things out of craft sticks and it is amazing how fast they will turn something into wood chips.  They are also fond of chewing on clothes - be aware, my sweat pants are a bit aerated now.  A good supply of dried blackberry cane works but they seem to prefer the willow from the pet store so far.  Of course, save all your toilet paper rolls and paper towel rolls for them.  A toilet paper roll is about a 5 minute time to a pile of remnants.  We ended up with some empty Christmas and birthday paper rolls - they acted like they hit the jackpot!  They can also be pretty loud when they chew - depending a bit on what it is too.  This can be loud enough to be distracting if you are in the same room.

• They are FAST and agile.  Only get them out in an area where they can't slip under a door or out any other holes.  If you have "stuff" piled up - they will use it to hide in/under.  
• Can can jump 10-12 inches pretty easily.  This was more noticeable when younger and in "home made" play areas using books, cardboard box pieces, etc.  
• They like to crawl under you.  BE CAREFUL sitting or trying to stand in an area with them - it would be REAL easy to sit or step on one.  If you move a cage/tank to a play area for them - be careful if moving it while they are out since they tend to RUN under things as you try to set the object on the floor.  We have had a couple of close calls because they ran under a tank as we moved it to the area they were playing in.
• They are most active late in the evening (after ~7pm) and are usually moving around in the morning.  Our wonderful little Thumper will run on his wheel into the night - I have woken to him running at 3am. 
• They don't tend to bite/nip (much).  They can nip on occasion; when young it was more of a "hm, is this finger edible" test.  Once older it has been more of a "please don't chase me, I don't want to be handled now" or maybe a "you haven't paid attention to me recently".  A few times it was an accident in that they were trying to sample something like my sock while on my foot and got a hold of more than desired (by both of us). They have never broken skin and at this point I don't tend to worry about being bitten.
• If you have an exercise wheel and the gerbil likes it; the metal ones tend to be quite noisy.  The gerbils can run fast enough that you can hardly see their feet.  Our Thumper has done multiple flips in the thing and flung himself out on a number of times when we were watching. Ours actually seems to like attention when on the wheel - he has us trained to clap after a fast run and he will do sprints and then stop and look your direction as if expecting some clapping.  You may be thinking "yeah, right.." but I think you will find that they do indicate they like attention and find various was of showing that.
• Ok, lets get this over with;  the gerbils poop a lot.  Of course, the more you feed them..  If you give them "out time" - meaning time outside of their cage/tank - plan on some cleanup.  We have wood floors which is likely better than carpet but still not all that pleasant.  Also note that they tend to kick it up in the air when they take off running - so it will likely find its way into areas outside where they stay/play.  The good news is that it tends to be pretty dry and is easily cleaned up with a tissue or piece of toilet paper.  If some low ceramic bowls are laying around the play area, they do seem to "potty" there more that average but they will go pretty much anywhere though.  If you let the gerbils use a "gerbil ball", you will want to check behind them for any presents they leave behind.
• Our daughter doesn't like to clean up after then and it shows.  Plan on being involved in the cleanup or at least making sure it is done well enough.
• There is still interest in them after 8 months but it isn't like having something like a dog.  I think if given the opportunity, our daughter would want the dog and would be "ok with keeping the gerbils too".  
• They do enjoy crawling on people.  There seems to be enough of a difference in their claws to where one has an easier time climbing up shirts than the other depending on the material.  If you sit cross legged they will stand on your knees and look around. 
• At around 9 months in age, they still don't tend to sit still for very long when out of their cage - they only sit still to chew on whatever is nearby.  Holding them is possible with one for a short period but the other one is always in motion so it is like holding one of those kids "water snake" toys where it is always in a state of sliding out of your hand (crawling in this case).
• Our gerbils can be "petted" but only very little.  Mainly if they are eating something they really like.  Otherwise they tend to move away after a few seconds.

• We have taken the camping in a travel trailer 3 times so far.  Make sure your AC works since they spend their time indoors.  I would not take them outside unless it was an emergency.  They are not too bad to travel with but remember to remove the wheel at night if you are a light sleeper.
• We have also taken then on a week long vacation down south.  If you don't have other pets, remember that you have them and that hotels may charge you extra for having them or deny your stay if they don't allow pets.  We didn't plan ahead for our trip home and this was a little bit of an issue.

The setup of the 10g plastic fish tank plus 2 story tank topper is a decent amount of living space for our 2 gerbils.  I think that combo was about $200.  You can probably find cheaper, I simply found places that had what I wanted.   Then there are other items - some needed upfront and others just acquired over time.  If you get a cage topper (for an aquarium) then I suggest finding a thin rod (brass works well) at either a craft store or home center.  Bend the end to a small J shape and you can use that to snake though the top of the topper to lift the ramp that rests in the aquarium.  This greatly simplified the removal of the topper without a gerbil getting smacked by the ramp or trying to climb it while removing the topper.

•  hut(s)
• chew sticks 
• food
• hay
• treats
• water bottle (best get one that is a anti-chew style)
• wheel (7-8 inch version seems the right size)
• bowl and chinchilla dust (they do seem to like their dust baths) - they do tend to make messes in this as well.  Either sift, carefully extract "stuff" or replace once it starts to get excessively dirty.  You don't have to let them play with it daily but they will use it if you do.  Watching them "flop" in the dust is pretty funny to watch.
• maybe some ceramic dishes 
• used under water bottle to catch drips
• food dish if desired
• "potty" - just a spot they tend to go in.  This gets used a lot but otherwise the tank itself fills quicker; generally clean the dishes daily.
• ceramic tiles 
• I put 4-6 of these in the tank & topper.  They seem to prefer standing on these than the cage wires. I bury some in the bedding in the hopes their digging against them helps  wear their claws/nails down.  The tiles in the topper tend to need daily cleaning also.
• "pet fences" 
• We purchased 4 of them.  If you hook 2 together you get a nice ~4-5 ft diameter play area.  The ones we have are only about 9 inches tall so we took 2 more and hooked them on top with twist ties to prevent the gerbils from jumping out easily.
• Smaller tank for in the car while traveling is nice.  Can let them play in it at other times too.

 Here is a pick of the general setup.  Note; don't leave the gerbils unattended with the towels - it isn't great for them to chew but we do let them "burrow" while they play with us in the play area.

[2015/11/08 - updates]

1. Both gerbils are still very healthy.
2. One gerbil has a strong desire to not be caged and has learned over the last 3-4 weeks how to "climb" out of the fenced enclosure. By basically performing a quick hop as high as possible and then quickly grasping the bars with a climbing motion he uses a bit of momentum to reach the top of the fence. It took many attempts to get it right but he now repeats it at will.  It is entertaining to watch - until he is free. Our initial mitigation was to put a ~4-5" strip of cardboard around the top edge of the fence so he couldn't find anything to grip to climb over.  A minor gap one evening though allowed him a short lived freedom.  He enjoyed taunting us as we tried variations of chasing, enticing with food and general corralling.  After about 20 minutes my daughter finally caught him.  It probably could have been sooner but I couldn't stop laughing at the sight of my wife *flat* on the floor with arms outstretched in what I can only describe as a mild form of pinball using her hands to try and keep the gerbil within reach. Trust me, the gerbil was not hurt in this (wish I had video, might have been a winner on "America's Funniest Home Videos") - I think my wife was more traumatized than the gerbil (not real found of gerbils that close up to her face).  A few other escape attempts were close - we had to move the tank/topper to nearer the center of the fenced area since it appears he was able to jump onto the outside of the topper in the back and then climb/jump to the flat cardboard area.  So far, our changes are working but we'll likely have to continue coming up with new ways to keep him in.  It seems a bit like "Escape from Alcatraz".
3. The same escape artist gerbil is a bit nippy at times recently.  I am starting to equate the timing with having handled foods he likes (almonds being the common one).  He starts with sniffing the fingers and then attempts to gnaw.  He follows fingers when you move and keeps trying - it is a bit annoying but now I try not to handle food before handling him.  Washing hands *really well* before handling him helps a bit but I think he can still tell.  I don't think he is trying to purposely hurt me (or others).  He just doesn't seem to differentiate between the smell of food and the real thing as well as his brother.  His brother doesn't exhibit this behavior. 
4. We are now putting down builders paper (at Lowes) under the overall play area.  This gets replaced weekly during cage cleaning.  It helps to contain their various "outputs" a bit and reduces the amount of damp mopping needed on the hardwood floor. 
5. If you sit with them and they hang out behind you a lot - best to keep an eye on what they are doing - I now have a pair of sweat pants which I can't wear in public because of them.. You may think they are only bumping/pushing on you but that is likely not what they are up to. :)  You've been warned..

The funny things children do - our daughter

Ok, so you find a piece of paper sitting in the kitchen which looks like it was supposed to be the start of a "to get" list.  You take a quick look and laugh because it says "Gerbowl wiper" and we just naturally expected that she was being funny and was reminding us to get both a real bowl for the gerbils that they could use for a sand bath and something it clean it out with. 

What we didn't realize until a wee bit later is that the note was sitting on a kitchen washcloth and she was saying that she had used it to clean up a makeshift sand bath container we had been using. 

We now question the meaning of any notes and don't grab washcloths which are laying around..

The little things we can tease the kids with later in life are quite funny.. Hope to never forget any of these little things.

Enjoy and God bless!
Scott

Thumper - The jumping gerbil

Ok, we are still working out how to keep the gerbils in a safe contained area while letting them roam a bit.  One of our gerbils, Thumper, just has the need to roam outside of any "contained area".  He is pretty smart to start with and is getting better at escaping contained areas and now has found that he can jump pretty high.  I think we will have to work on a way to contain him in our hallway by blocking off a few doors and such with towels - that will give some room to roam but prevent the need to empty out the "treasure" that my daughter tends to collect under her bed while trying to convince Thumper to come out.  Actually Thumper does tend to come out and I think he may actually like being chased a little - it is quite funny to see how easily he evades us. 

Here is a quick video showing how high he can jump.  I do fear that he will hurt himself if he keeps this up though.

The family addition - pets

So our kids have been wanting a pet for some time.  Our son would like a cat and our daughter wants a horse but would "make do" with a dog.  yeah, right..

I'm not a cat person.  My wife has never really had indoor pets.  I had dogs as a kid and really enjoy them but for a couple of reasons they just are not a good fit for our family (right now).  Part of me would really like a dog but I just can't justify it.  I even researched them and picked out around 4 breeds which I really like that would make nice pets for us.

Eventually, I came back to reality and started looking into other possible pets.  No cats. Can't be big.  No fish or birds.  No lizards, snakes or similar.  Kids don't want a goat (ok, too big too for indoors).  Finally looked at rodents of various sorts.  I didn't want something that was mainly up during the night.  Prefer something that is pretty easy to care for.  Something that doesn't tend to smell too bad.  Something that can be held/handled/played with to a decent extent.

After some research and a good number of youtube videos it was pretty clear that gerbils would fit the requirements pretty well.  They do chew *a lot* and it sounded like it would be best to get a pair of them (same sex though).  I didn't really want multiple critters but because they otherwise sounded like a good idea I decided to pursue this further.

I decided to test the waters with the kids though but in a non-obvious fashion to gauge whether they would be interested.  Ok, more like whether my daughter was interested - I know my son would enjoy watching them but would never want to take care of them.  Anyway, one Saturday morning I took us all over to a nearby pet store to just "look around".  I don't think I thought this through well enough first.  Anyways, we get there and they have a number of dogs there needing adoption.  My daughter makes a bee line for them and decides that "cupcake" is what we need.  I very briefly got the kids down the rodent section but they had no interest.  I thought the whole pet idea was done at that point.

A week or 2 later, we were having dinner and pets came up again and I told them I had considered letting them have gerbils.  At that point my daughter finally expressed some excitement and interest.

So the pet idea was back on track now.  Previous stops at the pet store didn't leave me very optimistic because they only ever had one lonely gerbil.  I made another quick stop one night to the pet store and they had 3 young male gerbils that had just come in.  They were still in their quarantine waiting period but they were there!  A couple more trips to the pet store and the kids in tow - they still seemed interested so we loaded our arms up with all the necessities and head home with 2 new family members.

As an aside, my wonderful wife that is pet tolerant but not excited about pets generally looked at me at one point as we were heading to get the little guys and says "they have 3 of them.  hm.".  Anyways, we started laughing and commenting on feeling bad about leaving one behind.  In the end, we had to get only 2 of the 3 but it was close.

We didn't initially have the full size tank/setup we were working on so it would have been really cramped.  I have a larger tank on order but it has yet to be delivered after 2 weeks - supposed to be here tomorrow but we'll see.  The 2 story tank topper arrived pretty quick and even though it wasn't optimum, we are able to put it on top of the smaller tank we have.  The little guys do seem much happier with the extra space of the topper.

It took us a day or so to commit to names for the gerbils.  One is a honey/white mix (Thumper) and the other is black with white around the front ankles (Shadow).  We did have to laugh at a few earlier name ideas which were girl names.  I know the gerbils don't care but hey, it just seemed too wrong :)

It has been a couple weeks now and the little guys have grown a lot.  We have learned a lot as well.  They are now pretty tame; they are ok being held but are so active that it doesn't last too long.  They both have very distinct personalities.  Thumper is a full throttle adventurer/explorer and a bit of an escape artist.  He now scales the outside of the topper and has learned that he can jump pretty high which he uses to get loose for quick explorations of his surroundings while we try to "convince" him to go back to the "safe area".  He is a bit larger than Shadow and that may be because he really likes to eat and seems to try and steal his brothers food at times.  Thumper isn't really scared most of the time.  Shadow on the other hand is smaller and a little shy and skittish.  He is not quite as wild overall but is an impressive sprinter if startled. Shadow is much easier to just let wander on our folded arms and chest.

We are still sorting out their environment.  I need a nice bowl for their dust bath instead of a plastic ice cream bucket.  They are supervised with it but they still try to give it a quick nibble here and there which I know isn't good.  We are still working out food/treats a bit.  We are using plain dry gerbil food as the primary food but am trying to use a seed/nut food as the source for "treats".  I have some hay which they seem to both nibble and use in the normal bedding.  For bedding, I am using aspen shavings and white Carefresh which they seem to like.  It does support some tunneling.  For the aspen shavings, it can be somewhat expensive at the pet store but I did get our next batch from Tractor Supply - much larger quantity and very good price.  Not ready to use it yet but am prepared.  Only downside seems to be the larger storage requirement.  They really enjoy chewing up toilet paper rolls, paper towel rolls, toilet paper and store-bought willow sticks.

Here are a couple quick videos of our furry friends.

Our entire family is enjoying the gerbils.  My daughter is learning how to be responsible and take care of them.  Her and I really enjoy playing with them.  My wife and son enjoy watching them and watching me and the daughter play with them.  I think we get laughed at quite a bit but we love every minute of it.