I've been reading all the posts going around lately, and I've been wondering... how does everyone see their gerbils? Maybe it is different if you have a dozen (or more!).. I don't know. Do you believe they have feelings and personalities? How smart DO you think they are? How do you think they see you?
I have two gerbils, but I'll start with the one I had last before these. Her name was Tippy and she was the sweetest thing. She was big and fat and brown with the sweetest kink in her tail.. She was a total pig and loved to eat and she got whatever I got for supper as a treat (I am smarter now.. but food made her so happy ;) Talk about bribing for love). She hated the alarm clock and the phone. Whenever they rang she sat RIGHT UP and looked at me and said WHAT IS THATALL ABOUT ?!?! Let me sleep okay!! with her eyes. She lived to 3, when she started making clicking noises. I was in Toronto then, and the only vet downtown who knew anything about small animals was far away by but and subway. But she looked really sic so, very well wrapped up, of we went to the vet. Unfortunately the small animal vet wasn't there, and the other one knew NOTHING. She said that she had seen a hamster once, and a guinea pig, and !
weren't they all the same (?!?). Anyway (I am still mad), she said that Tip had a sunflower seed addiction and to give her bird vitamins, and she gave her a shot to hydrate her. Tippy didn't look any better. When I went home for vacation a few days later, I took her to a vet in Alberta who immediately saw her heart condition. I started her on medication but by then it was too late. We sat up for 3 nights together, her in my hand, and I kept asking her if it was okay to put her down, but she LOOKED at me and said not yet just wait a bit okay, so I waited. It was the middle of winter but I managed to find some watermelon (her favourite) and she had SUCH a treat, and then I phoned the vet. But happily for poor Tip she died 10 mins before we were supposed to leave. I have had really bad experiences with inexperienced vets putting gerbils down, so I was happy that tippy didn't have to go through that. But I missed her so!
much! I had been away at school for the first time, and I didn't know anyone, and she had been my little friend, to come home to every day, and I had told her all about my day. Poor Tip..but she was the most coddled, loved gerbil so she had a happy gerbil life.
My gerbils now are Kippy and Percy. Kip (she-gerbil) is big and fat and brown (just as I like 'em) and solid. She is also stubborn. She loves to eat and will take food from my hand when she is in the mood (she does have moods). She will also have tantrums and wreck her nest. She makes me think of a little girl, 8 years old, with springy pigtails tied by a messy bow. She is a darling, and she nips, but usually it they are a pinching nip, asking to be PUT DOWN NOW OKAY!!. She is also really scared of things. I had gotten her originally for Tippy, for company while I was at school (she was about 6 mos old when Tip died) and Tippy and i raised her together. (For part of my year I had 2 little friends :)). When Tippy died she was so scared and sad and she kept looking at me and asking WHERE IS MY TIP?OOHNONONO.. so I got her a little baby, Priscilla, whom she promptly attacked. One mad and sad !
Kippy and one terrified baby lived in seperate cages until it was time for me to go back to school. I divided their carry-case into two parts but the plane was delayed and they both looked to car-sick from the drive to the airport that I removed the barrier and they cuddled together. And now they looove each other :) :) My Percil (Priscilla turned into a boy) is my little gray momma's boy. He is skinny and fearless. He loves to touch noses with my family dogs when we are home visiting. He loves to chew, *especially* strawberry baskets, which he doesnt get too often because they are plastic. He !
falls asleep in my hand and sometimes I go around the house for over an hour with a limp little gray puff in one hand. He will not take food from my hand (wierd) but he is so sweet! I have always loved gerbils, but this little boy feels like a bit of my heart was cut away and made into a Percil.. corny, I know, and my friends think I'm nuts. They all insist on recounting the grisly end to their childhood small pets, which I loathe hearing. Percil is so darling, and when I come in the door he pokes up his head and watches me until I come to give him a pat.
And they do communicate. When Kippy wants food that is new (as in, food with sunflower seeds, which she does not often get) she will wait until I am watching, and then spill her bowl. And when she wants fresh water she'll fill up her bowl with bedding (They refuse to drink from a tube)
I DO believe they have little personalities. Everyone says I am making it up. But irf you look at their bulgy shiny eyes it is easy to understand what they want. Maybe I AM crazy ;)
Anyway, sorry this is so long. I must get back to work..;)
--Melanie, Kip, Percy, and little Tippy's ghost
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