u/mimili11

Just their sandbath, which turned into bedding bath (I had cleaned it all up yesterday 🥲)

I don't get it—I feel bad for my gerbil because she's constantly scratching the Plexiglas on her cage and even trying to chew it. It's all scratched up, and it looks like I'm mistreating her. Plus, recently she's started jumping on the metal lid to try to chew it too... I feel bad for her—she must be bored or stressed, I don’t know—even though I’m doing everything I can. She lives with her two sisters in a Bucastate 3.0 cage; I’ve put in as much bedding as I could (about 10 inches, I think), she has plenty of buried hiding spots to make fun tunnels, a wheel, and all kinds of chew toys (cardboard, empty egg cartons, wicker balls or similar items for rodents, rope balls, twigs and branches from apple and pear trees, pinecones, etc.). I put their food in the bedding in several batches so they have to search for it; I make lots of foraging toys for them; I also give them sprays ( sometimes) , things to keep them busy building their nest, etc. I even built them a playpen connected to the cage with a ramp, where I let them out at least once a day when I get home from school until they all go back in on their own. I don’t know what else to do...

Today I was about to clean the sand in my gerbils' cage when I saw some tiny things, about 1 mm long, moving. There were just a few of them on the wooden lid. They’re very small, quite slender, don’t jump, and have beige bodies and brown heads. I immediately checked my gerbils’ bodies, but they don’t have any marks, aren’t scratching themselves, don’t have any scabs, and are acting completely normal. I cleaned out the gerbils’ sand, and there actually weren’t any in the sand—they were all clustered between the wooden lid and the acrylic container. I looked around the cage a bit on the other wooden surfaces to see if there were any there, but I haven’t found anything so far. Please help me—is this dangerous for my gerbils? (Sorry about the photo quality)