If can't find chloroplast, another alternative

y husband and I ventured onto this site. Excellent ideas and great looking cages! We recently adopted 2 cavies, the cutest little things. I had already purchased a 36x30x30 two story cage from Martin's Cages before coming here. I was recommended here by another newsgroup because I had some questions. I absolutely LOVE the cage as well as do my piggies.

Now on to the purpose of my post. Just like homemade cages as well as Martin's cages there had to be a slight modification. I had a hard time finding chloroplast, so we used the plastic non-slip dish cabinet liner (non-sticker kind, it grips with the rubbery side) which they can't bite due to the a layer of bedding on the second level, and it was laid down in 1 sheet, so they really couldn't bite it if they tried. That was super cheap, like $3.50 at Wal-Mart for 8 feet on a roll. Then I was thinking about making a bedding guard that the pigs could see through yet would serve the purpose of keeping the shavings IN the cage. I was walking down the garden section of Wal-Mart and came across "Insect Screening." I know what you are thinking... EWWWW medal! Noooo...it's NOT medal... it's very flexible fiberglass that feels like cloth, yet has the durability of fiberglass. It looks like the stuff that screen doors are made out of. For a 36" x 84" roll, it was only $4.50. My husband used c-rings to clamp the material to the cage wire so that it couldn't be chewed as well as kept the bedding from slipping through the cracks.

So for about a whole 10 bucks (that's with tax) I have a great cage upper floor cover and a practical way to keep the bedding scattering to a minimum and allow for the piggies to see out of. It does sometimes fly out when one of the pigs does her cross country run and flies around the corner to go downstairs before jumping ontop of her cabin's roof. I'd need a 5 foot barrier to keep that stuff from going nutzo! hehe

Just thought I'd share my little "Martha Stewart of Guinea Pig Cages". I am very impressed with what people have done with the grids and chloroplast. Hopefully when we have more room we can build something almost as spectacular as the cages I've seen on this site.

Keep up the good work!