Snuggle Buddies

One of my favorite things about Tinki and Telly is their love of snuggling.  Sugar gliders are nocturnal, so when I take Tinki and Telly out of their cage during the day, there is nothing they like better than to curl up in a ball and nap on me.  Since they are so tiny, they have found some very interesting, but snuggly places to curl up in.

For instance in my shirt!

Telly waving for the camera. 

Sugar gliders are marsupials, so they naturally love places that remind them of their mother's pouch. Baby sugar gliders only spend about two and half weeks in utero, so it is essential that they live in their mother's pouch until they are developed enough to make it on their own.  To promote bonding between pet sugar gliders and their owners, Pocket Pets sells pouches that simulate this close relationship, where sugar gliders can take a nap while they pouch hangs around their owner's neck. Tinki and Telly each have their own pouches, but prefer to snuggle in the same pouch.

The Pocket Pet pouches.

Telly in his pouch.

Tinki being camera shy in Telly's pouch.

Telly Needs a Friend

            As everyone should know, the most important thing that you can do before adopting a pet is researching the type of animal you are looking into getting.  As I stated in my first entry, my sister and I had no idea what a sugar glider was, let alone how you take care of one.  However we made sure that we were capable of taking care of a pet sugar glider before we finally decided to get Telly.

            One of the most important aspects of owning a sugar glider is knowing and understanding that they are social creatures.  In the wild, sugar gliders live in extended family colonies of up to seven adults and their young children.  My sister and I made a pact from the start to have Telly out of his cage every second that we could so that he would not get lonely.  Unfortunately, life gets busy and we were not able to take him out as often as we would have liked.  Also, sugar gliders are nocturnal, and my sister and I are not, so we were worried that Telly was getting bored and lonely at night.

            When we got Telly, we asked the Pocket Pet employees when they would be in our area again and they told us probably not for at least another six months.  This meant that we could not get Telly a friend for quite some time.  A month after we got Telly, we went back down to Manchester to go shopping at the mall, and to our astonishment Pocket Pets was back.  We knew that this was a one in a million chance, so as soon as we saw them we knew that we had to get Telly a buddy.

            After inquiring as to which gender of sugar glider would be best to bring home to our little guy, we found out that it does not matter.  The Pocket Pet employees told us that Telly should do great with either a boy or a girl, and that all male sugar gliders are neutered so there would be no surprises if we decided to get a girl.  After a quick period of deliberation, we decided on getting Telly a little girlfriend.  Once again, we were taken to the cages that housed the baby sugar gliders and when the door of the girl's cage opened up my sister immediately saw the perfect little friend for Telly.  Just as when we got Telly, we did not choose our sugar glider, our new sugar glider chose us.

            My sister and I were so excited to get home and introduce our new baby to Telly, but truth be told we were also extremely nervous how they would react to each other.  Telly was such a social little man that we knew he would accept any sugar glider that we brought home, but we did not know how the new little baby would adjust to a new home that already had a sugar glider.  While anticipating the pending introduction, my sister and I brainstormed names for out little girl.  In the end we settled on Tinki.

Telly on the left & Tinki on the right.

            When we got home my sister took Telly out of his cage and firmly held him in her hands while I held Tinki in mine.  We slowly brought them toward each other and rubbed each of their scent glands on the other one, exactly how the Pocket Pets employees told us to introduce them to each other.  Telly was very interested in Tinki and I could tell that he was extremely excited to have a friend.  Tinki on the other hand was fairly timid and was not quite as sure what to do, but she soon warmed up not only to Telly, but also to me and my sister.

Snuggle buddies from the start!  Telly is snoozing on top of
Tinki while they sleep in their carrying pouch.

            Honestly, Tinki and Telly have adjusted to each other so well that sometimes I forget that we did not get them at the same time.  They truly have a special bond and I could not imagine my life without either one of them!

As you can see it didn't take long for Tinki to feel
comfortable enough to pass out in our presence.

What's in a Name?

As you can probably tell, this entry revolves around the long (and even excruciating) experience that my sister and I had while coming up with a name for our new sugar glider.  As soon as we got in the car for the trip home, my sister and I were bouncing ideas for his name off of each other.  We each came up with a handful of names, but nothing quite fit.  I think the problem was that our new pet was a native of Australia and considered “exotic” and we wanted something that reflected that.  Cue my sister’s fanatical obsession with Australian actress Rebel Wilson; and suddenly our little guy was named after a lady.  Don’t get me wrong I think Rebel Wilson is hilarious, but I by no means thought that Rebel was the name for our little man.  I let my sister know that I did not think that he looked or acted like  “Rebel”, but as much as I wanted to further protest his new moniker, I bit my tongue because “Rebel” was mine and my sister’s pet, not just mine, so I knew that we had to cooperate to make his life with us amazing.

This is one of the very first pictures that we took of our new friend.
Does he look like a "Rebel" to you?

So my sister made it known to our family that his name was Rebel.  But as the next couple of days dragged on she started to have second thoughts; I think my hesitation over the name had finally eaten its way into her thoughts.  I also think that as we got to see more of “Rebel’s” personality, we realized just how little of a “rebel” our little man was.  He was way too sweet of a little guy and had an enormously outgoing personality that in no way reflected his minute size.  My sister and I soon found ourselves back at square one; what were we going to name him?

Eventually, and believe it or not, we settled on one of the very first names that we brainstormed for him; Telly.  Now before you question our sanity, there is a story behind that name.  My family has four other pets on top of our two sugar gliders (the story of sugar glider number two will be told a little later); we have three cats named Tiggir, Leo, and Meowth, and one dog named Koia.  My sister had taken to calling Leo, our only male cat, “Telly” because he reminded her of the Teletubbie creatures from the children's show of the same name.  As we started to see our little sugar glider's personality begin to emerge, we were amazed by how much he resembled Leo.  Therefore it was only appropriate to name our new baby boy after our first baby boy.  Despite the uncertainty of his original name, once we decided on naming our little guy Telly, the name just fit and we knew it was the one.

My sister holding Telly.

What the #$%@ is a Sugar Glider?

      I vividly remember that warm August day, back in 2012 when I laid eyes on a sugar glider for the first time.  My sister had been wanting to go to the mall in Manchester, N.H. and since summer vacation was coming to an end, my mom relented and the three of us took off.  Going to the Manchester mall was nothing new to us and we were expecting this trip to turn out like the many others before it.

      We entered the mall and began to make our way around the interior hallways, window shopping as we went along.  Then suddenly we took a corner and a huge group of people had gathered around what looked to be a couple of tables and three men advertising something.  As we got closer to the tables it became clear that each of the men had something jumping from one of their pockets to another and from one of their hands to the other.  Whatever it was, it was small enough that we still could not make out what exactly was jumping; was it a toy, was it a "magical" contraption, or something entirely different?

      Naturally, our curiosity was piqued and we moved even closer to the three men.  Suddenly realization dawned on the three of us; those things that were jumping around on the men were living creatures.  But, not just any living creature, they were exotic sugar gliders and the men were part of a company called "Pocket Pets" that sells them.  Both my sister and I are animal lovers, so we instinctively wanted to know what exactly sugar gliders are.  I am the oldest of three siblings, and I pride myself on being mature and responsible, so as much as I wanted to learn about sugar gliders I knew that getting one was out of the question.  My sister on the other hand (the youngest of three children) begged my mom to go up to one of the men and find out more about the little creatures.  My mom agreed based on the condition that we could not and would not get one, mostly due to the fact that we already had four pets (three cats and one dog) and my dad would be mad if we came home with another one.

      We approached one of the men and he told us what sugar gliders were and some basic information about them; for instance that they are native to Australia, they are marsupials, and they are legal to own in New Hampshire.  He also gave us some specific information about their company and how to care for pet sugar gliders.  Once we were done getting the information, my mom shooed me and my sister away from the area, with the idea to get us away from the sugar gliders before we started teasing to get one.  Like I said before, I truly understood that it was not a real possibility to get a sugar glider even though I thought that they were amazing little creatures that would make fun pets.  My sister on the other hand, begged and teased my mom to get one and slowly but surely my mom was giving in to her.

      Eventually, while we were walking around talking about what we had just seen and how cool it would be to have one, we saw a lady with two young daughters who had just bought two sugar gliders.  My mom approached her and just asked her a little bit about what she knew about sugar gliders and what made her decide to buy them.  The lady said that she had seen the "Pocket Pets" once before a few years ago and her daughters were absolutely enamored by the sugar gliders that they were selling.  However, the lady chose not to buy them at that time because she, like us, knew nothing about sugar gliders.  She said that when she got home she did a lot of research and sugar gliders seem to be an all around great pet.  Unfortunately, she did not cross paths with "Pocket Pets" again until that day, several years after first seeing them.

      This story only intensified my sister's desire to get a sugar glider that day because she was nervous that we would never get another opportunity to get one.  Between the information that we got directly from "Pocket Pets" and the lady's story, my mom finally gave into my sister's pleading.  We turned right around and went straight to the set-up.

      When we told the men that we wanted to buy one of the sugar gliders, they took us around the back of their set-up and showed us two cages; one was filled with female sugar gliders and one was filled with male sugar gliders.  My sister chose to get a little boy, so the man opened up the cage full of the little boys.  When the cage door was opened, my sister, mom, and I almost died from the cuteness.  Inside the cage, about twenty little baby boy sugar gliders peeked up at us from under a cloth blanket.  Instantly, my mom locked eyes with one of the little guys and knew that he was the one for us.  

      Along with our new little baby, we also bought a cage (that came with a water bottle and food dish), the specialized pellet food, vitamins, and a cloth pouch.  As soon as our little sugar glider was ours, my sister and I could not contain our happiness.  We could not wait to get home and set up our little guy's cage.  Now the only issue was, who gets to hold our new friend first?