Degu Cages?

I was wondering if those who own degus would be willing to post pictures of their cages.

I have a pair of degu that I've had for awhile. They live in a huge cage which takes up a whole wall in my critter room. My dad built it and went a tad bit overboard I must say.
By huge I mean, me and 2 children can get in it and sit down. Even stand up. It's rather large. They've had it for a while now and they LOVE peeing on their shelves to drive me mad :hair:
I've tried them with fleece but they are anti-fleece.

So I have a few question...

What fabrics are safe for them?
Does anyone use PVC with their degus and notice chewing?

Also, I'm thinking I want a cage with a deep plastic bottom so they can borrrow down in the shavings. But I want one big enough for the two of them. I plan to have shelves in the cage, as well as, tree branches.
Any suggestion on a cage?

Can't wait to see pictures.

Here was the first degu cage we had -



... but that picture was taken with fresh shelves. Omg they would pee on those shelves and they'd be icky within a week, as well as the wall behind the cage, the wall next to the cage, and everything around. I loved my degus, but they were not the pet for me. Too messy. I ended up rehoming all of mine.

... but as we take back our adopted-out-animals, they have ways of finding me. I had a pair returned awhile back, and we re-adopted them out after about a month of thinking we'd "try again" with degus. No wooden shelves this time, but omg the entire cage and table and wall and everything were sticky. Nope, I clearly can't do it. Not a clean freak by any means... but they're too much for me. Here was the cage we had dropped off with that pair (I sold the first cage, how stupid, right? Could have been a good chin cage)



So they were adopted out... and now I was contacted last month by someone who wants to return four of them that they adopted from us. Oy. So sometime soon we will be getting in four degus and I will get to experience the mess yet again. They're great pets, don't get me wrong... but mine destroyed everything. They would rip up hammocks, regardless of what they were made of, as well as everything else in the cage.

I believe the two girls that I have now came from you, if I remember correctly.

Cardboard seems to be my girls #1 thing to destroy. They destroy it like nobodies business. And Popsicle sticks...I can give the twigs and they just nibble at them. Give them popsicle sticks and they chew them to bits.

Thoughts on there 2 cages...

http://www.ferret.com/item/marshall-ferret-townhouse/651121/
http://www.ferret.com/item/my-first-home-multi-floor-ferret-home/650815/

I was thinking I would add a piece of safe wood around the bottom where the wire part attached to the plastic and up a little bit, so when burrowing, the bedding wasn't being pushed out.

I was going to out branches like they have now and ledges, etc. to the cage in replace of all plastic shelves.

Please share links to other cages you might know of.

I believe they did, yes. ). They're doing well, I take it?

When i had the degus...That was before the chin rescue exploded...I went from getting a few chins in per year to over 50 chins coming in in 2011...unfortunately ran out of time and patience for anything I wasn't absolutely in love with. I adopted out my pet rabbit and some frogs around the same time as I decided I was done with the degus. I wasn't being fair to any of them, as the chins and the rescue were taking up most of my time. I loved them, don't get me wrong, but especially for the degus...they deserved better than someone who would crab daily about everything being sticky.

But anyway...Mine loved cardboard, now that you mention it. I used to give them Kleenex boxes and toilet paper rolls and they would just tear them to shreds. I don't know if I ever had Popsicle sticks haha. They had chew toys but I don't remember them chewing on the chew toys as much as i remember them annihilating the shelves. My chins, even my current beaver-chin, couldn't hold a candle to how they would chew the wooden shelves to sawdust haha.*

As for the cages you linked, I like the first one better, just because I know mine would have loved to dig and burrow. I'm not sure how deep that pan is, but it looks nice and deep on the first cage. I have several of the second cage, and the pan isn't shallow by any means...but judging based on the pictures (I've never seen the first cage in person) I would think the first cage has a deeper pan. I like your idea of the wood pieces too, I think that would help.*

Both cages are comparable, they're close to the same height, the first is about 40 wide whereas the other is 24 wide. So maybe the question is whether you'd rather have more room for digging or less. You actually end up with more width space in the first cage, but it depends how you plan to set up the cage as to whether thats something you want or not.*

I'm not sure how big your degus ended up...but mine could have probably gotten out of 7/8 bar spacing even as adults. But...I always kept them in 1/2 inch just to be sure...so maybe not.*

The second cage isn't a bad cage by any means. I have several of them and I sell those cages to my adoptive homes for the chins. It's a good cage. And the pans may very well be comparable in depth, I'm not sure. I can measure the pan for the second cage if you wanted a specification on how deep it is. It might even say that on the website you linked, but I'm on my phone right now, so I could be missing it.*

One note about the second cage - if you do end up getting it, get it from amazon. That's where I get mine - they're like $85 there and it's free shipping with no oversize charge because the order is over $25.*

I dont know what happened with all the asterisks, ignore those. My phone's having issues with the long posts.

Unfortunately, I dont know of any cages that have deeper pans. The second cage is one of the deeper pans I've seen on cages, but it's not hugely deep by any means.

I once saw a picture, on a UK site/forum I think, of a degu cage. It was a wire cage with not a very deep pan...but they'd put a plexiglass sort of box in the cage. It looked at least 12'' deep to me, and they'd had a branch or something so the degus could get in and out. And that was their little burrowing area. I always liked that idea, but I adopted out my degus before I ever tried anything like that. It could be worth thinking about? It'd open you up to a wider variety of cages since the pan itself wouldn't be as huge an issue.

ETA: the first post should say, 'i believe you did' not 'they did.' stupid autocorrect

They are doing very well. Still just the two of them and still as bonded as ever.

They were in a bird cage with small bar spacing, but I didn't like it much and they needed something bigger. So my dad make them a huge cage with mesh wire. They've been it in for a while.

Tried them with fleece and a borrowing box, but that was a no go, they are anti-fleece.

But now I was to redo them a new cage so they can just borrow. But can't seem to find a cage with a deep enough pan for them to be able to do so.

I have 3 of the 2nd cages and I like them for chins, just not sure about degus.

My girls love to pee on their shelves, so I thinking of doing more branches and fewer, smaller shelves. Like corner shelves and what not.

What other fabrics would you say is good for them or is it just fleece?

My girls aren't huge on hanging toys and toss toys either. They have them, just not a big chewer on them. Popsicle sticks and cardboard they destroy.

The cage they are in now took a lot of thinking and I think this one is going to take more. lol

Mine weren't crazy about the fleece either. They had hammocks and fabric things they could go into... but I swear they put extra effort into shredding the fleece. Though the pair I had returned to the rescue loved their fleece hammock and were always cuddling and sleeping in it. I only had one breeding pair, so all the babies I sold are related... I guess each degu is it's own individual haha.

Here's a thought. What about having a cage where the wire would sit inside of one of those plastic totes? Like at Meijer, we have these huge sterilite totes... if you could find a cage reasonable about the size of one of those totes, maybe you could take out the pan or the bottom of the cage, and just have the cage rest inside the tote. And those totes can be like 2-3' deep, so that'd be plenty of room for them to dig and burrow without shavings getting everywhere. I don't know how well this'd pan out in real life, but it's a thought.

I think the branches would be better than the shelves. Mine peed on the shelves too, and I hated it. The branches... well, they peed on those too, but the pee mostly sort of dripped off, so those could be cleaned and what-not. I liked the branches and smaller perches better than I liked the actual shelves. A few shelves would probably be ok, but you know how it is when they have tons of full-length shelves.

As for fabrics... mine would chew and destroy everything, but they didn't ingest. They would just chew and shred and leave it alone. When I had them I used denim for one of their hammocks. I had some sort of polyester fabric house for them that I found at the pet store... I used one of those cuddle tents for birds. No idea what that was made out of, but they loved it. Oh they chewed it all - but based on the way they chewed it, I would just make sure no strings were hanging out or anything like that, and they'd be fine. I'm sure some people might say that fleece is the only safe fabric, but I had one fabric... I don't know what it was, reminded me of a slippery polyester blend, and they didn't chew that. But everything else they did. Don't get me wrong, if they chewed it to the point it wasn't safe, it was removed, but they'd get quite a bit of use out of a hammock or a house, made out of whatever fabric, before I'd have to remove it.

lol I know how that goes. Good luck!

Thoughts on this cage?



Do you think the car spacing is small enough that a degu can't get out?

It definitely looks small enough. I think it'd be a good cage for degus, with some additions. I would be sure you C-ring those doors closed (or somehow keep those small ones closed with something metal) - I know mine would be out of those small doors in 5 seconds flat if they weren't held closed.

I thought you wanted something with a deep pan for burrowing?

I do but I can't find anything with a deep pan and small enough bars. So I'm thinking about this cage and seeing if my dad can make a large/deep nesting box that they can burrow in. Still debating it. lol

The picture of the 1st cage you posted earlier in this thread...do you remember the name of it or where you got it?

Ah I gotcha.

I actually got it off ebay - I scoured ebay for you - http://www.ebay.com/itm/Ferret-Chinchilla-Rat-Bird-Sugar-Glider-Cage-3994-/140688599441?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item20c1b1a991

I remember it being cheaper when I bought it (course, that was over 5-7 years ago now). Never shoulda sold the thing, it was a good cage.

ETA: it had a wire grate at the bottom for poos and stuff to fall through, but the grate was bigger than 1/2 x 1/2... I had hardware cloth over my grate for the time the cage was with me.

This cage is shorter, but similar, and cheaper - http://www.ebay.com/itm/New-Large-W...168?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item3a6f66d838

Appears to be same cage as the first, a little cheaper - http://www.ebay.com/itm/Ferret-Chin...775?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item35b8ad73af

Had one of these donated to the rescue, in black - http://www.ebay.com/itm/Bird-Sugar-...716?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item20bd297304 - Not as good a cage as above, and could probably be sturdier... but I imagine with wooden shelving (if you're going that route) it'd strengthen up.

Oh, and I want to note - on that first cage, my degus figured out how to open all the side and even the front doors. I had to have mini-padlocks on them all. Smart little stinkers, lol.

Thanks!

yea, I think I'm going to have to mini pad-lock all the doors for sure.

No problem. )

Yeah, I made the mistake of originally just clipping the side doors... that was fine for a bit... but then they figured out a way around my clips... and then one day I came home and the front door was open.. and I was like... "well, maybe I didn't close it all the way" - you'll see how the latch is if you get that cage...So I closed it, went about my business. Later that night, I was in my apartment at my desk (complete other end of the apartment) and I see a degu run across the floor. Lol... I went and looked, front door was open. So the locks became a necessity. They definitely were smart, I'll give them that. I don't think my chins would have been able to figure that out, I'm not even sure how the degus did, but they did...

Oh, and when you get the mini padlocks... I bought a set of four and another set of two... the set of four was for the side doors, that way one key would open them all, and the set of two was for the two front doors. I can't imagine having 6 separate keys lol!

greychins said:

Oh, and when you get the mini padlocks... I bought a set of four and another set of two... the set of four was for the side doors, that way one key would open them all, and the set of two was for the two front doors. I can't imagine having 6 separate keys lol!

Click to expand...

Good thinking. Sets are defiantly a good idea.