Gerbils - Good digging/tunnelling substrate?

[Sway]

Hiya,

Got four boy gerbils in a nice big corner aquarium, so they've got loads of room for digging.

Made up a mix of sawdust, woodshavings and meadow grass, but it doesn't hold well enough for them to tunnel properly.

Any ideas for a proper digging substrate?

Was thinking soil, but worried about moisture/bugs. Maybe sand? Really not sure.

Here's a couple of pics, more levels to be made above the substrate shortly to give them even more space.





Cheers,

Sam

[Heathwood]

I had gerbils as a kid and used to keep them in a tank half full of peat. Adding some wood shavings or straw gives strength and structure when the gerbils tunnel.

Mine dug lots of tunnels and seemed to really enjoy it. Only problem is they spend quite a bit of time down there and would dart down a tunnel if they didn't want to be handled.

[balders118]

I just used load of sawdust and packed it down. They could build great tunnels in it but it they would rebuild them every couple of weeks as they weren't the strongest.

You can use peat (which I did once) but would advise against this unless you have a very open top cage for plenty of air. At the time I did I didn't and the inside would always condensate. When I emtied it I also found a plant growing in their! They make awesome tunnels in peat though. A pet shop I got my gerbils from reccommended peat but told me not to mix it with shavings as the shavings will soak up wee etc so you need to clean them out more regularly which is one of the benefits of peat - every 2 months or so you should clean them. A big downside is that it is messy. You'll get handfulls of peat everytime you pick up your gerbils and it generally makes a mess. Also they will bury food/toys/water bottle so unless you have extra tiers for these to go on peat isn't a good idea.

[SmokinV8]

peat/shavings mixture, i do know that there is a reptile sand subtrate that will allows tunnels to be built then as it dries out it hardens this would be ace for them, think it was from company called komodo, will look into it when at work.