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Due to the long pregnancy period, newborn degus are well developed - they have fur, they can see and they have teeth. Only a few hours after their birth, they will start searching the surroundings of the nest box. Soon after this, they will also start eating normal food. Some breeders separate the young degus from their parents 3 weeks after their birth. I personally recommend you not do that before they are 5 to 6 weeks old, because it is better for them. But don't let female children be with parents any longer than this, as they can become pregnant with their father.
You must * NEVER REMOVE* newborn pups from their mother for any period of time but you may touch them if mom allows. The pups need to hear their mother's voice as this soothes them and prevents developmental damage, whilst stimulating physical and mental development. Similar to human babies, pups learn to recognize and respond to their mother's call within the first days of life.
Newborn pups' sensory systems are so developed that they can respond to familiar and new environmental stimuli from birth. Degu’s are able to walk supporting their full weight within 3-4 hours of birth and are also able to right themselves, sit up on their haunches, rear upright and vocalize. By the first or second day of life, pups are able to functionally groom, including face washing, hind paw scratching and rapid head shaking. Behavioral patterns including play and dust bathing are shown to develop rapidly during the second week after birth.
You may notice that young degus quickly learn to explore and become braver away from their parents after the 4th or 5th day of birth. Play is almost exclusively family oriented and involves frequent body-nose contact. Your newborn degu pups need a lot of care in their first weeks of life. You must be very careful not to stress the pups during this time, as early adverse emotional experience can alter the development of the pup’s brains. This can cause physiological and cognitive deficits in later life, which are irreversible.
The first three weeks are critical to the degu's normal development. During this time handling should be MINIMISED to avoid stress. After this time, research has shown that handling the pups but NOT removing them from their mother does not have severe detrimental effects. However continual handling at a young age has been shown to alter juvenile behavior. Research has shown that lactation and child rearing is also highly stressful to the mother, so care should be taken not to cause her undue disruption. This stress is related to high production, energy utilization and body mass.
The father will participate to a great extent with raising his pups. Rearing the pups with the mother and father relieves some of the stress for the mother and the burden is shared. It has been observed that pups reared with both parents huddle less with the mother, giving her more 'time off'. During growth, interaction of the pups with their parents is a very important factor as it is the pups earliest emotionally modulated learning process, or 'filal imprinting. Pups have specific ways of responding to cues from their parent, which are critical for physical and psychological maturation. It is interesting to note that disturbance of pup-parent interaction leads to 'hospitalization syndrome’, which results in permanent deficits of vocal behavior, personality development, intellectual/social capacity, and mental disturbance. It is therefore better to allow pups to develop normally by allowing the positive emotional experience of developing strong emotional bonds to both parents.
Eventually, when the young are first separated from their parents and put into an unfamiliar place, they may become nervous of their environment. Typically, they do not groom or play as normal at first and increase the amount of vocalization, neck nosing and forepaw clasping. However, the degu's brave personality ensures the pups soon familiarize themselves and start exploring.
Degus experience delayed puberty, a feature uncommon amongst rodents. Although there is wide variation in the age at which degus reach sexual maturity, female degus often mature sooner than males. Female pups will reach puberty around 7 weeks old, whilst male pups reach puberty around 12 weeks of age. It is safest to re-house the pups in same sex groups when they are weaned, around 4 to 6 weeks of age.
