Re: Is my baby sick? (Some questions)
Ok...thanks again.
CLEARLY, I need to make some adjustments. Perhaps this regurg was Caress' way of telling me that? She seemed to have been doing fine up until now...?
Her enclosure is covered on two sides, and is in my office. (A no traffic area in my house...unless I am in there working, which is only a couple hours a day) She clearly likes to hide, and spends most of her time under her half log. In a ten day period, she is only active about three days. My "handling" her is brief, and only consists of picking her up out of the enclosure and letting her crawl around my hands for a few moments. (I try to keep her stress level down because I read that she likes to hide. ("very solitary creatures" I read somewhere) handling her is probably more for me than her...she is fascinating.
She has soaked in the water container twice since i put it in there. Both times were right before a shed, and both times she stayed in there soaking for like two days. Those two times were the best sheds that she has had since she was given to me.
I use "Crittercare: natural bedding for small animals" as a substrate. I usually use about a half a bag of the stuff (bag is 14 Liters) and pat it down...it winds up being about an inch thick. I suppose it is pretty good insulation against too much heat from those under tank heaters?
I will work on fixing her up with a place to hide on both ends, and perhaps a smaller water dish. I obviously need a better method for maintaining the temp inside her enclosure...I will get to work on that ASAP. It is probably best to wait about 7 more days, then try giving her a smaller rat to eat. Circleville is a remote city here in Ohio, and there is no place to buy rats here. The nearest place is 30-45 minutes drive to go buy one. I clearly need to adjust her feeding schedule somehow though...I will figure that out...
Thanks again for all your help and advice...
Dennis M
Re: Is my baby sick? (Some questions)
When we were using a tall tank, we used foam insulation board around 3 sides (used for houses) to keep temps up, and covered the screen top except for where the lamp dome was. It worked pretty well.