Thickets House are a hugely popular UK manufacturer of chinchilla cages made from wire. They already come complete with wooden ledges when bought new. We agree that these cages are built to last a substantial amount of time. It’s common that they would appear on second hand selling platforms such as pre-loved or even the Facebook marketplace. Obviously getting a new pet or even upgrading your current set up, you want everything clean and fresh. Along with getting your new (pre-owned) cage, we recommended to swap out those dirty, smelly ledges for fresh, clean ones.

It is a common theme that other smaller cage accessory companies are only making these sizes on request. Such companies would charge a certain amount more for this bespoke service.

We set out to produce and stock every size ledge to fit the Thickets House cage dimensions. We have added a selection of Thickets replacement cage accessories that you can find here. Along with the replcement ledges, people wanted to add more to help prevent those messy clean ups throughout the day. And so the birth of wooden splash guards began.

What are splash guards?

Splash guards are an item that attach to the sides of a wire pet cage. Their sole purpose is to prevent your pets kicking their shavings and toilets out of the cage and onto your floor. They reduce waste ending up on the floor by a staggeringly huge amount.

Our products don’t just stop with replacement ledges and splash guards though. In fact, all of our products copme with extra large washers that support easy attachment to the Thickets cages.

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“Introducing Tanya, a local lady living in Jacksdale (my neighbour as it happens).

Tanya is a lady who was struggling with the world and how her autism affected her day to day in instances such as work. She tried various avenues of employment and found that it was difficult settling in any of the work places. She found herself masking (covering up her real personality) to fit in and this was exhausting for her, as anyone with autism will know, she would arrive home tired and fed up on a daily basis.Covid hit in early 2020 and Tanya found herself on furlough. Without the pressure of going to her workplace daily she began to feel a lot happier, but she still needed to keep an income. She began to think of ideas of what she could do that would allow her to work from home, incorporate something she was passionate about, and that would also actually be a viable business.

At school Tanya had enjoyed woodwork, almost finding it therapeutic, so she began to form a plan combining her skills and surprisingly her pets. Tanya and her extremely supportive partner, Charlie, have a couple of chinchillas as pets and struggled to find toys and accessories for them at reasonable prices in regular pet shops and online. And so Garden Valleys Small Pets was born with their own branded toys and cage accessories being given the official brand name, Meadowland.

Garden Valley Small Pets specialises in the very things they were struggling to find; toys and accessories for small pets that also kept the animals minds active. These items are all made from scratch by Tanya at her home in Jacksdale.

She used some of her furlough money to buy a multi tool and spent a lot of time researching what kind of items would be good to market. She then began to make her first item – a shelf for the chinchilla to sit on whilst having a nibble on a treat.People started to hear about her merchandise through local advertising and Facebook, and the orders began to come in. Using her profit, Tanya began to invest in better tools and a branding design for her business; labels were designed for packaging and a website was developed.

This year Garden Valley Small Pets has entered ‘The Pet Directory, New Business Awards’ and this will hopefully boost business further.Whilst speaking to Tanya I asked what her ultimate goal would be and she replied, “I would eventually like to be able to employ a team of people that all struggle with employment due to Autism, so they can come to work and be understood and not have to mask their true feelings for hours of the day.” I asked her how she would feel if this became reality rather than a dream, and she said she would then feel she had accomplished what she set out to do.

And so due to Tanya’s solid determination to turn a struggle into a positive business, I think she is worthy of a mention as a ‘Local Inspiration’ and a huge asset to our village (and pets!).

#WomensDay#InternationalWomensDay#IWD2022

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Our nest boxes are made using kiln dried pine with nothing that could cause harm to your small pet if they chew. It has been a very common sight in recent years that a lot of manufacturers, small and large, produce and sell housing and nest boxes that attach together using nails, pins and screws. This is a potential hazard for any small animal that likes to chew.

Of course, we can’t stop our animals chewing because this is all part of active engagement with their new toy. Chewing also promotes good teeth and gum health, so we can’t stop this behaviour. The only thing we can do, as responsible owners, is to look at what we can change.

Where you see the ‘No Nails Or Glue’ sign on our products, this indicates at a quick glance that this product is safe for chewing little furbabies.

We have also been made aware of a few other smaller businesses producing and selling products that look identical to ours. Whilst we do not know if their claim of not using anything hazardous is true, obviously this raises a concern for us here at Meadowland as we don’t want any customers thinking that these products are anything to do with us. You will find the stores that are licenced to sell our products here.

Should anyone have any concerns, please reach out to us and let us know. Our products all come with an official Meadowland branded label and registered barcode.

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Earlier this month, we asked our friends over at Garden Valley Small Pets, to run a Facebook competition. The competition was to name our brand new dangling toy and in return, the winner would be the very first person in the UK to get their hands on one. As well as being able to see their personally named toy on the shelves of physical pet stores.

The public got involved and some amazing and very creative names were suggested. But one name imparticular stood out to us… Bamboozled! Bamboozled was suggested by Lesley Ann Owen, a regular visitor to the Garden Valley Small Pets Facebook page and a previous customer of theirs.

The Bamboozled toy is a dangling chew toy that consists of all natural materials making it safe for a variety of small pets including Rats, Chinchilla’s and Degu’s. You’ll find loofah, kiln dried pine, bamboo (obviously) and loofah make up this chew toy. Held together with natural twisted seagrass with a metal clip for easy attachment to a wire cage roof.

See the new toy here.

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