long fall :(

[nubbin]

does anyone know anything about Degus resilience to long falls, I opened the top half of my Xtrail cage and manny did a suicide dive off the top shelf and landed on the floor with a sickening thud, he seems absolutely fine though. I'm sure these little guys are gonna give me a heart attack one day.

[mel]

Mine too try to dive out of the top door of my xtrail. Alvin has succeeded once and landed ok and was fine. Luckily now he usually waits for a lift down or scampers down the bars.

[Kat]

I'm glad that your degu is alright. Scrat did a death dive a few months ago. I don't know who was more shocked him or me.
He was fine too. I kept a closer eye on him for a few day after just to make sure that he was eating, drinking and moving OK.
I'm sure they do it just to scare us. Little scamps.

Kat

[Deleted]

Jadzia does this from time to time, although it's "just" from my lap or the cage opening.
The other day she tried to jump onto the windowsill, missed it by a centimeter and plunged
to the floor (about a meter, I think).

I was shocked and imagined her with her back broken and all that -
but she was quite happily running around, looking pleased with herself.
She got no injuries and she is just fine, so I guess they are tougher than they look!

[zoebaz]

I guess they've evolved to bounce after falling out of trees, as ours regularly drop from 3-4 feet to the floor with no ill effects, as well as the odd cage fall when they miss a shelf. Always ok though...