How To Clean Gerbils Cages

Hi, my name's Marie. I'm the deputy manager of the Small Animal Department at Wood Green Animal Shelters and I'm going to tell you how to care for gerbils. I'm going to tell you how to clean a gerbil cage.

By far, the best option is to house your gerbils in a large glass tank. Gerbils housed in hamster cages can often damage their legs and their tails. The glass tank also provides them and ensures that they are able to express natural behaviour.

So, you can fill this with good quality organic soil about halfway and that way, they can dig all sorts of tunnels underneath and also make a nest underneath as well, and this really helps them express that behaviour they want to do. First of all, when you're going to clean it, make sure you've got a good secure pet carrier that you can place the gerbils in. Place some of the bedding into the carrier that they've already been used to.

And that way, they're going to feel more calm about the experience because they've got some of their smells around and it's not quite so scary. So, you then want to catch your gerbils and place them into your carrier. So once you've got your gerbils into the carrier, place them in another room and make sure they're on a nice surface where they're not going to get knocked up by any other pets or children in the home.

You'll then need a dustpan and brush and a secure bag to clean out the accommodation. You'd want to remove all of this bedding completely. Obviously, a lot of this soil and the hay can be recycled in your green bin or even in your compost bin in the garden.

So, please try and recycle with gerbil bedding. Once you've removed it all out, sweep it all down completely with your dustpan and brush, and you then want to use a pet disinfectant. Spray the whole tank down and just use a sponge to completely wipe it down and wash it down until there's no detergent left on there.

And that way, we're going to kill off any bacteria that are built in them. Gerbil setups like this, require cleaning at about every 2 to 3 weeks as it's quite a big depth of soil, they don't need quite such regular cleaning as they would in a hamster cage which is obviously another benefit. Ideally, everyday, you should be just removing any old bedding and any old food that's built up and just top them up afresh, and then as I mentioned, do a full clean out every 2 to 3 weeks.

So once you've removed all the bedding, you sprayed it down, you then want to set out fresh again. So, have a bag ready of fresh organic soil, fill it up about halfway, place in some fresh good quality green hay, and then you can place sorts of enrichment like toilet rolls cereal boxes and fruit tree twigs such as apple wood. Place those in there.

Always scatter feed your food for your gerbils. Never just place it in a bowl because they're going to get bored and they're going to get quite fat as well. Gerbils often dig and bury for their food, so if you place it in the bowl, they're going to bury it quite quickly.

So just get a small handful and scatter it around the cage and hide it in a tunnel, and that way encourages natural behaviour, foraging. There are many types of herbs and dried wild plants in the market which you can also place in a gerbil tank, again, keeping their diet and their accommodation as natural as possible. And this way, you're going to have healthy happy gerbils.

And that's how to clean gerbils. .