My daughter owns two gerbils. One boy gerbil, one girl gerbil. Or I suppose, given that they are both 2 years old and fully mature, a man-gerbil and a woman-gerbil. They live in separate cages because we don’t own a python and we can’t trust the cats to clean up after themselves. My daughter, by the way, is 11 years old and increasingly curious about…natural things. To this end, she was curious as to what sorts of natural things might happen if she were to impose a life of sin upon the gerbils and move womangebil into mangerbil’s quarters. A sensible choice really, because he has the most amazing nest made from a shredded washcloth lying at the bottom level of a three-level cage. He is a well-appointed gerbil.
It will come as no surprise to those of you who have a clue about gerbils that the meeting did not go well. The life of solitude had deprived mangerbil of any social graces and he viewed womangerbil, not as a voluptuous nubile but as an intruder bent solely on raiding his coveted cache of sunflower seeds. So he attempted to kill womangerbil. And it was actually a good thing that he erred on the side of hostility because womangerbil seemed pretty intent on protecting her virginity even if it meant splattering the enclosure with the blood of a mangerbil.
The 11 year old goddess looked on with much surprise and horror and plunged both hands into the fray in an attempt to break up the fight. It was at this point that she learned that gerbils really don’t have a problem getting their teeth buried to the gums into the flesh of a little human girl, and that they can hang on in spite of vigorous shaking and screaming. A few minutes later, after mom & I have executed a high-court-appointed separation and declared a summary restraining order against both of the offending creatures, I was tending to the torn and bleeding fingertips of my daughter. In an effort to cast a little sympathy onto the situation, I reminded her that when I was 6 I had a rabbit chomp down on my own fingertip (left index if you must know), and that thanks to that beast of a rodent I required a trip to the ER and 6 stitches.
Through her sobs, she managed to hitch out, “Lagomorph, dad!” :rolleyes:
Your preteen is adorable, even in tears. Truth be known, I know how she felt.
I was about 9, all full of piss and vinegar. And cheezies. Because I loved cheezies. So there I was at a friend’s house, eating cheezies and I saw my friend’s gerbil cage. He was a damn cute little bugger, all furry and stuff. I just wanted to love him and pet him and hug him and squeeze him. So I reached into the cage intent on starting with the petting. He sniffed my finger – which was fair enough I suppose, since I wouldn’t want someone petting me if I didn’t know where their finger had been. It was then that I learned my first, second, and third objects lessons about gerbils:
Gerbils like cheezies.
Gerbils are creatures of simple thought.
If it looks like a cheezie and smells like a cheezie, a gerbil will try to eat it.
I had been eating cheezies, thus my finger was covered in delicious cheezie dust. The math pretty much adds itself up at this point. I yanked my wounded cheezie-finger from the cage but quick, then ran to the bathroom to run it under cold water.
It was there that I learned my fourth lesson about gerbils: Gerbil bites bleed a lot.
And then there was the time back when I was teaching psychology and using a colleague’s gerbil to demonstrate operant conditioning, and he chomped down on me when I was transferring him from the Skinner box back to his cage.
I like to think I maintained a reasonable amount of dignity and restraint, but…ow.
When I was just a wee lad. I had a gerbil (Mouse was her name, I thought it was a funny name for a gerbil). She broke her leg and had to be taken to the vet, who taped up her little gerbil leg so it could heal.
It also did not improve her temper, when on the way back from the vet I noticed that she had rolled over on her side, and my Mother reached in and tried to right the little rodent.
More than thirty years later, and my mother has not yet let me forget it was my fault she got bit by a gerbil :p
I’m sorry that your return was occasioned by such pain for your daughter. But… anyone who can correct someone about the rodent/lagomorph dichotomy while being tended for gerbil bites gets mega cool points.
We let our mangerbil and womangerbil share a cage. They acted like gerbils are supposed to do…in other words, womangerbil got pregnant.
She gave birth to about four babies, IIRC, and when Daddygerbil began to eat them, we thought it best if we make Mommygerbil a single mom.
We think one of her babies was…a little slow. He had a tail that curled up over his back and every so often, for no reason, he would spin in circles in the cage.