We've been watching our friends' hermit crabs this week. It's touched off a bit of "pet mania" around here. An aquarium has been in the plans for us for some time now. Maybe at Christmas? But Henry especially has been yearning (yes, that's definitely the word for it) for his own pets because of the crabs.
The crabs were a source of endless fascination for him until...well...it ended. Because the food is smelly, and because we discovered gerbils. Currently, we've got books from the library checked out to read all about keeping gerbils and setting up aquariums. Henry's researching his pet. He's saving up money (we promised to match his amounts to help him out). I think he's leaning toward having gerbils in his room instead of an aquarium at this point--but we have to make sure we can make up our own, healthy, food mix for them. You see, normally gerbil food contains a lot of oats, wheat, and sometimes barley. We just can't take that risk now. So we're trying to find a good mix of seeds and other ingredients that we could feed the little guys safely. We'll still have to be very careful with the mix because of possible cross-contamination, though, so Brad and I haven't decided for sure if it's worth the risk at this point. Henry might have to end up with a little aquarium with glowing neon fish instead (which he really likes too).
We will definitely keep you posted about what we decide and also include pictures of our new friends whenever they come to live with us.
2 comments:
Make sure you check out the fish food, too. But I had an aquarium in my room when I was a kid and I loved it!
Thanks John. I've thought about that, but with fish, you don't handle them (like with furry animals) so there's a much smaller chance of her getting sick from it. As long as they wash their hands after feeding the fish, it should be fine.
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