So I have two female sugar gliders, that I got about a week and a half ago. One is 9 weeks 5 days old and the other is 9 weeks 3 days old. They came from the same breeder, but different families. One is a white face and the other is a classic grey.

Originally when I had went to the breeder's house, he brought out the classic grey. She jumped on me right away and started grooming my hair. Then he brought out the white face and she was much more timid and crabby.

But after about a day of having them, they completely switched. The classic grey constantly crabs when I have her in the bonding pouch, even if I keep it open so she can see what's going on. If she sees my hand she lunges and crabs, but I always ignore it and keep my hand there so she doesn't learn thay she can scare me away. I usually only take her out for an hour a day, because I feel that that's all she can handle for now. She has a very hard time relaxing when she is in the bonding pouch. Usually she will stay wide awake the whole time even during the day, which is part of the reason I have only been taking her out an hour a day because I want her to be able to sleep. She will sometimes take food out of my hands. If she is in the pouch I have to wait a long time for her to take it, and usually I will get lunged at and Crabbed at in the process. If she is in her cage usually she won't crab at me and is better about taking food from my hands.

The white face has come along very well so far. She would be perfectly fine if I kept her in the bonding pouch all day, however I usually don't because I think it's good for them to have down time. She has been taking snacks from my hand since like the 2nd or 3rd day I got her. She will let me pet her while she's in the pouch, and last night she even wanted to play with me. And by play I mean she was running around her cage like a mad women, and she kept looking at me and moving her tail around like a cat does when you play with a cat. And from the outside of the cage I was moving my hand all around the bars and she was chasing my hand around. And she was dogging my hand, and it was actually pretty fun. But then I had to go to bed and she kept waiting for me to play, and I felt kind of bad.

I understand that it could take months to bond, but after seeing how well I am doing with the white face, it kind of makes me feel like I'm not doing something right with the classic grey. Is there something different I could do with the classic grey that might work better for her? I mean I just feel so bad for her because she just seems terrified of me.

And also will sugar gliders come out of their pouch and climb on you when they are ready, or do you pick them up and force them to come out of their comfort zone? My family keeps telling me to pick them up, but I feel that it would cause them not to trust me and it would ruin the whole bonding process, as my goal is to not make them scared of human hands. Also I live with an aunt that is very loud and constantly wants to see them, I've tried explaining to my family that they are not like puppies and can't just be grabbed and messed with by everyone in the house, especially when they are not bonded to me yet, and I'm having a hard time getting that through to the family. I'm 16 so I don't really have a lot of say, but I'm the one who has the 15 year commitment with these guys and I want to do everything I can to bond properly, but it's hard when not everyone is respecting boundaries. So any suggestions on how to keep the family back a little? I know some of you probably have kids and stuff and have probably gone through something similair with trying to keep outside interactions to a minimum during the bonding process

I'm sorry this was so long I just had a lot of questions and I wanted to be as thorough as possible.

Thank you!

Welcome, I am glad that you have found this forum.

You are correct, it can time, more for some than others to develop a trusting relationship with a human, that is bonding.

You sound like you have done very well, and for the most part I recommend continuing an hour a day with them on you if you can. That is plenty of what I refer to as "pouch time" and leaves them with plenty time to get needed sleep.

I personally never learned to take the bite. One of my girls (from my first pair), Lulu was a very crabby girl, and would lunge at my hand, attacking and chasing it away. What I did was pull away initially, but immediately go back and keep doing so until I could touch her without being attacked by her. I felt I still won, lol.

We've come a long way with consistent pouch time, and play time. I can trim her nails easily by distracting her with meallies, and even lets me hold her in my hands during day time hours. At night time when awake, most gliders will not like to be held.

My girl Skadoosh (the other half of my first pair) was more easy going, they have totally different personalities. But they have seemed to have switched a bit also. Skadoosh is still really sweet, but less adventurous as she used to be, now Lulu is the most adventurous, opposite than it used to be, also Skadoosh seems more timid of my than Lulu, also opposite. Skadoosh used to hang out on me, coming to the front of me or sitting on my leg so I can pet her a bit during playtime, now it's Lulu that does that and Skadoosh won't so much.

I'm going to save myself some typing, because this video says it better than I can.

I read from a long time glider owner.
BONDING IS A MARATHON NOT A RACE.

We are at 8 gliders now, each one has bonded differently.
some have bonded strong, some have bonded weak, some have bonded fast and some
have bonded VERY SLOW.

I would suggest counting the WEEKS or better yet the MONTHS, you have spent with these little guys.

Remember you are a GIGANTIC GIANT, they are a tiny itty bitty critter.
it must take them a LOT of courage to start to trust you.

I recommend purchasing this TENT

I used it quite often in the beginning, and still use it from time to time.
Zip it up and open their pouch inside, they will start to explore. Try feeding them treats to lure them out of the pouch and pet their heads gently (from the back so they don't nip!). Make sure you spend time with them everyday. They will soon begin to trust you.