I received Sue's three gliders into care yesterday. All three are boys who have been neutered with poms intact.

Kioko is the largest and his brother Washi has the whitest face. Shikoni is the original single glider and he seems to separate from the two often while out.

I gave the cage a cleaning, put in a new pouch and some new things to explore, added a second exercise wheel, I reversed the door locks so they operate better, and I am going to put in a plastic mesh floor so they can rest easier in the cage.

They seem very healthy, tame and loved. I cant wait to get to know them. First night feeding was ground turkey, mixed veggies, mixed fruit and a Leadbeater blender mix.


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I caught a very nice double rainbow over the house today. Of course the camera just cant do it justice. I should have gotten out the tripod and tried a long exposure.






This reminded me of my trip to Glacier National Park in 2005 where we saw an amazing double rainbow on the way into the park. We were so close that I couldnt get the entire thing into one shot so I stitched two images below. I would swear that I saw a pot of gold rolling down the highway...

A demonstration of simplistic mass mealworm harvesting and then bulk feeding a cage.

Most of the popular budget or flimsy style of cages have the lift up "guillotine" type of access doors on them. These are inherently dangerous to sugar gliders. In my own past I had been feeding gliders on the threshold of the cage and the door came slamming down. Luckily nobody lost anything in that event but it managed to scare the crap out of me, so I set forth to find a better way.



Here is a motivational video if you had any questions about the idea:









For me the answer was in junking the "budget" cage that came with my sugar gliders and buying a better designed and larger cage with swing out doors. I have three of the Exel cages right now and they are perfect for my needs.

Some folks just cant afford the sturdier cages so the budget ones have to do. I have had it on my todo list to come up with a way to modify the lift up doors to be more safe. I finally got this done tonight.

There may be various designs for the lift-up door, but I only had this one to work with which seems to be a very common one from ebay sellers . There may always be a better way to accomplish this so use your noodle. I do not have access to a spot welder or anything else that could have made this better, so I just made do with the basic homebrew.

All you really need to do is turn one side into a hinge and the other into a hook. Then you simply lift up the door an inch and it will swing open and safely stay open so you can do what you need to do without fear of head trauma to your little pets or your own fingers.

I subconsciously decided to make my door open to the left for some reason.

I turned the original bottom loop down to become the bottom locking hook.





The top loop was bent out of the way and not used. You can cut this off when you are done and satisfied with your modification.



The top corner of the door gets cut and the free wire gets bent over, in and down to hook into the cage while holding the top of the door shut. You can tie the loose wire to the door with a metal twisty if you want to.




Both of the hinge side loops get squeezed together to become a tight hinge to hold the door.







I hope this helps someone. Please leave comments here or on youtube of your success or probable modifications to this concept in order to help others.

QUESTION: Can you save your mealworm farm from a mite infestation ?

ANSWER: YES YOU CAN!


When I finally got a meal worm mite infestation, I set out to find a solution. 100% of online reading will tell you that the only recourse to a mite infestation is to throw out the entire farm, sterilize and start over from scratch with a new batch of worms. What nobody tells you is that your chances of getting infested again are very high.

THE ODDS ARE AGAINST YOU

Odds are that the place where you purchased your worms has mites and the worms shipped to you have mite eggs. The substrate you are buying has an extremely high chance of having mite eggs in it. A spec of dust carried into the container by you walking by can have a mite on it... There are species of mites everywhere and some are on your body as you are reading this. Fortunately, the only mites we really care about with meal worm farms is the typical grain mite which has a number of species variants.

The mites that infest your meal worm farm are so tiny that you may not even notice them. I had noticed a fine "dust" for some time collecting along the corners and edges of my farming drawer. I figured that static electricity was adhering the dust to the side of the container. Only after some time did I see some of it moving and come to realize that it wasnt dust at all. The grain mites will want to collect where they can get the freshest air which is usually at the edges or air holes of a drawer. So if you see dust collecting, well, you probably have a mite infestation.

When I finally realized mine, I found mites all down the back of the shelf where I had my worms and they were collecting down on the floor in a huge mass. This is gross and can also be dangerous if you happen to have any other pets that can come along and sniff at the mass such as cats and dogs. Breathing a million grain mites into the nasal cavity and lungs is no good for any animal.

So I cleaned. I sanitized. I bleached. I vacuumed and threw away the bag daily. I did anything that came to mind to get rid of the infestation.

I moved my existing farm outside immediately and figured that I would have to toss it but I wanted to at least try to find a way to sanitize it safely and without killing it off.

I researched and experimented and came up with two ways to rid your farm of mites that nobody else will tell you. Both have worked for me. The first method worked quickly and allowed me to restart my farm indoors but it has some tradeoffs whereas the second method took some time but was effective at saving the entire farm and I recommend it.

METHOD 1: Sweating

Grain mites thrive in warmth and humidity, but much like meal worms, there is a line that they cannot cross in which they will simply drown and die. Luckily and simply, the grain mites will die off before the worms will. What I did was screen out all of the adult worms from the rest of the farm, dusted them off with compressed air for good measure, then placed them all by themselves with no substrate or anything else in a small GLAD brand disposable container. I closed the lid tightly and punched a couple of pin holes. Very quickly the container will get wet from all of the respiration of the worms. It will get drippy wet inside. I opened it once in awhile to replace the air and let out some moisture. My goal wasnt to kill the worms but to only drown out the mites but it is a fine line that you need to reach but not cross. Some of the worms at the bottom may die off from this. I did this some months ago and dont quite remember how it went or how long I did it, but I do know that it worked and I was able to immediately start the new inside drawer. Most of the worms were able to survive the high heat and humidity longer than the mites and any remaining eggs. The adult worms were able to pupate and begin to repopulate a clean drawer in which I worked to manage humidity much better than I did before.


METHOD 2: Diatomaceous earth

I read how this is used as a natural "pesticide" of sorts. The microscopic ground diatom shells are jagged and pierce the body of anything small that encounters them and the creature is left to dry out and die. It also acts as a natural desiccant allowing the container to stay drier also inhibiting reproduction. I didnt know if this would work but it was the only thing I could find that I could try with the remaining worm farm. The idea was not to put it into the substrate or in direct contact with the farm, I decided to use it to catch the masses of mites as they left the farm. If you can kill off all of the new bugs, they will stop mating and laying eggs and the brood will die off.

So I found a larger container, loaded the bottom with DE powder that I purchased online , and then put the farm into it and closed it up and kept tabs on it. I immediately noticed the stream of mites climbing out of the farm and into the DE. They were amassing on top of the dead corpses of previous mites. I would occasionally reach a stick inside and stir of the masses hoping that anything left alive would succumb to the DE.










As far as I could ever tell, I never saw the mites going back into the container, so it looked like a one way trip. After about a week or two of non-stop streaming mites, I figured that this wasnt working. I noticed that my container was getting moist under the lid. It appears that the heat of summer and the respiration of the growing mealworm farm had turned this contraption into a mega mite brooder and extermination trap in one.

So I needed to remove the moisture. I chose to cut out some holes, glue in yard fabric as an insect trap and then I mounted a fan to exhaust air out one side. This moved air across the inside of the device and pulled out moisture.






The following week had fewer and fewer mites hatching or climbing out and it eventually got to where none were to be found on the outsides of the farm container. I kept maintaining the farm and it was doing fantastic out in the warmth of summer. I had never had a farm produce so heavily. I fed the sugar gliders out of the outdoor farm for weeks and let the indoor farm recuperate. Apparently meal worms like warmth. With the exhaust fan going, the farm did well up to 100F, then not so good.






I went through one or two complete cleanings of the outdoor farm until I was satisfied that I had gotten rid of the mite problem and then I brought the farm indoors into my new two drawer farm with exhaust fan.

I havent seen any mites, bugs, fungus, mildew, chunky substrate or any kind of moisture build up with this new farm design.

Now, do keep in mind that transferring worms or beetles can also mean transferring mites and mite eggs. The eggs or mites can easily attach to the insect for the ride over. You will never know if what you see is frass, grain, dust, mites or eggs. So beware! Keep your worm farms dry. I recommend installing an exhaust fan to move moist air out and you may never have a problem again.

Pican died early this morning. She was 8. She was mother of three and is the first glider I have lost in my care.

I had noticed her slowing down a little and a day ago I noticed her perching up high all by herself which I have never seen her do. So I have been keeping a worried eye on her. Yesterday afternoon when I pulled out the food bowls I peered into her group pouch and found one of her children had been overgrooming on her for awhile to such extent that she had ripped a large gaping hole in her mothers back and was in the process of continuing to do so and did not want to stop or let go. I dug Pican out of there and tended to her wound. The hole was the skin only, not the body and there was no blood. But The skin was so loose, I could easily move it around and peer inside at her muscles and whatnot. It was very strange and also did not seem to cause her discomfort.

I did what I could to the wound to keep her for the night until we could see the vet in the morning. Around 3am I went to bed and realized that she was probably not going to make it. She was very sluggish and only wanted to rest her head and would not take her favorite food. I gave her a petting, a kiss on the head and one last "I love you" and I think she passed soon after alone in her pouch. I am pretty sure that she succumbed to her original problem whatever that may be and not the fresh wound. I dont think a vet would have been able to save her as it was an internal problem, perhaps a liver failure or just old age.

So why did Junior start eating mommy alive? Maya is one of the last born twins and she takes after her mom as far as being food aggressive with her siblings. She is not a biter, but she is bitey. She bites the feet of the other cage mates and even daddy. It's an odd behavior that I have also seen in my colony of 8. It seems that they know biting causes grief and they use that tool if they want to.

I think Maya was grooming mom and a nibble that would have normally gotten a reprimand went unanswered by mom. Maya kept grooming and pulling and nibbling and sooner or later she got too far into it and broke skin and then kept going.

It is a very strong instinct of gliders to be "mouthy". Most owners will attest that gliders will remove scabs or try to bite off a wart or mole or yank your hair. In nature they bite everything they are curious about as that is a large part of how they perceive the world. They bite into trees to make them bleed out yummy juices. They bite worms and berries and whatever they see ends up in the mouth.

As smart as they seem, I do not think that these animals have any understanding of life and death. I do not think that little Maya was trying to harm mom, she was just nibbling away at something new and removing something that didnt seem like it should be there. Unfortunately, tired old mom just sat there and let her go at it.

This afternoon I let her mate named Buddy explore her body. He nosed around her a bit, climbed on top of her for a bit, left some poo and moved on. I dont get a feeling that he knew anything specific or that he'd miss her but it was worth a try. He has his three kids to keep him company now.

Pican was not my favorite critter. She was bitchy, fussy, noisy and would bite if you didnt handle her super gently. But I was able to take her from her previous 5 years alone in a tiny cage eating catfood and shrimp. I gave her a mate and children and a family to spend the last few years of her life with. So I am happy that I was able to have her and I will miss bitchy old Pican.

Rest in peace Mommy.













http://www.sugarglider.com/journal/Kazko/Received_Pican_49.asp

Much like the usual worn out counter appliances, kichenware, lamps, accessories, dated decorative knick knacks, hats, shoes, clothes, toys, books, and so on, you can always depend on there being a bin or two full of various purses at your local Goodwill store. Most purses usually cross the line of ridiculous for some reason or another, perhaps they are all picked through and only the crazy odd remain, but you can dig around and occasionally find some perfect purses or bags to bring home to use as sleeping pouches for your sugar gliders. And if you are the type to lug your gliders around all day, well a purse seems right for that task.

I look for the tough cotton types of material such as denim, canvas or duck to help avoid problems with nails.

Used purses are so cheap that you can pick out more than you need, dump them all into the front loader for a cycle or two, removed the straps, internal dangly pockets and other things that get into the way, and hang em in the cage.

Mine love their purses.

I usually hang them on the cage door so that when I open the door, the purse swings out for very easy access to the critters inside. A large bolt and pair of fender washers and nuts does the trick.

My stealth wheel is somewhere over a year old and has gotten a lot of use between my three cages. The plastic bearing has been going out and it has just gotten worse and worse. So I decided to fix it any way that I could muster.

The best thing I was able to find to replace the bearing was a 3" garage door pulley from the home store.




I removed the wheel from the stand and then used a small nail to tap out the one way quick screws that secure the plastic bearing onto the wheel.




I was not able to find a way to remove the axle bolt from the bearing as it was either rusted into its sleeve or was somehow magically affixed, so I simply pried the bolt head through the back wall to release it.






The pulley is a very close fit as a replacement.




I drilled a larger center hole to allow the new bearing to protrude through the wheel.





I decided to drill out three of the six rivets that held the pulley together and then use the holes to affix the pulley to the back of the wheel using new rivets. Small bolts would work as well.






A quick reassembly of the whole thing and I have a much better working wheel again ready for more slow motion videos.

Most of the cages we get are made in China by people who are not really trying for best quality or design for our animals. This can lead to some unintended side effects.

For instance, what do our sugar gliders love to do when the door is open? Well mine love to come running, or climbing really. Any time I open a door, the critters come around from the side and always wrap a finger hold around the open door frame of the cage. Some of the cages have lots of space around the door frame so when it closes on a finger, no problems, and some dont.

I have one cage that is very bad on the sides. I have known this since I got it and have been very careful with it yet I still manage to get a finger in there once in awhile. If I werent being so careful with it, those fingers would have all been chopped off.

BAD DOOR



GOOD DOOR



Also, even when the door is wide open, a single clingy glider can grab the door, pull and accidentally slam it shut which could then cause severed fingers or limbs in all sorts of places around the frame. So be weary of this.



Many folks have those "budget" bird cages with the slide up doors. I used to have some of those and I cant tell you how many times that door came slamming down accidentally when it was not supposed to. That is enough force to break a glider neck, chop a foot or at least hurt somehow. So I recommend extreme caution with this style of cage door as well.

The good thing about the budget doors is that they can be reworked to swing out simply by bending some of the metal tabs or adding a little bit of homebrew if needed. What you want to do is make it so that the door has to be lifted one inch to unlatch and then it swings open on one of the sides.


So be careful when closing your doors on your gliders and plan for accidents.

Out of random curiosity I did an Internet speed check from the server console. It's looking good. Upstream is a bit over 18Mbps. If I can get some of my sites making income this year I am going to fatten this up some too. I think the next tier is 50Mbps upstream. Imagine that.

This site is currently running on a real hardware server but I may virtualize it eventually to save energy. Most of my other sites are already on a linux virtual machine hosted here as well.

Some day everything I use here will be merged down to just the single VM box with a few guests on it. I already have the hardware that can support all of it. 16Gig ram goes a long way to support basic Internet servers.

   

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kazko
Gender: Male
Occupation:computer geek
Member since: Jan 24, 1997
Posts: 6747 View my pictures!
I'm on the map!
My Bio
NUTHOUSE (3) Pican 4/30/2002, died 6/02/2010 Buddy 5/01/2006 Hazel 2/01/2007, rehomed 11/28/2011 Maya 4/25/2007 Pili 4/25/2007 MISFITS (3) Big Guy 9/23/2003, died 1/29/2014 Lil Guy 9/23/2003, died 5/13/2015 Hunter 4/19/2006, died 3/23/2014 JP 8/12/2006 Shikoni 2004 Kioko 2003 Washi 2003, died 5/27/2014 SUGARSHACK (3) Chico 1/15/2006, died 9/14/2011 Cookie 10/15/2005 Kimmie 10/15/2005 Lucky 5/25/2007 Spritz 8/24/2007, died 7/06/2011 Ginger 8/24/2007, died 12/16/2012 Rock 9/09/2007, died 3/23/2013 Crystal 9/09/2007, died 11/01/2012

   

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