Product Review - Marchioro Samo 82
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Place Purchased: Ebay
Price: £79.99 (+£9.99 P&P)
Score: 6/10
This cage is a pretty huge cage, which is fantastic if you’re wanting a bigger group. It’s recommended for up to 8 rats, so up to 16 mice…obviously that’s maximum figures, so it’s best to go a little under that, but I think 16 would still be really happy in there. Kitted out with loads of hammocks and toys, there’s plenty of fun to be had.
My group love this cage and for keeping mice happy, I’d give it 4/5. It’s got a really deep base, so great for digging, tunnel making, or underground mazes! It’s tall, but still has a large footprint, so it’s still OK for the less agile mice. The bars are 10mm apart, so it’s good for keeping MOST mice in, although smaller mice would escape and it’s possible to push the bars apart a little more, so stronger mice would, too! The only downer for them is the gap at the top of the door clips; since the doors clips onto the first bar above, there’s a bit of a gap, which is easily blocked by elastic bands, or cable ties.
For humans, however, it’s not so good: 2/5 It comes flat-packed and putting it together is pretty simple, but you might injure yourself quite a bit while doing it! It’s tricky and frustrating, but the simplicity makes up for it. The top half comes already built, so if you had a smaller group and were feeling a little lazy, you could always just use the top half. This is a good option for if you change groups round etc, as you don’t always have to put up with such a large cage if it’s not needed. You could even source another base (or large plastic lid/storage box) and create another cage.
Although it’s so big, it’s not as heavy as you’d expect and to make things even easier, there are two handles on top and the base comes with 4 castor wheels (optional additions) for easy wheeling.
Where it let’s you down is accessibility. The Samos were originally made with two large doors at the front, with two small doors built into each of those doors. Newer versions only have the small doors. There are two EVEN smaller doors on each side, but even with these, it’s not possible to reach every area of the cage, as there’s no top door either. This makes attaching hammocks/toys VERY hard! It also means that when you want to add a toy or remove anything, you have to lift the cage totally off the base to do it, which then means you have to either have escapees, or remove them all beforehand…a lot of extra work.
The cage comes with a water bottle, which is far too hard to use for mice (and also quite ugly!) and a large food bowl, which three mice could easily sit in. This clips onto the bars and is useable, but it has an inner lip, which means emptying and cleaning is more hassle than it should be, as bits just slide into the lip and it takes forever to get them all out! You also get a ‘treat clip’, which, for the life of me, I can’t figure out how to use without forcing the bars apart by another cm…so I haven’t used that.
You get three platforms and three ramps for easy access to them. These platforms are sturdy enough, but I don’t like them. Marchioro platforms are ‘adjustable’, but you have to ‘adjust’ them for them to fit in their own cage and to use the ramps, which means you have this smaller section of platform, where faeces and food gets trapped and is harder to clean. They also don’t ‘adjust’ enough to fit the long way…so you only have that option. The ramps are REALLY hard to keep stable as they don’t clip onto the platforms well enough. I’ve only used one, as all my mice are fit enough to climb the bars, but for a less agile mouse, I’d prefer to have new ladders/ramps instead.
All in all, I use it, the mice love it and I don’t have TOO many problems, but I wouldn’t buy another one, as it’s only JUST worth the massive price-tag.
Reviewer: Effy
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