Stop & Chat: Hamster Update

Bunny doesn't like to stay still so she's never in focus.

It's so amazing to see how the hamsters have warmed up to M, me, and life in our household. It's also fun to notice the differences between their personalities, although Hammy is still undergoing some changes.



Bunny is the more adventurous one. She doesn't get spooked easily, and we like to joke that she does not care at all. I could poke her in the eye (not that I have) and she would sit there, not caring or even acknowledging what I did. She's sleepily greeted me and proceeded to fall asleep in my hand as I pick her up and snuggle her several times now. I don't mean to wake her up, I just get worried that I can't see her breathing and open up the area she's in to check on her.

Bunny enjoys scurrying around wherever she is, whether it's a new setting or not. She's a shy eater, though, so don't expect her to nibble in front of you. Instead she stuffs her food into her food pouches for later on when she's in her private pantry.

Hammy has changed a lot in the past month and a half. She was the smaller of the two hamsters, so when they fought she would simply lay on her back and let herself be attacked. It translated to lots of anxiety and stress after they were separated, and I have had my work cut out in building up our relationship. Picking her up wasn't something I could ever count on, as the moment you touched her she would scurry for the closest hiding place she could find. I wasn't even comfortable trying to pick her up to bring her to the bathtub for some bathtub bonding (a method recommended to help your hamster warm up to you and to strengthen your relationship). Instead there was a lot of placing my hand near her with some food on it to coax her out.

Now she actively comes to my hand and will walk onto it with little to no hesitation. She still gets antsy about being picked up at times, so I have to tread carefully with that as she continues to warm up to being handled. I have been able to clean her home and rearrange stuff without her scurrying to her hidey holes. Instead she'll actually get in my way by being a curious little fluffybutt, crawling on my hand and sticking her head wherever I'm working. I'm too happy with her coming out of her shell to be annoyed at her hindering whatever I'm doing.

Now for the big event in my life/the hamsters' life.

Shortly after my post that introduced the hamsters to this little corner of the internet, I was contacted by someone from Kaytee who offered to send some stuff to assist in my plans for habitat expansion.

What I didn't expect was the amount of stuff they actually sent. The day this arrived in the mail, all I could do was sit and stare at it for several minutes before taking pictures to send to M, who knew I had been contacted by the company.

After the initial shock and excitement wore off, I immediately got to expanding the hamsters' homes.

This is how Hammy's home turned out. If you look really hard, you can see her in the blue loop-d-loop tunnel above the red section of tubing. She's really taken to that area as her hidey hole.

This is how Bunny's home turned out! Her two favorite spots are the outhouse (purple/green thing that is behind the curved red tubing) and the snap on wheel. I find her all over the place, though. Recently she's taken to sleeping in the purple loop-d-loop. I hypothesize that she likes feeling tall.

Now for my disclaimer: as you can probably figure out, this stuff was sent for free. All that was asked of me, however, were some pictures emailed to the representative showing how I built up each hamsters' home, and to let them know what I thought of their new LED bubble plugs. I made my own decision to blog about it and share their kindness here. Thank you again.

Now that all that is out of the way, on to my expansion plans! I plan to eternally expand the hamster homes until our entire house is taken over.

LOL. Okay, not exactly, but I do plan to continue to expand each hamster's habitat until I feel they have a large enough space to call home. That will likely take a while, as I have a habit of spoiling my pets. Ask my old winter white dwarf hamster. For the two and a half years I had her before she died, I was always working on her home, adding to it and rearranging everything to keep her stimulated.

That's it for my little update on our hamsters. I hope everything's going well in your corner of the world, and if you have any pets that they are in good health and enjoying life!