baby gerbils

Question
QUESTION: i have 4 baby gerbils that no longer have a mother. my sneaky female rat removes the cage lids and gets in the gerbil cages to eat there pumpkin or sunflower seeds. she cant put the lid back on lol. later that day my girlfriend came home and there was blood on the living room floor. she went and looked at my dog and she was fine then she went into the kids room( our rodents bedroom) and saw that our mamma gerbil was gone. there was grey hair all over around the blood and idk what to do with the babies. how to feed them or anything. then out of nowere my other female rat lilly(gental,sweet,affectionet, and a mommy of 5, just weaned her litter) jumps in the cage with the babys and wont leave. i came back into the room later and she was nursing them .im just wanting to make sure thats ok. i dont want the baby gerbils to die or get hurt. but lilly wont let me or my girlfriend touch the babys she jumps at us and bites our hands when we go to move her adn check on them. idk what to do. please help me.

ANSWER: Hi Marcus

I'm really sorry to hear about your gerbil mum.  It is a real shame that this has happened.  Babies are totally reliant on their mum in the early days - once they get to about 2-3 weeks old then you are usually confident that they will survive, but prior to this they need her for food and warmth.  It is great that your rat has decided to look after them.  Some animals naturally look after orphaned babies and it sounds like she has adopted them.  My only concern is whether or not she has enough milk for the babies.

If she is happy to stay in the cage with them and isn't harming them, then I would suggest you leave her there, but close the lid so she can't get out.  It might be worth contacting your local vet and asking if they have any of the powdered milk that is for orphaned animals.  It is different from standard milk, or even cats milk as it is easy to digest and is diluted with water.  If you can get this then you could use this with a tiny dropper to feed the babies although by the sounds of it Lilly may not let you.  If she looks as though she is doing a good job, then let her get on with it and you have to trust in nature that it will be OK.

It would be a good idea to buy a packet of baby food - I find the creamy porridge oats is the favourite.  Mix a little with water and put about a teaspoon of this on a low dish into the cage.  Lilly can eat this and it will help give her extra nutrients to feed the babies.  When the babies are about 2 weeks old they will start to leave the nest and they can eat it too if you put it in a low enough dish/jam jar lid.  You can also drop seeds - sunflower, linseed, sesame etc. near the nest, also small pieces of bread, raw porridge oats etc. as the babies will be able to start eating these from about 1 week.

At 4 weeks of age you do need to sex and separate out any boys.  They can live together in one tank, and the girls in another.

I have never heard of a rat raising gerbils, but this may well work.  Assuming these are very young babies, then this might be their best chance.  If it isn't working - if you don't think she is feeding them, or they look as though they are not eating enough or gaining weight, then you might need to remove her from the tank and take over the feeding yourself with the special milk.  You do need to give some of this to each baby every hour or two certainly for the first week, but as you get closer to 2 weeks you might be able to give less as they will start eating solid food.  However, you must make sure the babies are kept warm as their body temperature can drop in a matter of minutes if they are outside the nest until they gain a bit of weight and full body fur.

In terms of Lilly harming the babies - hopefully her maternal instinct will be to protect them.  Unfortunately with babies, there is never any guarantee they will be OK - some mums get stressed, or feel threatened etc. and this can cause them to harm the babies.  If you do touch any of the babies make sure you touch all of them so you don't single out just one of them.  Also, if Lilly doesn't want you near them, stay away, but if Lilly wants to come out for a play this might give you an opportunity to check up on the babies.  

I hope this helps you and you get on OK - please let me know.

Regards
Sheila

---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------

QUESTION: The babies are doing great. There smaller than they should be but they all have bellies on them.
lilly is ok with us messing with them and checking on them but only if we pay attention to her also
she is very spoiled lol. And another question. One of the grey gerbils died last Thursday and im pretty
sure that somthin was wrong with it. Lilly pushed it out of the nest and nether me nor my girl friend
were home. The other ones are fine, but lilly keeps grabbing the orange one and will not let it leave
the nest the other two grey ones wonder all over the cage but she wont let the orange one play
with its sibblings. She isn't hurting it or anything just wont let it leave the nest.

Answer
Hi Marcus

Thanks for the update.

Animals who live in colonies tend to push any sick creature out of the nest so that they don't all die from the illness.  I suspect that Lilly knew that the baby had something wrong with it and therefore perhaps for her own safety, and that of the other gerbils, she decided to push it out.  It is very sad, but I have heard of it happening before.

It is curious about Lilly not letting the orange gerbil out of the nest. While rats are believed to be colour blind, they can somehow distinguish between different colours.  I have heard of groups of Russian hamsters picking on the one in the litter that was a different colour, but obviously in Lilly's case she seems more protective of this particular one.  Do you know what sex it is?  Is it different from the other two gerbils? As long as she isn't hurting it, I would think this is fine.

I wonder if her behaviour towards the gerbils will change when they get a bit bigger, but for the time being I think this is a lovely story and it just goes to show how nature will take care of one another.

Regards
Sheila