TRAUMA!
How else would you describe it when your five year old comes running up to you breathlessly telling you that your one pet gerbil is eating your other pet gerbil?
Expecting a little playful tail-nibbling going on, I almost lost my lunch when I saw the harsh reality that Lucy (the evil red-eyed one in the cage) was indeed actually consuming Fui (seen here enjoying better days in Spencer's hands).
My stomach is much too weak to even play with the gerbils when all is well and since it was quite apparent that there was no saving Fui at that point, we just placed a little covering over the cage and waited for Daddy to come home to take care of the messy business of extracting a formerly beloved pet from the grips of the evil cannibalistic traitor gerbil.
By the time Glen got home the sideshow was over and Fui looked like he was peacefully sleeping in the corner, so we made a graham cracker box into a special casket for poor little Fui and the burial services will be held shortly.In the meantime we're trying to distract Emma and Adam, who were the only two actual eyewitnesses of the gruesome sight other than me, with more lighthearted pursuits and hope that one day they'll forget the trauma part and remember the happy days they spent watching them playfully flit around the cage.
5 comments:
Sad news! May Fui rest in peace! Coincidentally, my family had a few gerbils several years ago, and the one named Lucy systematically murdered all the others. We joked that Lucy was short for Lucifer.
Is that normal to have them eat each other? We don't have pets, and that is the reason why. I can't handle pet death!! I know, I know, my children are deprived!
No--it's not really normal, but it's not all that abnormal either.
At first we were convinced that Lucy had actually killed Fui before her "feast"...but after reading up on gerbil behavior, it's probably the more likely scenario that Fui died of natural causes and Lucy was merely taking advantage of the situation.
When Glen, um, took care of things he noted that there was really just a tiny little spot on Fui that had been consumed. Somehow that made it feel a little better, but we are in agreement with Karey that Lucifer seems a much more apt name at this point.
So SAD for the kids!
I remember our dog got one of the baby ducks...it was hard not to be really mad at Daisy for a long time.
In some ways it was also a good life lesson.
That is so sad. That happened to our hamsters when we were little. THey would fight all the time, then I think one of them killed the other. We buried them in our backyard. I've had issues since then, so watch EMma and Adam carefully.
Just kidding.
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