Meet our Sugar Gliders, Bullet and Chestnut! We met a breeder and took home our very own two sugar babies. This was 7 years ago! We have spent the past SEVEN years enjoying our sugar gliders, sugar babies, sugar bears. They have their own personalities, just like a child does!
For years, we did not have a pet due to allergies. At some point, when the kids were younger, we got a hampster, Frosty, but their life span is short. When Frosty passed away, a friend told my husband about sugar gliders. We googled them and discovered that sugar gliders are an AMAZING animal! They are hypoallergenic and they live 12-15 years. They are small pocket pets that can go almost anywhere with us! Sugar gliders are the 2nd SOFTEST animal in the world! (number 1 is the Chinchilla).
Our Male Sugar Glider, Bullet
Bullet, our male, is our adventurous cuddle bug who is very curious and always wants to explore. He is a little on the “chunky” side because he prefers to eat sweets and he’s a tad bit lazy. He is very relaxed and he “goes with the flow”.
Our Female Sugar Glider, Chestnut
Our baby girl, Chestnut is our princess, and she knows it! She is miss prim and proper, except she does like to steal Bullets’ fishy sticks. Miss Chestnut enjoys snuggling with her mama and a super soft blanket. She LOVES to pose for the camera!
Sounds of Sugar Gliders
They bark like a little Chihuahua puppy and, when they’re super tired, their ears flop down like a puppy. They bark when something is wrong, when they are bored, and when they want treats! I have also noticed that Chestnut barks when she dreams. I always wonder what she’s dreaming about and I hope it’s a good one!
There is one noise that only a Sugar Glider can make, and that is Crabbing. When a glider gets scared or annoyed, they make this loud, high-pitched screeching noise as a defense mechanism.
They purr like a cat, except their whole body vibrates and they chitter when they really want to tell us something. My sugars have learned to tell me when they’re hungry by quickly sticking their tongue in and out really fast. They could be completely sound asleep in a pocket, but a faint smell of any kind of food immediately results in a sugar bear climbing out and grabbing a piece for themself!
Special Features
Sugar Gliders are nocturnal marsupials who are very energetic and curious. I call our Sugar Bears our Zoo because they have unique features that resemble quite a variety of animals. They have hands and feet with fingers and toes and joints, just like people! Sugar Gliders closest relatives are the Koala Bear, Kangaroo, and Possum.
The females have pouches in the front of their belly for their babies (joeys), just like a kangaroo. They hang upside down like a bat and their large eyes help them to see in the dark. They curl their super soft tails like a monkey. The tail is just as long as their body and helps them keep their balance.
One of my favorite features is what I call their parachute! Sugar gliders have an extra membrane of skin/fur that flows along their sides from their hands to their feet. When they jump, they spread out their arms and legs wide and use their parachute to glide through the air. A glider can physically glide up to 165 feet! In the wild, sugars will glide from one tree top to another. In my home, they only glide a short distance, from me to their cage.
Their Habitat
In the wild, Sugar Gliders can be found in Tasmania, Australia, New Guinea and neighboring islands of Indonesia. They typically live in colonies of 20-40 in the trees in the rainforest. Sugar Gliders make cozy leaf nests inside tree hollows to snuggle together.
As a pet, our sugars live in our living room. At night, they play in their cage, running on their wheel, eating their supper, and playing with their toys. During the day, they sleep snuggled up in their fleece pockets or under their fleece blankets. They like to run, jump, climb and glide. They are always looking for snacks to munch on when they are not sleeping/snuggling.
What do Sugar Gliders Eat?
In the Wild, Sugar Gliders adjust their diet based off of the climate and season. They eat a variety of foods including, insects, pollen, spiders, sap, nectar, and fruits and berries.
As a pet, Sugar Gliders eat what their family feeds them. There are a variety of diets that one can feed their sugar gliders, including: Pouch Mates, TPG, BML, and Critter Love. All four of these are good diets to follow. We feed our sugar gliders a combination of Pouch Mates and BML. They like the pellets and “glider gravy” that have a good balance of calcium and phosphorous in them. They need the proper nutrients to keep their bones strong so they can glide. Our sugars love the chicken that is in the BML diet, so we give them that also.
They also love their “treat”, which is vitamins mixed in a water bottle cap full of Yoplait yogurt. Our sugar gliders are super picky. They LOVE to eat the Peach Harvest and Orange Cream flavors, but they won’t eat blueberry or strawberry. Other gliders love berries. Like I said earlier, they have their own personalities, haha.
Bullet and Chestnut love to eat these snacks: Cheerios, fishy sticks, steak, chicken, ham, Hawaiian Bread rolls, almond slivers ect.
Bullet loves peas and Chestnut loves cucumbers. They both love watermelon and canteloupe.
Click here to see my tattoos for my sugar gliders! https://lifewithcathy.com/category/miscellaneous-pieces-of-life/tattoos
What kind of pets do you have? I would love to hear about their personalities! Please share in the comments below.
I loved this post! I learned a lot. Even though I’ve met them and you’ve talked about them, I didn’t know half of what you’ve shared here. Thank you! I love that they’re hypoallergenic!
You’re welcome! Yes! They are super fun to own! 🙂