Top Tips to Keep Your Degu Happy and Healthy

Degus are charming, sociable rodents that make fascinating pets. Understanding and meeting their unique needs will ensure they thrive happily and healthily in your care. This guide covers essential tips to help you provide the best life for your degu.

1. Encourage Social Interaction for Wellbeing

Degus are naturally social animals, thriving in groups in the wild. When keeping them as pets, it’s important to house at least two degus together—but ensure they are the same sex to prevent unwanted litters and aggression. Companionship offers mental stimulation and comfort; degus will groom, play, and sleep huddled together. Lone degus often develop stress, depression, and poorer health, becoming withdrawn and eating less. By providing a compatible companion, you support their emotional and physical wellbeing.

2. Provide a Spacious, Multi-Level Habitat

Degus are active and agile, benefiting from a large cage that offers plenty of room to explore vertically and horizontally. A tall cage with multiple ledges, platforms, and tunnels mimics their natural environment and encourages exercise. Including a thick layer of dust-free bedding lets them dig and burrow, which are important natural behaviours. Building or buying a custom cage suited to degus increases their enrichment and happiness.

3. Feed a Balanced, Low-Sugar Diet

A correct diet is vital since degus are prone to diabetes and cannot process high sugar or carbohydrate-rich foods. The foundation of their diet should be high-quality grass hay, making up at least 70% of their intake. Complement this with specialised degu pellets or suitable chinchilla/guinea pig mixes. Avoid sugary treats and fruits entirely. Offering natural chewable items like untreated apple or pear wood supports dental health and prevents teeth overgrowth.

4. Facilitate Regular Physical Exercise

Exercise keeps your degu fit and mentally stimulated. A spacious cage with diverse features promotes climbing, running, and jumping. Adding a solid-surfaced exercise wheel (about 25 cm diameter) encourages active play safely. Outside the cage, supervised playtime in a secure, hazard-free area can further satisfy their curiosity and energy. Remember to keep cage items balanced with free space, allowing natural digging, which is a key activity for degus.

5. Maintain a Clean and Comfortable Environment

Since degus are confined mainly to their cage, cleanliness is crucial to their health. Weekly cleaning involves replacing bedding, refreshing nesting materials, and wiping down cage surfaces and accessories. Retaining some of the familiar bedding during cleaning helps reduce stress. Degus themselves tend to be tidy animals, but a fresh, hygienic habitat reduces the risk of infections and promotes longevity.

6. Provide Regular Sandbaths for Fur Health

Like their relative the chinchilla, degus need sandbaths to keep their fur clean and healthy by absorbing oils and dirt. Provide a dust bath using fine volcanic or chinchilla sand two to three times a week for 20-30 minutes. Some owners leave baths inside the cage permanently, cleaning and refreshing the sand regularly, while others offer baths on alternate days and remove them to minimise mess.

7. Show Gentle Care and Build Trust

Strong relationships form through patient, gentle handling. Speak softly to your degu and allow it to approach you rather than forcing interaction. Avoid picking them up by the tail, which is fragile and prone to injury. Regular calm interaction will foster trust and a happier, less stressed pet.

8. Introduce Variation for Mental Stimulation

Degus are inquisitive and benefit from diversity in their environment. Add new toys, rearrange cage items after cleaning, or experiment with safe new foods to keep their minds active and engaged. Providing foraging challenges and new experiences enriches their lives and prevents boredom.

By following these guidelines centred on their social needs, diet, environment, and enrichment, you will help your degu live a fulfilling, happy life. With attentive care and a stimulating home, your pet degu will reward you with delightful company for years to come.