Considering a new cage

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Idgie

Chin Geek
Joined
Jan 30, 2009
Messages
318
Location
Chicago burbs
I’m considering getting a new cage for Ripley. I was looking at the Ferret and Critter Nation 2 Level. I’m leaning toward the FN because it bolts together and seams sturdier. (Ripley currently is in a cage with 1 inch spacing & that is fine)

Couple questions:
1. If the FN bolts together, then can I unassemble and reassemble a couple times a year? (I spend a couple months a year in another state)
2. Is the cage ready to go after you buy it or are there accessories that I’d need to purchase or modifications that need to be made? (I have her water and food things-I mean for the cage itself.)
3. Is it better to use fleece liners with these than bedding? Seems that the bedding would just go out the sides of the cage onto the floor. If so, who sells them and how often do you need to change them? Ripley drinks/pees a lot!

Thanks!
 
Hi Idgie.

I don't know much about the FN, but I do have a critter nation and they are incredibly well made and sturdy cages, despite not being bolted together. The parts lock themselves in and there's no way for any pieces to fall off unless you take it apart piece by piece in order. The only piece "loose" at the end is the lid, which latches on to stay closed. Having had a chinchilla break its leg in a cage with 1" spacing I will never go back above 1/2", I'm even considering lining my CN with 1/2" mesh. The horizontal bars of the CN also better allow chins to wall-surf within the cage and to climb.

That said, the cages are quite similar so I can help with your other questions. Midwest (the manufacturer) sells the fleece liners, though the cage should come with fleece liners for the wire ramps. I personally just use fleece blankets and wrap them around the bottom pan and shelf. My Chin is litter trained and pretty much exclusively pees in his litter box, but I vacuum out the cage with a small hand vacuum every day. You can get wet/dry hand vacs for about $80 if he does pee on the fleece a lot, should allow you to keep the same fleece in a little longer but regardless they should be changed pretty much every week.

You can buy side-guards to go inside the cage to keep bedding inside, but I've read that they don't work that well and also since they go inside the cage they cut down the floor space by about 2" on all sides.

Both the FN and CN can be disassembled, though with anything that bolts together like the FN you always run the risk of stripping the threads and would then have a much harder time rebuilding them. They are on wheels though, so moving both around is quite simple.

Hopefully I helped a bit, let me know if you have any other questions!
 
Thanks. Is the spacing on the walls only or is there somewhere on the flooring that is mesh? Do they hurt their feet bouncing off the walls? Someone said that the Lixit bottles don’t fit well in the 1/2”. That’s what I use, so that could matter.

I am concerned about stripping the threads, too, but didn’t know if I could unsnap the CN. I travel in a truck across country and take her cage with me, so I was hoping to make it smaller for travel. I could possibly leave it together, but it is over 100 pounds!

Maybe I’ll switch to fleece from bedding, but it will be wet after one pee & I wasn’t sure how fast it dried or if it smelled. Guess that I could get several pieces of fleece and change it every few days. I would still wipe the cage down every week with water/vinegar.
 
Unless you can find one of the older FN cages (I think they stopped making them about 5-10 years ago) then they don't bolt together anymore, they are exactly the same as the CN, just different bar spacing. The FN has 1" mostly vertical bars and the CN has 1/2" mostly horizontal bars.

To answer you questions:

1. Yes it can be disassembled, but might be time consuming, depending on how disassembled you want it. If you want to just take the top and bottom units apart that's pretty straight forward, but you will likely need help to take the whole thing apart and put back together. Likely a mallet and pry bar too.

2. The cage does come with plastic pans, so they do need to be replaced with metal ones (most people get them at Bass Equipment) or covered with fleece. I also advise against using the ramps, they are unnecessary and a potential hazard. That's pretty much it to make it chin safe, but you can also add more shelves, ledges, perches, hammocks, etc.

3. I use fleece in my FN, I don't have metal pans yet so that works for me, you can't use bedding in the plastic pans since the chin would chew the plastic. Keep in mind though fleece is only safe so long as your chin doesn't eat it. There are vendors on here like Fleece for Furries that make fleece liners. I make my own, it's much cheaper if you can do it that way. The fleece needs to be changed at least once a week, but most people change it a couple times a week. It depends on your chin and if they are litter trained to pee in a box or not, some people change it as often as once a day. So you will need at least 2 sets, one to have in the cage while you wash the other.
 
The spacing is 1/2" on all surfaces, but there is a plastic pan that sits on the bottom of the cage and a plastic shelf. Those are what I wrap in fleece. My chin does pee on the fleece sometimes, but mostly in his litter, and so long as I change the litter every day and the fleece once a week I don't ever smell anything. It absorbs/dries quite quickly when he does pee on it.

If you switch to fleece you may be surprised though; put a litter box in the corner and fill it with the bedding you currently use, and I'd say there's a good chance he will pee almost exclusively in that bedding. That's all I did with my fella, and he almost never pees outside it.

As for the water bottle, I'm not sure. I have both a Kaytee and a Living World one, and they look to have about the same size nozzle as the Lixit. It's a bit tight, but the nozzle does go through the bars just fine. The Kaytee and LW can be hung inside the cage if necessary too, but it doesn't look as though that Lixit can be.

As I said I had a chin break his leg in a cage with 1" spacing, though I didn't see how it happened so it could potentially be unrelated, though I couldn't think of anything else that could have happened besides a failed wall-surf. My chin now bounces off the walls of his cage like a madman, he has for months with no problems. Doesn't hurt his feet, they have pretty tough feet these little guys (just not tough shin-bones.)

If you're leaning towards the FN I haven't heard anything bad about it, I'm just super paranoid now because of the leg break. And my fella LOVES climbing the walls of his CN, I often come home to him just hanging on the walls, so I like the horizontal bars for that.
 
Thanks so much for all the info. Hopefully it will be helpful to others, as well.

I decided to just keep the cage that I have. Ripley is doing fine in it (as my chin before her did) and it meets my needs better than the FN or CN would afterall.
 
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