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Escapes |
Tilly & OsAnyway, this is a story about Tilly and Os (her eldest baby) and one of her new babies. When Tilly and Pan's original babies were about three months old, they were looking a bit cramped in their cage, so I went out and bought them a Superpet multi storey cage, with several different levels and tubes for them to play in.... they love it. The doors on it (there are 2 at the front and 4 in the side) close by hooking back on themselves.  I had to go out one evening, and came home to find that my dogs had overturned furniture and moved things around, which isn't like them. I immediately checked the chin house and my heart nearly stopped - the bottom door was hanging open and I could only see Pan and Weaver. After a bit of searching, I found and caught Tilly, who was none the worse for her adventure, but I couldn't find Os anywhere. At first, I thought the dogs might have eaten him, but there was no signs of blood or fur around, so I discounted that. Then I realised that the window was open slightly - it was July and really hot - and I thought that poor little Os had panicked and jumped onto the ledge and got out. I lived in a flat at the time and if the fall hadn't killed him, the foxes certainly would have. I was devastated. I had just about given up hope when I heard chin crying - I searched around and found the poor little chap, frozen with fear, behind the radiator. Thankfully, he was also none the worse for his adventure, apart from being covered in dog slobber - I guess he must have hidden in a place where they could see him but couldn't get to him, and they just drooled on him. That was over a month ago, and he still runs and hides whenever the dogs come into the room, but he's getting over it now. Needless to say, I have double secured the cage doors so that can't happen again. The next escape was one of Tilly's newest kits. I heard her crying and went to investigate (I knew she was due any day) and saw a kit climbing down the outside of the cage. The spaces between the bars were too big. I immediately transferred Mum and babies to the other cage, which has a much smaller mesh and counted myself lucky that I had found them in time. They were born on a Friday; on the Sunday morning, I checked to make sure everything was in order and could only see one baby.... the other one had squeezed out between the smaller mesh and was sitting in a box underneath. So Sunday was spent making the mesh smaller still - the holes are now only about 1cm square. 
Received by email 27th August 2003 |
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