NightwishRaven999's Degu Keeping Journal

[NightwishRaven999]

This will be my journal...a blog of everything degu-related.
I will regularly be updating this blog with journal entries and personal logs.

I have projects for this upcoming year that I would like to share with you. I have ideas and goals that I would like to publish and achieve.

In my journal I will be discussing the various goals, ideas and projects I have in mind that relate to degu keeping.
Hopefully some will share their thoughts with me and include ideas of their own.

My journal will include many photos and illustrations.
I will also be talking about various products for degus, rating them and discussing them as well as talking about and displaying several degu cage setups I am working on.

My goal is to create a very fun and interesting blog that will be open to the opinions of other forum members.

Hope you enjoy
Jordan



NightwishRaven999's Degu Keeping Journal

[NightwishRaven999]

Journal entry: 1

For the past few years I have been focusing on providing my degu girls with a more natural setting.

I used to house my degus in a tall parrot cage years ago.
The cage had many small levels and perches and lots of colourful wooden toys adorned it.

Ever since I have been housing my degus in wooden cages, I have been using more and more natural elements in my setups.
I rarely go outside without having the degus in the back of my mind...always trying to find things to bring back home and furnish their cage with.

Since late 2008 I have been ammasing a large number of tree branches (mostly birch) which I have been using in the degu cage. I look for thick branches and give the leaves to my degus for consumption. I have also collected several buckets of stones from rivers, lakes and hills. Large rocks to small pebbles, all can find their place in the degu cage.

Here are some of the items I use to furnish the degu cage.



True, it may look bland like this. A pile of stones and some branches...cardboard tunnels and clay pots with some coconut shells.

I do not use toys in the degu cage.
I prefer to think of the degu cage as a safe haven for the degus.
A place where they can feel cozy and "at home".
For the past few years I have been trying to put priority on the degu need to run, chew, burrow, forage and climb.

The few toys I have, I use when I let the degus out of their home for their daily run. But even then, they use the opportunity to run around and interact with each other.

The advantage with groups of degus I have found, is that they do not need toys to occupy themselves. In groups of 3 or 4, degus start to be much more self-sufficient...meaning that they will rely less on you for distractions.

In large groups, degus will spend most of their time grooming, cuddling and talking to each other. They are so sociable and it is so fun to watch them go about their business, interacting with each other and living peacefully.

It became obvious to me that they did not need the toys.
So instead I spent time doing research and reading about the degu's natural habitat in Chile.

There are some stunning photos on Flickr.
Many photographers in Chile have taken superb photos of degus in the wild. I really enjoy seeing these photos, so my goal has always been to try and produce a more natural environment for my beloved pets.

Using only branches, stones, logs and hay, it is possible to create stunningly natural looking setups.

Here are a few examples of what I have managed so far.










There are many opinions regarding the usage of hay.
I have never used a hay rack in the degu cage.
Although hay represents 50% of a degu's diet, it is also used as a burrowing substrate and as a sleeping material.
Hay is relatively inexpensive where I live. I also know it will not go to waste, since a group of degus can consume a large pile of hay in only one week. I will usually purchase a large 40oz (1.13 kg) bag of timothy hay and empty its whole contents on the bottom section of the cage. The hay can easily fill the entire cage and cover all the levels, but I keep all of it on the bottom level, creating a thick pillow where the degus can burrow, hide and avoid being seen if they wish to.

The degus have a house which they will sometimes take a nap in, but at night they always retreat to the cozy pile of hay...snuggling together underneath it all.

It is also fun to throw in a handful of oats, dandelion flowers and herbs into the pile. Herbs and plants will mix in the hay, enticing the degus to forage through the thick clusters. I also like to mix in small clumps of white or red millet in the hay.




Bedding is also vital when landscaping a degu cage.
Of course, its primary purpose is to absorb degu urine and keep the cage dry and smelling fresh.
But this does not mean it does not have any other uses.

I like to use generous layers of bedding, especially on the bottom of the cage. Instead of creating a flat layer, I create mounds and depressions in the substrate, creating an interesting relief. The occasional rock and stone here and there will also help to beautify the cage and provide an intersting and varied setting.

No need for those fancy, colourful and expensive toys.
We can make lovely homes for our degus by using natural objects and elements.

Another thing I have been working on in the degu cage is floor space. I, like many others, have the tendancy to crowd the cage with too many objects. What is the point of making the cage so large if I am going to create a degu obstacle course

Everytime I clean the cage and change the setup, I have to stop myself from putting too many branches and elements in the cage.

As was pointed out on the forum, when degus are let loose in a room, their first reaction is to run around...run, run and run some more. So the cage should be balanced enough so that the objects and elements present, do not hinder the degus from running or sprinting from one side of the cage to the other.

This is something I have been working on for a while.






In the wild degus are extremely active and run many kilometers everyday. Keeping this in mind I have been trying to furnish the cage with fewer things to allow the degus larger open areas.

I find lots of pleasure tera-scaping the degu cage.
My goal is to keep improving each setup and finding new elements that could help improve the environment of my little pets.

This is a never-ending quest, but it is nonetheless fun and extremely rewarding.

I will try to get some photos of degus in their natural environment on here.


I will keep the Journal updated on a regular basis.
Hope you enjoyed.

Jordan

[fred]

Aug 31, 2011 7:17:35 GMT NightwishRaven999 said:

Hope you enjoyed.

I most certainly did Looking forward to the next installments!!

[blossombrooks]

That's cool! :-) I really like the idea of a hay mound for foraging, I'm gonna do that. Excellent!

[Maravilla]

Perfect! Makes me thinking on how to improve my degu's conditions... Think, I'll need bigger cages... No, I am not joking!! I never make jokes about so important things!!

[deguconvert]

Excellent, Jordan!! I love how you have displayed everything and set it up like a conversation. Very inviting!

[NightwishRaven999]

Journal Entry: 2

I have been translating ingredients from German degu forums into english for a while. But now that Apology has made a wonderful post about the natural products she uses to feed her degus, I feel greatly inspired and encouraged to continue including more natural products in the degu diet.

Many products are not hard to find. Many herbs, seeds and plants being available in the markets, fruit and vegetable boutiques and shops that sell natural products.

Since I am off work today, I took some time to clean out and dry some of the ingredients I purchased a few days ago.

In Québec we have many outdoor and indoor markets that sell vegetables, plants, herbs and products like honey, syrup and wax.

A few days ago I was able to purchase a large amount of fresh dandelion leaves and stems. They are often used for salads, so the leaves are not hard to find.



After washing the leaves well to remove any chemicals or unwanted bugs, I set them out the dry outside in the sun.
I found hanging them upside down to be the best way of drying the leaves and stems.

I also purchased a large amount of Sage leaves.
Much like dandelion, the degus enjoy them fresh or dried.





I have set out many of the leaves to dry on newspaper using a large aluminium pan, layering the pan with a sheet of newspaper and spreading the leaves and stems evenly. I then layered another newspaper sheet and added more leaves on this layer as well. The newspaper is great for absorbing moisture.

I have also been using Aubergine.
An easy way to dry it is to cut it in very thin slices, much like you would cut a cucumber.
I do not know if others have done this as well, but after spreading the Aubergine slices on newspaper I sprinkle salt all over them.

The salt absorbs all the water and moisture very quickly and can be wiped off after a bit.





Even after a few minutes, you can noticed the salt absorbing all the moisture as the water beads up on the surface of the Aubergine slices. Once the water beads form, you can easily absorb them with a paper towel or a cloth.



I use the same method for dehydrating Zucchini.





Carrots and most other vegetables can be dried easily, without use of salt or special techniques.

The degus really enjoy the vegetables, herbs and plants.
They got used to eating celery, carrot flakes and parsley many years ago. Eventually I started growing my own herbs, basil, rosemary and thyme, which the degus began to enjoy.
Dandelion leaves and flowers along with the occasional rose petals and daisy flowers also helped vary their diet.

I still purchase degu food brands that are imported from Belgium, but the degus are less limited in their choice, as they have a varied diet. They do not rely on the degu food as much as they used to in the past.

Besides their food bowl, the degus have a foraging (herb/plant/flower/seed) dish in the cage at all times.


A mix of chopped hay, clusters of white and red millet, rose petals, calendula flowers, chamomile flowers and dandelion flowers, quinoa, oats, basmati rice and dried carrot flakes.

Many seeds Apology mentioned in her thread can be found in animal supply boutiques. I always look in the rodent section, but found many good degu products in the bird section.
White and Red Millet clusters are very cheap and can be found almost everywhere.

To those who have difficulty finding seeds and grains for their degus: The next time you enter an animal supply store, take a look in the bird sections.



I have found there are many products available here that I can use to vary the diet of my degus.
Even in large indoor supermarkets, I have found packages of dried vegetables used for soups and stews...vegetables that can be added to the degu food bowl.

Like many on this forum, I have been trying to include more greens and natural products to the degu diet. Now that our friends from DeguForum.de have shed some light on the subject, there are many opportunities for us to provide our degus with a more varried diet.

A BIG thank you to Apology for her informational and illustrated thread: deguworld.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=food&action=display&thread=8775

I will keep my eyes open for products available in North America.
When I spot some products that are available to members in this part of the world, I will share with you all.


Jordan

[apology72]

WOW, I'm totally excited. The dandelion tufts are really huge
Everything together looks so yummy
I am delighted that I could inspire you a little and hope that others take an example to you, and also take a lookout for natural feed ingredients ;D

[davx]

Great! Jordan,I like this thread, really .

It remembers me on my history of rethinking degu keeping.
For me it was the fact, that I read, that degus in wild live at the ground (ground dweller) and in their burrows. Shrubs in the natural habitat of the degus is sparse or in other words degus prefer open space with sparse shrubby vegetation and avoid dense vegetation. When I came to the german deguforum, I was confronted with the opinion, that degus need much vertical space (=parrot cage/volière) to climb more than ground space. I couldn't agree to that and later experience of other degu owner confirmed my doubts and the deguforum retought too.

The next big issue was the rethinking of the degu diet. My first approach was to avoid any possible harmful food item, in particular (possible) toxic plants. Even dandelion I suspected to be toxic because of the milky sap. That was ridiculous, because dandelion is a really good fodder plant, but it was the first step, to doubt on nearly everything. Later I went the way back and tried first common green plants, fodder plants, later I approached to more problematic plants, weeds, wild little known herbs. But this was a longer story...

Btw. the technique for drying vegs with salt I never heard before... it sounds really interessting.
Here we have another topic of rethinking: degus and salt. The common opinion is that salt could harm the degus, but recent discussions suggest to try out if additional salt (natural salt stones) could support degu health (in wild several mammals walk from far away to salty paches and feed on it).

[moletteuk]

Enjoying your blog, Jordan

I've started experimenting with drying veg, I've just been putting it on trays in a low temp oven for a while. (I did burn 3 lots of carrot though)

[NightwishRaven999]

Sept 2, 2011 0:22:18 GMT davx said:

Great! Jordan,I like this thread, really .

Shrubs in the natural habitat of the degus is sparse or in other words degus prefer open space with sparse shrubby vegetation and avoid dense vegetation. When I came to the german deguforum, I was confronted with the opinion, that degus need much vertical space (=parrot cage/volière) to climb more than ground space. I couldn't agree to that and later experience of other degu owner confirmed my doubts and the deguforum retought too.

Here we have another topic of rethinking: degus and salt. The common opinion is that salt could harm the degus, but recent discussions suggest to try out if additional salt (natural salt stones) could support degu health (in wild several mammals walk from far away to salty paches and feed on it).

Bonjour David !
This is very interesting. The fact that wild degus live in wide open space with a few shrubs and bushes, give us a good idea of their daily activities. They are runners, burrowers and foragers.

As for the salt, I only use it in small amounts and wipe it off once water has been absorbed. I have tasted the Aubergine once it was dry and could not discern any salty flavour.
The idea of some salts being helpful in supporting the degu health is very interesting as well. It might be worth looking into.


@ moletteuk
Glad you are enjoying the journal so far
I am very happy to hear this. Some vegetables are quite tricky to dehydrate. I will be posting about my success/failure at drying various vegetables and plants.

[NightwishRaven999]

Journal entry: 3

The aubergine has been dried successfully.
After chopping it up into thin slices, I sprinkled some salt on them to absorb the water. Once the beads of water formed on the aubergine slices, I used an absorbing paper towel to remove the water and wipe off the salt remnants.

After letting the aubergine dry off for 48 hours, I places the slices into the oven. The oven was turned on to medium heat for 20 minutes and the aubergine was left inside throughout the heating process and the cooling down of the oven afterwards.

Once out of the oven, the aubergine slices were transformed into hard, crispy slices. Some of the aubergine will be stored in a brown paper bag, while the other slices will be broken into smaller pieces and mixed up in the degu foraging dish.

The aubergine drying process has been a success !




The dandelion drying process is a little longer but I am happy to announce it is going quite well.
The last few days have been quite warm and sunny.
I took the opportunity to hang the dandelion leaves and stems outside in the sun. After 24 hours, the leaves turned a limp, but after 3 days of hanging upside down the leaves and stems are becoming dry and crispy.




The sage leaves are also dried up well and will be included in the feeding mix along with the dried aubergine and dandelion.


The second floor of the cage holds the food and water bowls, while the third floor of the cage holds a large dish which I fill up with mixes of natural ingredients.
Although the natural ingredient dish is larger than the degu food bowl, they are both being refilled at the same frequency....meaning that the degus rely less on the hard pellet food.


I use an Exo-Terra reptile water bowl as a natural food/foraging dish for the degus. Although the dish is made of food-grade resin, the degus have never taken interest in chewing it.
It has regularly been used in the cage for over a year and there is not a single bite/chew mark on the dish. The bowl looks very realistic and natural. It fits right in the "natural degu environment setup" I have been trying to work on.



Terracotta clay plates also make beautiful and safe feeding dishes. I highly recommend these !



More to come soon...
Jordan

[Maravilla]

Hello Jordan,
happy to read that the aubergine drying experiment was so successful!!!
As for the dandelion, you might cut off the stem when the leaves are dry. Last year, we dried dandelion like this, hanging for a couple of days in a warm, dry place. Leaves dried quite quickly, but the stems remained somewhat wet.
We are also in pure process of collecting food for wintertime.

Your degus can really be lucky having a "dad" like you are!! Hope to read more from your ladies soon.

[malteser60]

This is a fantastic blog Jordan, I'm really enjoying reading it. This is the aim for my degus, in creating a more natural environment for them. I'm growing my own herbs to dry and am aiming to go towards a completely natural food with very little commercial packaged food.

So I shall be reading this with great interest

[apology72]

[NightwishRaven999]

Sept 4, 2011 10:04:55 GMT malteser60 said:

This is the aim for my degus, in creating a more natural environment for them. I'm growing my own herbs to dry and am aiming to go towards a completely natural food with very little commercial packaged food.

Alexia, I am so happy to hear this.
It is encouraging for me and for others to see that many of us are advancing towards a common goal.
You shoud start your own journal where you could talk about your experiences with growing and drying various plants and herbs.

Hope to hear more about your project soon !

---

Journal entry: 4

I was able to go to the market today and purchase some more fresh herbs. The degus have enjoyed some fresh leaves earlier, but most of the herbs are being dried to add to the feeding mix later on.

Savory, Basil and Italian Parsley are in the process of being dried.
The Italian Parsley caught my eye. Unlike regular parsley, the leaves are larger and the stems thicker.



Fresh Savory and Basil (leaves and stems)





Dried Sage leaves



A note to our members: A good way to start off on the natural diet is to go about it slowly. Degus that have relied on hard pellet feeds their whole lives may find it harder to develop a liking for herbs and plants. Most degus will accept seeds right away but fresh greens can sometimes prove more difficult.
Degus that have been conditioned to eating fresh or dried vegetables will no doubt accept flowers, plants and herbs more willingly.

There is a product I have found to be very interesting:
Living World Timothy Toppings
lllreptile.com/store/catalog/reptile-supplies/canned-food-and-diets/tortoise-and-turtle-dry-and-canned-foods/-/living-world-timothy-toppings-flowers-and-herbs/

It is essentially a blend of timothy hay, dried flowers and herbs.
The hay mix contains Chamomile flowers, Wheat middlings, Calendula flowers, Rose petals, Dandelion leaves, Raspberry leaves and Peppermint leaves.

This mix is great for starting out on the natural diet.
It is an excellent way of introducing degus to a variety of dried flowers and herbs.

Faith (deguconvert) has also been able to find similar products made by the Oxbow brand.

Oxbow Botanical Hay
www.petsmart.com/product/index.jsp?productId=3135805#prodTab1

This product is very similar to the first, the difference being in the ingredients mixed with the hay. Oxbow combines Timothy Hay with Chamomile, Lemon Verbena, Hibiscus, Lavender, Rose Hips, Comfrey, Borage, Red Clover Blossoms.

These products should be readily available to our members living in North America and hopefully some parts of Europe.


More to come soon...
Jordan

[NightwishRaven999]

Journal entry: 5

I was able to purchase some fresh Mint herbs a few days ago and dried them with brown paper bags.
I finally assembled all my ingredients to form my first natural degu mixture.

I have posted about this more in details in Fred's "50% Natural Nutrition Project".


Here are a few photos of the result !







Although, this is very far from being a complete diet, I am pleased with the results and pleased with the ingredients I was able to get a hold of in a short period of time.

I am fortunate enough to have a market on the street I live, that sells a large variety of seeds and fresh herbs.


I have followed some of Maravilla's advice regarding Dandelion drying. The leaves have dried quickly, but the stems have remained more-or-less limp.

I have chopped off all the leaves to include in the mix but am keeping all the stems to feed to the degus fresh.
Something I have noticed during this time is how incredibly hardy dandelion plants are !

The dandelion bunches I have purchased last week have no roots and have been hanging upside down in open air for days...yet new leaves are still sprouting from the crown of each plant !

I have been giving the dandelion crowns to the degus and they immediatly noticed the new growth in the center of the stems.
Of course they love the tender, crunchy leaves so they go for these first !

Here are a few photos of some of the girls enjoying fresh dandelion growths ;D















While I am out at work, the degus seem to spend most of their time arranging the cage to their liking.
Everyday I find new tunnels and burrows in the hay.
Stones are being pushed around and branches being dragged from one level to the next. It is fun to see them change their environment to their liking and see them create their own little nests to sleep in. The fact that they are living in a group also keeps them busy during the day. It is said that degus learn from each other and go about their day-to-day activities as a community.
When I first started out with a pair of degus, I did not notice this. But now I can see this is very accurate.

When one of the girls starts digging or dragging/pushing things around, the others will start doing the same and sometimes help each other move things around. They are truly closely bonded (like a family) and it is simply awe inspiring to watch them go about their business as a close knit community.





The cage was cleaned out last week, yet there is absolutely no hint of urine or droppings. The cage smells as fresh as it did the day it was cleaned !
Building a cage can seem like a hassle...but in the long run it saves SO MUCH time and energy !

Some new photos of the degu girls...








Looking forward to Alexia's new blog !
Hopefully many members will join in the fun and start creating logs for their pet degus.

Jordan

[Maravilla]

Hi Jordan,
your mixture looks just wonderful and your ladies seem to be so happy with their new food, the fresh and dried ingredients. It's so wonderful to see so lucky degus!!
Keep it up... and us informed! ;D

[Kat]

This looks great. I will be following this thread with interest.

How did drying the courgette go?

Kat
x

[malteser60]

I love the photos Jordan, they just look so content munching away there.

How did you dry the herbs in the paper bags? Did you put them over a radiator or some similar heat source?