And then there were 5

It was a sad evening at home yesterday. As I was tucking G. into bed I discovered that Short E., one of the gerbils, had died.

So January 2004 The Lady Ann and G. went gerbil shopping. I had agreed to this as the pets of choice because G. had a speech problem with the 'r' sound in the middle of the word. Gerbil has a great 'r' sound in the middle and so I believed that having gerbils as pets would help him practice that 'r' sound as he talked about them. He pronounced gerbil as 'ji-bel'. He has gotten better with the sound.

So anyway, The Lady Ann and G. brought home two male gerbils from the pet store. One had no tail so we wanted to call it "Shorty" for obvious reasons. (G. had a soft spot for the gerbil with no tail.) Of course G. wasn't satisfied with that name. He observed them for a while and noticed that the one with no tail was an adventerous explorer that was all over the new cage as fast as it could go. The other one was more timid but had quite an ability to jump. They became Short E. and Jumper, the E. being for Explorer.

A little while later, one of the male gerbils had a miraculous birth! We determined that Short E. was really a she. We seperated Jumper from his bride and kids quickly. We also did research and learned that gerbils get pregnant the same day they give birth! Another litter was on the way. After the second litter we were up to 11 gerbils at home.

Some had to go. We also knew that gerbils are social and prefer to have company in the cage. We separated the boys and the girls and G. had to pick two of each to keep so that Short E. and Jumper would each have one cage mate. Two were selected, Blackhole (a male) and Sandy (a female). Lo and behold, Blackhole turned out to be a she and another litter of gerbils was had and we were back up to 9 and expecting another litter.

Blackhole had an accident - she bit someone who was holding her and the kid's reaction was to fling her because it hurt. I can't blame him but it was the wrong thing to do for both of them. He wound up with a deep cut on his finger that required medical attention and she landed on the floor with blood leaking from her ear. We buried Blackhole in the garden a little while later. We were worried about her 5 babies - were they old enough to be weaned? They were and she never did have that second litter. The gerbil counts is now 8, 5 babies in one cage, 2 girls in a second, and Jumper all alone. One of the babie was almost an albino and so it was named Whitey. Another had a back leg broken (I think it was my fault but it was an accident) and kind of rolled to move. It got a permanent "kink" in it's neck and is named Lefty because it's always looking to the left. The other three babies were simply called "No Name" or the "No Namers".

The cage with Short E. and Sandy were joined with the babies cage. Short E. was always fighting but Sandy seemed to get along with them. We had to seperate them again. Along the way one of the babies lost half a tail and so it acquired a name, Half Tail. Short E. was always blamed for chewing off the tail but I was never sure.

A month ago or so Half Tail and one of the remaining No Namers were given away to one of G.'s friends who became Lucky (aka Half Tail) and Super or Cali or Supercalifragilisticexpialigocious (sp?) and so we wer down to 6.

But Short E. died and we're down to 5. G. told me this morning that No Name has a name now, Pickachu.

That is the story of Short E., her children, and her grandchildren as I know it today. A memorial service will be offered sometime this weekend at the garden. God bless Short E.