The Degu Diaries

Every time I open the cage door Myka Degu takes a bite sized chunk out of the edge of the MDF. It's a little bit of an oversight on my part as I didn't think It would need protecting as they can only get at the edge when the door is open. I've left repairing it for as long as possible but the tools had to come out today as it's too bad to ignore any longer. I actually watched her pull a piece off with the door shut!

The girls have settled down a little since I got them on Friday so while they were snoozing earlier this morning I took the opportunity to take some photos of their degu home decor. Bottom Section - Grass Hammock If you've read some of my Cage Build Posts you'll know that the cage is built in 2 parts, a bottom & top section, for easier moveability. The bottom floor of the bottom section is the digging pit. My aim is to make this as natural looking as possible. It is filled with around 15cm of wood shavings and some hay. I've used horse wood shavings as the shavings are large and allows the degus to burrow when mixed with the hay. Underground Hideout They have an underground area which is a hay tunnel sunk down in to the wood shavings. If you can't find one of the girls the first place to look is here because they love playing in it. You can also see a few willow branches. I got a bundle of 20 of these from B&Q for £6.99. They're about 50cm long a...

It's almost 7PM and I'm not finished. At 5:30PM, while hanging the doors, I realized that there were no more screws of the correct size left and the shop would be shut before I got there. So I have only the top doors hung. Before bed I'm going to finish the inside by adding branches, bridges, ramps, ladders and other accessories. Then I'll fill it with wood shavings and hay ready for my new family members. Tomorrow I'll be outside waiting for Wilkinsons to open so I can get some more screws before I go to the pet store and my dad will kindly hang the remaining doors while I'm out. Hopefully they won't have sold out of degus before I get to the pet store.

I only have one day left to try and get my cage complete if I want to get my degus on Friday. My helper (brother) has urgent work to do for clients so I've been left on my own to finish it off. Shelf covered with ceramic tiles to help keep degus cool Despite being on my own I got quite a lot done today. I made a chiller shelf from an old pine shelf, timber offcuts and a few ceramic floor tiles. This will help keep the degus cool as the room they will be in is a few degrees warmer than the rest of the house. I also managed to lightly sand and varnish the interior one last time. This will help protect from anything that might get on the walls and it'll be wipe clean. The outside of the cage is also a lovely shade of 'sand' and purple to match the room. Vinyl tiles on shelf to help protect MDF from degu pee I also managed to to lay all of my vinyl tiles on the base and shelves but annoyingly I'm 2 tiles short so I'm going to have to buy some more of the...

Work on the cage has slowed a little due to other commitments but all four doors have now been meshed and the aluminium angle has been cut to size. The angle will protect the doors from degu teeth and protect them from any sharp bits on the mesh edges. 2 of 4 doors with mesh attached Tomorrow I'm not expecting to get much done other than maybe a coat of paint on the outside as I'm frantically trying to meet a deadline for work. I had hoped my order of cage accessories would arrive today as the website had them sitting in my local delivery hub but it looks like it'll be Monday now. I can't wait to get them! I've ordered: Some wooden bridges and ladders to use as ramps through the cage. A glass water bottle so that I can put it inside rather than through the doors. A 2 storey log cabin for their nest box. A grass hammock which they'll non doubt have chewed in a few hours. A temporary large wooden wheel. I'm hoping to be able to make them a flying ...

Made the door frames today with just enough time to cover one of them in mesh. Would have liked a little more done but they were just so incredibly time consuming. We were originally going to glue and screw the doors but we couldn't figure out a way to drill pilot holes through the butt joint efficiently. Instead, we glued and stapled them with a staple gun you use for upholstery. The seem solid enough as it is and the aluminium trim will help strengthen them even more. I'm still in the middle of an order of cat and dog paintings for Whitby Galleries and my extra paper arrived this morning so I better crack on with finishing those tomorrow. I'm aiming to get the mesh on the rest of the doors and the inside of the bottom section, back, and sides primed over the weekend.

Only 7 more days before my new furbabies move in and there isn't that much of the cage left to build… just time consuming things and a few shelves. This afternoon we fixed the 13mm x 13mm pet enclosure mesh to the kiln-dried pine wooden frame that was attached yesterday to create a ventilated roof. We used 15mm netting staples. I also managed to get the 2 internal levels cut ready to be attached after I've sealed the inside against degu pee. I've read mixed reviews about pee protection. Some people leave their MDF or plywood bare and rely on copious amounts of dust-free wood shavings to do the soaking. Others are a little more dubious (and so would I with MDF) and have used vinyl tiles on the bottom and the levels but left the sides bare. A few brave souls have painted and / or varnished everything. The way I see it is like this. A degu can't chew through a flat surface so as long as you end up with the same flat surface after you've primed and sealed t...

Wednesdays are usually a day where I never seem to get a lot done for some reason but not today. The degu cage build is moving along at a steady pace. This morning my brother, and myself, nailed and glued the back and sides of the top section together and then began work on the kiln-dried pine frame which will eventually become a wire mesh top. Top section half complete The pine we used is 32mm x 32mm. The frame isn't all that great a fit because we thought a hand saw would do the job, but no. I think we spent about 2 hours just trying to get the ends straight. With a little bit of filling and sanding it should be okay. The screws we used were overkill too. It was cheaper to buy a bag of 100 x 75mm screws for the doors than it was to buy 2 packets of 10 so we just used them. Ideally they should have been about 50mm but if it works don't fix it. The finished frame was then attached flush with the upper edge of the top section using some shorter screws which we had to ...

The cage is progressing nicely. The bottom section is almost complete. Still have the vinyl tiles (for extra protection against pee) to put in, one level to cut and attach, and some small platforms which will help form a ramp up to the top section of the cage. I have a deep 30cm mess guard which will form the basis of a makeshift digging pit and landscaped area. There will be one level and you can see the hole for access to floor 2 which will be in the top section. It was supposed to be in the back but it was going to be a nightmare to do because of the build being in 2 parts so it can be taken apart for easier moving. This means that I now have to rethink my first level. It was going to be set back slightly from the front but I may have to bring it closer to eliminate the massive drop and reduce injury should there be a fall. I'm going to have a look at some other DIY cages for some ideas but the main priority tomorrow is to get the main construction of the top section comp...

The weather held out for most of the day so the cage is progressing nicely. I have all of the pieces which make the shell cut (minus the 2 mess guards) and the bottom section pieces are partially assembled. I still have all of the internal shelves to cut. MDF pieces which make the bottom outer section of the cage. There was a little bit of weather drama early afternoon. 2 pieces left to cut and it was approaching 1PM so work stopped for lunch as the weather predicted thunder storms after 4PM. Not so. By 2PM it started to rain but thankfully a half hour dry spell before the real rain started meant the remaining side panels could be cut. Bottom section outer shell assembled (minus mess guard) . For a pair of novices with next to no carpentry skills (and a little fatherly help) the cage isn't looking too bad. MDF, while relatively inexpensive, is notoriously hard to join as it can split when screwing down into the edge. To combat this we nailed and glued the panels togethe...

Made a start on the cage yesterday. Attempts at using a jigsaw to cut my 18mm MDF failed so my brother ended up resorting to a handsaw. The cuts were straight enough but the edge ended up off at an angle rather than flat. We got the base, back, and sides cut for the bottom section and then tried planing and sanding to bring the edges flat. Didn't work out so great. It doesn't matter so much with the edges which will be facing outwards but the ones that butt up on the inside need to be as flat and straight as possible. This morning it was down to Argos for a circular saw to see if I could get a better cut. A bit of practice on some scraps of chipboard and things were looking good… then the heavens opened. Hailstones, thunder, lightning, and massive raindrops put a stop to plans for the rest of the day. Hopefully the weather will be better tomorrow. Then all I need is to figure out how to cut across a 4 foot MDF sheet with the circular saw?

Let's hope the cage build goes easier than getting the materials delivered. Ordered before 6PM on Wednesday for next-day delivery. It got to 7:15PM before the driver called to say he'd be about 10 minutes. 10 minutes later he called again to say he'd broken down and everything would be delivered Friday. Friday came with the expectation of the delivery arriving early morning. Wrong. 6PM the driver called to say he'd be about 15 minutes, then he got lost, and then when he finally turned up I was short of 2 lengths of timber. Nightmare. This weekend is pretty much the last chance I have of making my cage before the new Pets at Home store opens. I used to have to travel an hour by public transport to the Metrocentre but one is opening in South Shields on 17th August and it's a lot closer. I'm planning to have the cage built, almost furnished and the bedding / substrate in so I can get my 'goos' and a few last minute items on open day. I basically have this...

It has been a fair number of years since I owned any pets. My last furbabies were a boisterous bunch of 6 boy rats. The enjoyment of seeing the look on a person's face when they asked what kind of pets you have and you reply with "Rats" is priceless. I was thinking of getting more rats but I wanted something a little different and after seeing a quartet of degu at my local pet store I instantly fell in love with the little critters! degu by staflo , on Flickr Let the Housing Headache Commence! After a lot of reading, I've discovered that degus need a lot of space. My rats lived in a 6ft tall by 3 foot wide cage created from putting 2 smaller cages on top of each other. They loved it. Why don't I use it for the degus? Here's the headache… 1. Made of the wrong materials While the majority of the cage is made from wire. The base, floors, ramps, and shelves of my old rat cage are made from plastic. While rats have a need to chew and gnaw as much as deg...