Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I was at a petstore and saw the cutest baby gerbils.The mom was in there to but the babies were just trying to sit up and nibble on food and kept falling over.They are so cute are they like rats? Do they get friendly and can you hold them? o
If they bite like hamsters then Im not interested at all.
How long do they live?
I do have pet rats so I have all the litter and a nice extra cage too.

Still around? I've just rescued two male gerbils, they're adoptable in a few weeks. I've been doing lots of reading on them. I also have rats, so I too am spoiled. The gerbils I have aren't friendly and "obsessive" over me like my rats are, but then these two have obviously not been handled much, or socialized anywhere near as well as my rattie boys have. Based on what I've read, gerbils are very sweet, not nippy like hamsters have a tendency to be (though hamsters from good breeders are no more nippy than a rat would be... any animal from a pet store might be nippy... it all depends on the breeder, and most pet store hamsters come from idiot breeders... not all of course, some really awesome breeders sell their little ones to pet stores, though that is the exception rather than the rule. I have a wonderfully sweet and loving dwarf hamster who was handled early on by her breeder, then sold to a pet store, then to me). Gerbils are very smart, and can be taught manners. The ones I have, even though they obviously haven't been well socialized, do not bite. One of them nibbles when he gets irritated at me, but it doesn't hurt. It's pretty much the same as when my rats nibble at my fingers when they think I have treats for them. Gerbils have one very huge advantage over other rodents: they pee very little, so their litter doesn't need to be changed as often as it does with rats or mice or hamsters. They're not like rats in personality... they don't try to rip the bars off their cage trying to be with you, and they don't lick the skin off your face when at last they are graced with your presence. Basically, I guess, you just have to love them as gerbils and not as rats!! They are unique, as a species and as individuals. I haven't had these two gerbils long, but they are definitely rewarding. They're fun to watch, and it tickles when they try to dig at my hands. It's neat to watch them drag all the toilet paper I give them into their house, and their fur is very soft. They're great in their own way. I try not to compare my pets to each other... if I did, I wouldn't love my mice nearly as much as I love my rats. But the mice are wonderful in their own little ways, just as the gerbils are wonderful in their own ways. You just have to learn to see them as they are. Gerbils aren't going to seek or enjoy your attention the way your rats do. But they will entertain the hell out of you nonetheless. Google "American Gerbil Society" for more info on gerbils. Check Petfinder for adoptable gerbils near you. I got two of my rats from our local humane society after finding them on Petfinder and I very, very highly recommend searching Petfinder before ever visiting a pet store or even a responsible breeder. I don't know how common it is to find the most absolutely perfect animal imaginable on Petfinder, but I've searched the site three times in the past year, and two of those times have resulted in me adopting three animals who have ended up being completely perfect.
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Kadee Sedtal

home of old lady Lucy (boxer/lab/garbage disposal), pretty girl Fancy (beagle), Crusher (yorkie), the rats-Chopin, Tchaikovsky, Pachebel, Fillmore, and Franz, the mice- Vivaldi, Schubert, Bartok, Johann, Giordi LaForge, Dorothy, Glenda, Em, and Rosa, and the wonderful winter white dwarf hamster- Feather
"I wish I had a dollar for every time I spent a dollar, because then, yahoo! I'd have all my money back." -Jack Handey