A Painful and Exhausted Degupdate

Last night I lost it. The last two weeks were bad, bad, with both my parents having some major health issues, my aunt being an asshole and the Katja dying and right now I’m really, really  protective of the other two degus, so when last night Estelle escaped and was nowhere to be found, I really found the end of my tether. I did something I haven’t done in 21 years of relationship: I called Mr home (poor guy had just left a couple of hours before because he had to take the kid to a medical appointment). Find yourself a guy who’ll take a 200km round trip to give you a hug.

Finally I found Estelle in the Little One’s wardrobe, under the socks drawer. How she got in there? Your guess is as good as mine.

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Estelle is also generally very shy and quiet. She doesn’t yet take treats from us and cusses me out whenever I try to offer her some. And she’ll just sit motionlessly in a corner when there’s something she doesn’t like, so while the Little One came downstairs for my help, she somehow got into that wardrobe and stayed very still. After we finally found her, we had to get her back. In the end I caught her and she very much did not agree with me.

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Degu teeth are sharp. If something like a thumb piercing existed I could have inserted one, because the teeth met in the middle of my thumb. At least it bled nicely, as you can see, so there’s little risk of infection.

Today we had the big cage cleaning and both degus don’t agree with being confined to the small left side, so Estelle used the opportunity so simply jump over my head, run down my back and escape again. This time I caught her with a towel and banished her to an old wine box for the time of cleaning. Candy simply stayed inside, but we cleaned like the devil was on our tail and by the end of it I was covered in sweat and litter.

©Giliell, all rights reserved Estelle, looking very suspicious at my hand. At this point she hadn’t found out how tasty I apparently am.

 

Jack’s Walk

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Jack and I have spent lots of time outside the past few days, trying to soak in as much sunshine and nice weather as we can before the days get too short and cold. The smaller creatures of the world are doing the same. All-day long, our neighbourhood is abuzz with bees, and there is a steady stream of chipmunks and squirrels skittering back and forth carrying treasure hither, thither and yon. Jack finds all this activity very distracting. He feels obligated to watch when they cross too close to his porch, which often happens, as we are an apparent thoroughfare, but he gets tired and cranky and eventually lays down his bowling ball of a head with a clunk and a sigh. If he can stay awake, Jack grumbles at the noises, but if he falls off to sleep, it’s a fitful one, full of twitching and whisker bristling. I imagine his dreams are full of giving chase in his younger body when he could run as easily as walk. I have those dreams, too, Bubba, only I don’t chase squirrels, I dance.

Jack’s Walk

The first day of fall and the world is golden. Voyager, all rights reserved.

The first day of fall was almost as beautiful as the last day of summer. There wasn’t quite as much sunshine due to a thin layer of stratus cloud that dulled the light, but the day was warm, and Jack and I took ourselves out for a country walk and a drive around some back roads. We stopped a few times so I could take pictures, and Jack could explore a few ditches and pee on some new trees. We had a lovely afternoon, but maybe we overdid things a bit because we both fell asleep as soon as we sat down at home. I’m pretty sure we’ll both sleep well tonight, too. At our age, a full day of fresh air and exercise is exhausting.

 

A Very Sad Degupdate

Our sweet Katja didn’t make it. After I was ever so carefully hopeful last night, she died this morning. Apparently her intestine had been too damaged already and she died this morning in the little one’s hands. Yesterday the vet said that there was probably something wrong with her apart from the infection, because she was the runt of the litter and the difference between her and her litter mate Estelle had become ever more apparent.

In the end it was probably double bad luck: Having a birth defect and a very inexperienced Degu owner who didn’t notice her problems soon enough. We did our best. I don’t know if somebody else’s best would have been good enough, ours wasn’t.

Farewell, my sweet girl.

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I also have the sweetest kid in the world. When she cried in my arms this morning she asked me why I wasn’t crying. I told her it was because I was comforting her. She went back to cry, but stopped after a minute or so to tell me “it’s ok, mummy, you can cry now and I’ll comfort you”, at which point all floodgates were opened.

Jack’s Walk

The tall trees are still in their summer frocks. ©voyager, all rights reserved.

Tomorrow is the autumnal equinox, making today the last day of summer, and what a wonderful summer’s day it is around here. The weather is a perfect 19°c with a gentle breeze that’s ruffling the trees and scattering the fallen leaves down the street. The sky is a cloudless deep blue, and one or two of the city trees have a smidgen of colour, but there’s still an abundance of colour in gardens and pots on porches, where late summer flowers lift their happy faces to the sun. It’s a perfect day, and Jack and I didn’t waste it. We had breakfast el fresco, then we went for a long walk and finally, we sat on the porch and watched the teenagers make their way home from school (mostly single file and 2m apart, with a few kids wearing facemasks). Jack thought it was a fantastic parade, and he wagged from beginning to end. A few kids stopped to give him a scritch, and when they were all finally gone, he came and sat at my feet while I wrote this. There couldn’t be a better day.

Jack’s Walk

No sign of the tinman. ©voyager, all rights reserved

 

Jack and I encountered quite a scary beast in the woods today, and he said, “Roaoar!” I jumped and had to look around a bit before I spotted him, and by the time I did, Jack was softly laughing.

“Silly Mummy, It’s only a toy.”

“I can see that, Jack, but it might be dangerous. It roared at me,” I said, playing along.

“What did it sound like, Mummy?”

“It sounded big and scary,” I exclaimed.

“Really? I mean, did it really sound big and scary?”

“Yes,” I giggled, reaching over to scratch his ear, “and maybe a bit like you. Only bigger. And scarier. Definitely scarier.”

“Ha!” he said. “Fooled you. It was me made who made the roar,” and to prove his point, he roared again and again as he walked into the sunlight and away.

 

Jack’s Walk

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I live in a highly agricultural area, and my small city is surrounded on all sides by family run farms, many of which have market gardens. So, from May through October, I have access to a variety of locally grown produce at our outdoor farmer’s market. It’s a bit more expensive than the stuff you can get at a grocery store, but it tastes better and there isn’t a hint of plastic packaging to be found. I have a great set of resuable produce bags.

Local also means that I don’t need to buy American produce, which is a relief during this damned pandemic. Covid may or may not not linger on fresh fruit and veg, but I feel better not taking the chance.

 

Jack’s Walk

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I’m sorry we weren’t here on Friday, but Jack and I have been experiencing technical difficulties. Our computer is old, and it’s been acting up and giving me the pip. So since I won’t be going to Paris anytime soon, I decided to dip into the travel fund and buy myself a new Macbook. This may not be one of my better decisions because I’ve never used a Mac, and I have no idea what I’m doing. Thankfully, the old PC is twitchy but useable, and I have time to learn about the Mac before switching over. Today I’m feeling ridiculously proud of myself for having successfully transferred over my lightroom files and catalogue. It took me all day yesterday, but I did it, and I learned a bunch of stuff in the process.

To celebrate, I took Jack to the park this morning and let him go for a dip. He stayed in the water for about 15 minutes, then shuffled up the bank and dried himself off in the weeds. I could see he was tired, so I sat on the grass with him, and we basked in the late summer sun for a while before heading home. It was a big outing for Jack, who tires easily now, but it filled him with happiness, and it helped clear my mind. Now, I can get back to that user manual…

DegUpdate: Getting to know each other

I have a confession to make: I’m in love. And yes, I shamelessly used the kids to get pets. Pets have always been a great point of difference between Mr and me. I love all creatures great and small, and while he does so, too, he prefers them to be at some distance and not his responsibility. Me? I’d try to snuggle with the grizzly… So now that the degus are here, I’m smitten with them. But they are super cute and Mr also spends time watching them when he’s here, so I think they’re working their magic on him as well…

We’re currently at the “getting to know each other” stage. But we’re getting there. On Friday, when we cleaned Degustan, they hid behind their box and refused to come out for hours. Today they were running around in the side tract while we cleaned the main part and were pretty much ok with us being loud and moving next to them. We’re also using the oldest bribe that there is: food. Special treats are offered in an outstretched hand.  So far, I’m making lots of progress with Candy, who today carefully sniffed my fingers several times, getting my smell, and who even dared to put a paw on mine. Katja and Celeste are still much shyer, though Katja is getting more adventurous by the day. Celeste…, we’ll get there.

Now, enough talk, here’s your fluffballs. You can see they#re getting more comfy with us by the increase in picture quality.

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Katja, taking a peek. The picture is pretty bad, still taken with lots of magnification through the wire of the cage, but sooooo dreamy. That#s her thing: Sneak out on the left side of the wine box, then take flight to Celeste who is waiting on the other side.

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Celeste, waiting for Katja. I’m getting really good at telling them apart. At first I though “fuck it, we’ll just randomly call them a name, how is anybody supposed to tell them apart?”, but when you spend time with them, you notice the small differences. Celeste is a big girl, and her light rings around the eyes and neck are larger than those of the others.

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Find that degu. Katja and Candy sneaking out from behind the box.

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Katja and Celeste. See, I was allowed to hold the phone in their face. You can pretty clearly see the size difference here.

Welcome to Degustan

As I mentioned before, the little one passed all the requirements for owning pets, and after we spent the summer researching and finding a good breeder, as well as me spending a couple of weeks turning an old cupboard into a pet habitat, the degus finally arrived on Wednesday. They are three young females (three being the minimum size of a group) called Candy, Katja and Estelle. Katja and Estelle are siblings, while Candy comes from a different litter, but they are very close in age so they were easy to socialise (the breeder did that for us) and are a good basis for a group.

But let’s start with the habitat, nicknamed “Degustan”:

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I cut an opening into my grandma’s old kitchen cupboard, put some solid fence in front of it and added boards to get a good size habitat. I also used the leftover boards to construct a side tract which increases the habitat size, but can also be used to isolate a degu should the need arise (and currently to keep them from escaping while cleaning the cage).

What sounds pretty straightforward was a hell lot of work, usually because I had to do everything at least twice since I was figuring it out as I went along. All boards have floor tiles on them to prevent urine from soaking into the wood and allow for easy cleaning. At the first try the tile glue soaked the wood too much and my boards bent. The second time I didn’t measure the depth in the cupboard, which was already upstairs, but in the extension, not realising that I’d changed width and depth. Now there’s a gap between the boards and the door, which can be dangerous for the degus, so I have now tied old t-shirts on the door to close the gap. And that’s just one of the many things that went wrong, but now it’s more or less finished and I’m pretty proud of it.I still have to make a running wheel for them, but that’s a project for next week.

Here’s the part you’ve been waiting for: the Degus

I still don’t have very good pics, also not of all of them. They are still very shy and mostly try to hide, though there are already differences noticeable. First, meet Candy. Of course I have an earworm ever since the little one announced the name, and now you have, too.

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Candy is the bold one. She was the first to leave the pet carrier and explore the new habitat. Whenever there’s a disturbance that sends them off hiding (which currently is still mostly “us existing in proximity”) she’s the first to re-emerge and get back to whatever she’d been doing. She also already escaped once and it was quite some work to catch her, especially since we didn’t want to scare or hurt her by grabbing her. Finally we managed to shoo her unto a towel where I then lifted the sides. Once they are accustomed to us they’ll be allowed to run in the room for some time each day, but until they are comfortable with us they need to stay in the habitat.

Here’s Estelle

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She’s loud. When we fixed the shirts to the cage door she kept yelling at us. She’s also very shy and mostly snuggles with Katja. Which was our first clue on how to tell them apart. Also Estelle’s light marks around the eyes are a bit larger than Candy’s. Katja (no pics yet) is easier to tell apart (at least at the moment), because she is still smaller than the other two. As you can imagine, I’m quite in love with them. I think Caine would have loved them, too, they’re obviously her kind of people.

Jack’s Walk

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September

The golden-rod is yellow;
The corn is turning brown;
The trees in apple orchards
With fruit are bending down.
The gentian’s bluest fringes
Are curling in the sun;
In dusty pods the milkweed
Its hidden silk has spun.
The sedges flaunt their harvest,
In every meadow nook;
And asters by the brook-side
Make asters in the brook.
From dewy lanes at morning
The grapes’ sweet odors rise;
At noon the roads all flutter
With yellow butterflies.
By all these lovely tokens
September days are here,
With summer’s best of weather,
And autumn’s best of cheer.
But none of all this beauty
Which floods the earth and air
Is unto me the secret
Which makes September fair.
T’is a thing which I remember;
To name it thrills me yet:
One day of one September
I never can forget.

Helen Hunt Jackson