It’s been nearly two years since we adopted the little guys: Daniel, Jack, Sam and Scott. When we got them we put together a cage for them using two second hand pets at home cage (those things are expensive new and just one wouldn’t be suitable for two degus, nevermind four). So. Two cage with lots of extra levels added, a huge metal wheel and lots of hiding places. It’s worked well enough, but the cage isn’t without it’s issues (such as the door being to one side of the cage which doesn’t provide easy access for cleaning out the cage) and the cages weren’t new to start with so the time has come to buy a new cage for the little guys. The cage the big guys (Thomas and Tobias) came with is the same sort of thing, but the way the shelves are laid out makes it easier to clean and the cage is still in a better condition than the cage of the little guys.

After lots of looking around and not really finding anything I was 100% happy with I narrowed my options down to the following cages:

• Liberta 2nd Edition Explorer

  Rat, Ferret and Chinchilla

  Cage

• Midwest Critter Nation Double Small Animal Cage

• Savic

  Rat & Ferret

  Cage Royal Suite 95

Keep reading for my thought on these cages.

Ideally I would have looked at all of these cages in person before buying one, however I couldn’t find anywhere that sells them locally. All three of these cage have doors which are such that the front of the cage opens fully for easy access to the cage. They also all have solid floors.

Liberta Cage

• The trays are deeper than they look in the photos, I should be able to put in plenty of bedding without worrying about it all being kicked out again
• The direction of the bars will make it more difficult for the degus to climb up the cage
• Hammocks etc. can only be hung from the top of the cage

Critter Nation Cage

• The trays don’t look as deep
• The half width shelves look sturdiest on this cage
• The wheels on the stand look as though the have brakes
• Hammocks can be hung from the middle level of the cage as well as the top

Savic Cage

• The cage is solid around the full levels to prevent bedding being kicked out as much, but the actual trays don’t look as deep and it looks as though there is a gap along the side of the tray through which bedding could be lost 
• It’s possible to hang things from the middle level of the cage
• The half width shelves aren’t as wide as those in the other two cages

Please note that I have compared these cages for how I intend to use them with bedding, I’ve seen lots of people with rats who use fleece instead in which case shallower trays might be more suitable.

The cage I settled on is the Liberta cage. The cage arrived flat packed and was fairly straight forward to put together by myself. It takes quite a lot of space to put together.

I have added two full wooden levels and replaced the two metal half width shelves with wooden ones. As the levels are much closer together now I have removed the ramps, otherwise I would have replaced these with solid ramps – whilst the ramps provided shouldn’t cause bumblefoot because they make up only a small part of the cage, I would personally worry that a paw or leg might get caught if a degu decides to push someone else off.

Things I wish I’d known before buying this cage:

• In order to get the trays out the doors need to be opened by 180 degrees, something to keep in mind if the cage is going in a narrow space.
• The half width shelves rattle and seem as though they would be incredibly noisy with degus running over them.
• The way the half width shelves are attached means that they can only be attached on the right hand side of the cage.

The little guys have really taken to their new cage and are enjoying redecorating (chewing all the new shelves).