Orphan Update

Poor Bamboo's babies are still doing well, even Amazing. Coach, the saphire, their nursery daddy, is doing a great job nurturing them and showing them how to eat and take care of themselves. Their favorite food, by far, is lettuces and greens (I get the packages of "Spring Mix"), but I am not giving them more them three or four leaves a day because I don't want them to get upset stomachs.

Gerbil Tragedy

Yesterday I walked into the animal room only to find Bamboo, one of my favorite females, dying of horrible seizures. As if that wasn't bad enough, she left behind six 20 day old pups, five of her own, and one foster, Amazing. The pups eyes are open, and they had started experimenting with solid food, so I have hopes that they will be able to make it with some TLC. It has been over 24 hours now and they still fat and energetic. I have seen them all eating some food and one drinking out of the water bottle, and they are all getting kitten formula, so I'm just crossing my fingers and hoping for the best right now. Below are some cute pictures of Amazing and his brothers (I think all six are boys). There are two nutmegs, one dark eyed honey, one agouti, and one spotted black. Amazing is an argente, and his hair is actually starting to grow in, but as you can see, there's still a lot of skin showing.

Tyr the Tortoise

Tyr the cherryhead redfoot tortoise is definitely growing. In November he weighed 705 grams, and was 6 inches long. Today he was 857 grams and 6.5 inches long. He barely fits on the scale anymore!

Exciting Gerbil Day

We had a big gerbil meetup today! There is a big gerbil show in May, and everyone was figuring out who they would be showing, swapping available gerbils, and registering gerbils that hadn't been registered yet with AGS. I came home with two beautiful boys from Donna of ABC Gerbils, she said she couldn't bear to place them in a pet home. I will be showing them in the pup class, we'll see how they do. I named them Pumpkin and Plush. I also reserved one female from a litter at Shawsheen River Gerbils of blue pups, a new dilute color they brought in from Finland. My new girl, named Blue Skye, will be living with an older female, Calico Flower, who's sister recently passed. I also arranged a "marriage" of another blue male, Hippu, with a spotted lilac female of mine, Bamboo. This will introduce spotting into the blue line, which is an exciting development. Here's a pic of Pumpkin and Plush-
Amazing the foster gerbil is doing amazingly well. Oddly enough, most of his body is hairless, although there is enough fur on his face to tell he is an argente. I think the hair will grow in eventually, but for now he is very funny to watch.

Happy Easter

Happy Easter from my two Easter Bunnies, Melody and Elvis.

Poor Rupert

Amazing the little pup is still doing great. I ended up putting him (or her) in with Bamboo, another mom who just had another litter, so Amazing will have less competition. Another funny thing that happened today was Walter gave Rupert a bath. He took it just fine, he is amazingly patient about the weirdest things.

Gerbil Foster Mom

Thought I'd share a cute story about a really good gerbil mom named Roxi. Last Saturday I was up at Donna of ABC gerbils house, and she showed me one of her females who had a new litter of three pups. One of the pups was tiny and failing, and she didn't seem to be taking care of it. Donna said that if the pups stayed with the mom it would probably die, so I should put it in with Roxi, who had three two and a half week old pups who were doing really well. I didn't know how that would work out, because the other pups were so much bigger then this tiny pink baby, but we tried it, and it's been almost a week and it seems to be thriving. I'm trying not to get too attached, but if it makes it I will name the pup Amazing. Here is a pic from this morning of little Amazing with the rest of the three week old litter.

We went to the beach

Lots of things have been happening, and all the gerbils are well. Just wanted to post about our super fun weekend, I got this picture of my new bunny Elvis the other day, he is a recent rescue that I saved from being eaten by a snake. He is part lionhead and I love his big "mane".

Also, yesterday me and Melody went to the beach at Plum Island. It was kind of windy, but the sun was shining, there were lots of other dogs on the beach to play with and it was a really great walk. I think there is not much prettier in the world then watching dogs play on the beach.