These are my Degus

What are degus ?

Degus are social animals, who live in groups in the mountains of Chili. Becausethey are used to company, you must always buy them in pairs. They best options is to buy a pair of females, preferably sisters fron the same nest. Males will sometime argue and fight. This will result in injuries. Males and females mixed, will only lead to large families and you will need a bigger cage.

Mixing females also tends to work good. After 1 of my older females died I had a 6 year old female left. I successfully introducted a pair of very young females to her and they lived all 3 together for another year. Just do the introduction slowly, pererably in a way the can see and smell each other, but cannot touch.

Degus are active the whole day. The tend to sleep for 2 hours and the be active for a few hours. This means that you can see them the whole day. This is a major difference compared to hamsters and chinchilla's who are only active during the night.

Taking care of themI

Degus are easy to take care of, as long as you keep some things in mind :

The like to climb and jump and are very active, so a big cage is required. An aquarium with a high cage is excellent.
Sugar makes them sick, so no sweets, candy or raisins.
Fat gives them liver problems. Sthey can have no nuts, sunflower seeds of peanuts. Although they like them very much.
Draft is very bad for them, the will catch a cold and die soon.
Because the live in the moutains, they are used to chilly weather. They cannot sweat, so excessive heat will kill them. Better a bit too cold than too hot.

Pictures

Here are some pictures. Click on them to get a larger one.