I have 3 sugar gliders, two females and one male. One of the females (Shiloh) was my original sugar glider who lived alone up until she met this daughter+father pair a couple of months ago. Shiloh and the father are about the same age, 3.5years and the daughter is about 5 or 6 months now. The male is neutered. They've been living together in a large PVC cage for a few weeks now. I was told I should expect some bickering, as long as they aren't balling up and hurting each other, as they get adjusted to the new living situation and reestablish a hierarchy.
My concern comes from both females chasing each other around the cage, crabbing and hissing what seems to be most if not all night. They never ball up (they did in the beginning but never again after I thoroughly cleaned their cage & pouches) and they've never hurt each other. But they crab and chase each other around a lot. Some days more than others but I would still say quite a bit. In the beginning, Shiloh seemed to be the dominating one but within the past week I've noticed the tables have turned and now the younger female glider seems to be the more dominating one. I figured they're still establishing a hierarchy. What triggered my concern is a couple of nights ago I noticed anytime Shiloh came out of the pouch, the younger glider would chase her with them crabbing at each other until Shiloh just ran back into the pouch. This seemed to happen every time she came out of the pouch and it concerned me that the younger glider might be chasing her back into her pouch and not letting her out to eat or run around. Like I said, I figure they're still determining who will be the dominant female of the colony but I'll admit I'm a bit worried since they've already been living together for a few weeks. Is this normal? These are the first sugar gliders I have ever introduced. They crab for a second when they get in the pouch together but they still almost always sleep together (I have two pouches in the cage). Even if one decides to sleep alone, many times she will move back into the other pouch with the other two sometime during the day. They seem to eat fine together so I don't think there's any food aggression. I don't know if this might be a factor, but sometime within the past week I saw the male mounting Shiloh after a long night of what seemed like nonstop crabbing so is she in heat? Could that effect behavior?
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Should I be worried?
