Degu biting?

[dyzired]

Okay so I have an 8 week old goo that I hand raised since he was about 2 days old. He's never bitten me before...he occasionally did like a little nibble here and there (not hard) just to kinda check me out...but today he was actually like..biting down on my skin. Still not hard enough to do any damage but enough to make me jump. Is there a reason he would do this? I take him out every day. am I not giving him enough attention or something? I mean I know animals bite..but I've had him since he was a baby and he sees me as his mom..why would he bite me?

[NightwishRaven999]

This is normal behavior for a young degu, and it is unintentional.

Young degus often have the annoying habit of nibbling on fingers. They are very curious and use their teeth to "explore" new things. They also need to learn the difference between thin wooden branches and human fingers.

One way to stop the nibbling is by letting your degu know he is causing you pain.
When your degu nibbles or bites your finger, make a loud high pitched sqeak, much like a degu does if another degu is grooming him/her too hard.
Eventually your degu will realize that he is hurting you.
It can take time, but it always works.

Once he matures, he will stop doing this. It seems to only occur at the early stages of life.
Others might have found a different method of working this out...lets see.

Hope this helps
Jordan

[philbailey1806]

I agree with Jordan, he's just testing you out a little more confidently than he did do IMO, unless you were doing something to cheese him off at the time? My Edna will let me know she wants to go back in her cage from being handled by a series of short, sharp "nibbles", like you say, not enough to break the skin or hurt, but enough to make you jump

[blossombrooks]

Snap. When daisy was little she liked to nip me for no good reason, she's grown out of it. I used to 'eeeep' at her and now she grooms me gently. Maybe he's trying to groom you and getting it a bit wrong? :-)

[Whizz]

Luigi often 'nips' me when he's getting annoyed because I haven't let him out to exercise and run around. He's really impatient and when he wants something - he wants it then and there!

However, when my Goos were a bit younger they did use to groom me a bit too hard, so I let out a high pitched squeak to let them know it was hurting a little bit. They grew out of the habit very quickly and now groom me very lightly, and then cheekily want a groom back!
He's probably trying to figure out how hard he can groom you until you tell him he's hurting you. Little Goos do love to push your limits.