What’s a degu?
May 13, 2005 
I just adopted a pair of degus (day-goos) from Petco.
But what are degus, you might ask? Well, I didn’t even know when I saw them. Other people were saying they looked like gerbils on steroids. I thought they were two small, different-looking baby chinchillas.
Then I did some research.
I found out that degus originally hail from South America (like guinea pigs) and live in desert climates, where they like to climb and forrage for food.
To me, they look like animals with a gopher-shaped head, guinea pig body, and gerbil tail. But, unlike the animals they seem to resemble, they cannot digest any type of sugar. None. Not even fruit!
They also seem to be compulsive chewers, using their orange (the normal color for degus) teeth to gnaw through even the hardest plastics. The plastic igloo, or, rather, the half of it that’s left, that came with the degus can attest to that. That’s why I set them up in a multi-level metal cage.
Degus are relatively new on the pet scene and as exotic pets, its hard to find many things at pet stores with “degu” on the label. Right now, my degus are eating a mix of plain guinea pig and chinchilla pellets.
I’ll be updating more about the degus, since I’m fascinated by them and their odd squeaky noises and resemblance to Pikachu. But for now, here’s some sites with more information about degus:
– Degus.org — Degu care guide
– Animal Network: Degus — Degu information
– Wikipedia: degu — Encyclopedia entry
– Degus-Online — a degu forum
