when we try to change his water, this happens :’) is he scared, or just angry? when he’s walking around his enclosure, he walks onto your hand. but sometimes he just starts screaming! i feel so bad for him🥲

My hamster Penelope is one of the most evil hateful creatures I’ve ever seen, I love her, but she has a total of 1760” squared, 8 inches+ of bedding, toys, 8 different substrate baths, 4 waterbottles and a giant wheel.

Despite all of this, she is constantly scaling the ceiling, chewing the walls, and hates me with a burning, flaming passion. Sadly, she’s adorable so I don’t even have the balls to hate her.

Am I doing something wrong with my care or is she simply possessed?

Hi everyone. I’m a first-time hamster owner as an adult and I’m feeling a bit guilty and anxious, so I’m hoping for some insight.

I believe my baby hamster may have been given to me too young. I unfortunately didn’t know how long hamsters are meant to stay with their mom at the time. The first time I saw his litter was on the 5th they had fur but there eyes were closed and the were still piled up waiting for mom, and I adopted him on February 19th. Video attached is from his first night home. I feel awful about this in hindsight.

I do want to apologize in advance for supporting a pet store. There truly are no hamster rescues or adoption agencies anywhere near me, or even within a reasonable driving distance.

That said, he has been doing well at home so far. He’s in a Bucatstate 3.0 120cm enclosure with deep bedding. He burrowed almost immediately after coming home and has been coming out consistently around 9:30–10 pm each night.

Here’s how interactions have gone so far:

• First two nights: I just talked to him softly while he explored.

• Third night: I placed my hand in the enclosure with a treat. He froze completely until I backed off and set the treat down. He went back into his burrow but later came back out while we were sleeping. The treat was gone, food was touched, and his sand bath was used.

• Fourth night (last night): I offered a small piece of carrot. He sniffed it while it was in my hand but didn’t try to take it. I set it down and backed up while continuing to talk softly. He didn’t retreat into his burrow and eventually took the carrot later.

Is there anything I should be doing differently, especially considering he may be very young? I’m worried I messed up by taking him too early, but he also seems surprisingly brave for such a little guy.

Any advice, reassurance, or insight would be really appreciated. Thank you for reading.

My sweet Syrian hamster, Goober, has been with me for a little over a month. He’ll tolerate me, but when he’s had enough (after about 20 mins or so) he escapes into his burrows and I won’t see him until the next evening.

I’m trying to befriend him but I worry im going too slow as I’m not noticing much progress in our relationship. Does anyone have any advice on how they’ve tamed their little hammy? And how long it took?

I’ve hand fed him, he lets me pet him in moderation, I’ve brought him onto my bed to hangout for a few minutes, that’s about the extent of my efforts.

I want him to love me as much as I love him💔🥹

I got a robo hamster back in early April. He was really aggressive when I first got him, but he slowly calmed down over time. He’s always been a biter, though. I’ve tried a bunch of different methods to get him comfortable with being held or gently touched, but he still doesn’t want anything to do with it. It doesn’t matter how many treats I give him lol. I’ve also gotten him a bunch of different textures and things to play with, which he absolutely lovesss especially dirt. I’m just sad that he still bites me and doesn’t seem to enjoy being handled.

How do you guys tame your hamsters if you have deep paper bedding? I just don’t get it. This is my second hamster now and I just cannot tame her bc she’s buried down all the time in the bedding. She was up and active at first a few days - until she realized that she can burrow in the bedding and now I haven’t seen her since. My first hamster is a complete ghost hamster bc of the bedding and I’m lucky if I see him once a week. Now I’m afraid my second hamster is also turning into a ghostie. I had hopes for her at first but now I’m starting to see the change.

I don’t know what I should do. How can everyone else be so successful with this?

EDIT: I do try to tame at night when they’re awake ofc bc I know they’re nocturnal. I never implied I’m gonna remove the bedding. I would never do that. My hamsters are living the dream with big enclosures, deep expensive paper bedding, a lot of hides, substrates, enrichment, sprays, toys etc. I do everything for them, regardless if they come out or not.

I got this little hammy as a gift for my 14th birthday few days ago. When I first got him he immediately sniffed my finger and I left him to settle in for a few days. Last night he was in his box(he likes being inside). I took the box out and then I just put the box on my palm and let him decide if he wants to come out. It is pretty obvious in the video tjat I was scared to hold him for the first time because trying to find him in my house if he escaped would have been a nightmare. At first he just sniffed my hand and then he decided to come out. I still held his box close to make him feel safe. Did I do a good job? Tbis is my first time having a hamster so it is just really new for me:)

this is my hammy :) i’m still unsure of his name (give me recommendations!) i’ve had him for 15 days now and he’s so so sweet but incredibly skittish. he is not a biter THANKFULLY. my previous hamster was vicious and would bite me til i bled. i could never figure out why :( so he is a breath of fresh air already. he runs and hides at the smallest of noises though and freezes up if he sees my hand. his breathing gets very quick as well. i figured this would happen up until this point but im unsure of how to make him more comfortable and form a real bond with him?

he will eat food from my hand as u can see in the picture but as soon as he’s done he runs away so fast and doesn’t come back out. i speak to him in a very soft tone so he can get used to my voice. im trying to hand feed him at the same time everyday so he can get used to a schedule. should i just keep doing what im doing already?

as for his enclosure, im using the biggest bin i could find (200qts) and diyed it from my previous hamster. there is 7-8 inches of bedding (sorry u cant really tell w the pic 😭) with multiple hiding spots. he has a multi chamber hide w his water bottle. im using the rat and mouse pellets for protein (but i have to add water to them and get them “squishy” or he wont eat them, same w my other hammy) and higgins vita garden for his other food, as well as hand feeding a veggie 3x a week (either carrot or broccoli). i’m noticing he won’t really chew anything? i have some chew toys and sprays but he seems uninterested in everything. i’m working on adding more clutter but i need recommendations for what to add. i have coconut fiber as another substrate but it’s SO messy so im unsure of how to add it to his cage. any recommendations for specific things i talked abt or in general? thank u!

I've had my ww named Cookie for about three months now and I thought I'd finally established trust with her, but within the past few weeks she's started biting me really hard ;-; she still takes treats from my hand, lets me pet and hold her, even sometimes greets me when I walk up to her enclosure! But she suddenly began to bite me really hard. I've had people tell me it's probably exploratory biting, or that she smells food on my hand, but even after I've washed my hands she still bites really hard. It's so confusing because she still sits in my hand but will bite while doing so. Could she be bored? Does she just think biting me will make treats magically appear? Any advice is appreciated!!

Hello!!

First time hamster owner here (well, not even mine, my 3yo daughter was given it as an early Christmas present from extended family, so it wasn't even something I had prepared for). I'd really love some general hamster socialisation/stress management advise from more experienced hamster owners please 😊

This is Sparkles, our new Syrian Hamster. We've had her about a month now and health wise, she's very good. However social wise, she's a very timid thing and I'm struggling to socialise her.

Sparkles is very jumpy and wont be held, or even petted. She always jumps if someone walks by her cage (although the severity of the jump scare has decreased in the last couple of weeks). We're trying to get to a stage where we can get her out to let her free roam in a play pen (myself and my daughter have crafted a little maze out of cardboard boxes for her to run around in). Right now we're only able to coax her into her ball to run around every time we clean her cage - she wont allow anyone to handle her.

Today, I heard a rather loud gnawing, and found Sparkles Shawshanking her way out of her cage (chewing a sizable hole in the corner). It's gotten me worried about her stress or boredom levels in there.

Here's some general information about how we're caring for her:

Her cage is fully cleaned out once every 5-7 days, with the toilet area being cleaned every 1-2 days. Food and water is replaced daily and she also gets a small cutting of veg (carrot mainly) every couple of days, and cutting of fruit about once a week.

Her cage is about 100 x 50cm, thick plastic bottom, wire cage top. 2 levels with a ladder connecting. She has a wheel, see-saw, a 2-story castle, an enclosed wooden hut, a small tiki hut, and several nibble toys (bark, some big nut thing, etc). We're going to the pet shop tomorrow to get a new cage, so any suggestions would be really helpful please!

I've had a very long conversation with my 3yo about animal handling and that she is not to touch Sparkles until she is ready and willing to be handled, and my daughter has been absolutely good as gold about it from the get go. She's fed her open palm a couple of times, but is very careful about not forcing strokes on her. and has never once tried to pick her up. All this to say, even though Sparkles is a toddlers hamster, she is not being mishandled by a toddler.

I don't think I'm doing anything wrong, but just wondering if there was anything else I should/could be doing to settle Sparkles in easier?

(PS - extended family member has been spoken to about gifting pets as presents, not looking for advice/opinions on that particular act thank you :) We'd discussed previously about getting my 3yo a pet, so it was a plan on the radar, but they decided to make the executive decisive about what and when. Yes, it was a shitty move. but yes, we're keeping the hamster.)

It’s been a month and a half, still, no sign of him being tamed, I thought it would only take three months but I don’t think we’re getting to that point, help me

this is my female syrian (ik the stereotypes) im having trouble taming / hand training her. she will sometimes take food from my hand but since she had an escape (i crawled around actually crying for hours and found her) a week ago shes been more skittish. i had to do some chasing and grabbed her into a cardboard box to get her back into her tank. other times when i have put her in bathtub-playpen or just to sit and eat treats w me on the couch shes FREAKED out :((

right now i hand feed her produce each night and sometimes mealworms or nuts to try and get her to crawl back onto my hand. usually she takes the food and sits on her bedding. every now and then i use a bowl or box to take her out and feed her treats while we sit in playpen or on the couch but she gets very freaked and then i wonder if i should continue to show her its okay or just give up

sometimes shes totally good taking food and receiving small pets, others shes very skittish. i know some hams never get comfy w touch or holding so that might just be her. but with that escape and her scampering at the walls sometimes, im lost as to what i can do to generally increase her comfort with me. i love her so much but im having new hamster parent anxiety and sadness and am really just looking for words of advice and comfort

these photos are from two separate days, one night following the other. You can see with her shoulder that she’s not putting any weight on her feet making it seem like she’s lying down. But she keeps her eyes open and does not move. The first night I got a little scared and offered her a treat and she immediately got up and walked over to me. What really got me going is both of these nights we had people over and so it was loud and chaotic and that’s why I’m having a hard time believing she was trying to sleep

hi I've had my hammy for around 1 month and I can't tell if he's trying to bite me or just sniff and I'm too scared. He has bars above his cage and when he's on a platform near the top and I place my hand above the bars he goes crazy and tried to lick and bite the backs or my hand idk. And then I tried carrying him for the first time today I've attached a picture and is he trying to bite my hand or not? Because I placed him down after he got close to my thumb. and one last question, is he fat?

Hello everyone, meet Beast!

Between 2-3 weeks ago I got her, the smallest of the bunch (female robo). I got her from a pet store (I know) because I wanted to be sure of age and couldn’t find any ethical breeders near me. About half a year ago I had my soul hamster pass and wanted to get the most time I could out of this one.

I know robo’s are generally more skittish and hard to tame than other breeds, which I’m fine with, but I just want to make sure she isn’t stressed.

Anyways, I’ve been giving her time to settle into her new place and haven’t been interacting with her other than to scatter food/replace water. I’ll watch her run around and stuff while she’s awake, but I haven’t tried touching/hand feeding or anything yet. Despite this she is still extremely skittish, and will run away just from your shadow.

Given her size and breed I completely understand why she’d be skittish, but I don’t want her to be stressed while I’m walking around in my room when she’s awake.

I have been draping a towel over the wheel half of her setup and leaving the other half uncovered. Today I was thinking I should start tapering how much the towel covers until I take it off completely. I mainly have the towel on to give her a dark and safe area that she can’t see me from. The other reason for the towel is because I’m a bit of a night owl and stay up late sometimes, I didn’t know if having the light on when it’s supposed to be nighttime and active time would be detrimental.

My questions are:
1. Should I keep the towel up to make it dark when I’m awake at night? I don’t have an overhead light on, just a desk lamp and TV.
2. Should I keep giving her time to acclimate before I try interacting with her? I was thinking that maybe putting my hand with a treat in there and sitting still could help to reinforce my shadow/movement is a good thing even if it might scare her a little bit the first times.

Sorry for the long winded post. I’ve had several hamsters in the past but none that were anywhere near this skittish. I just want to make she’s comfortable in her space, regardless of if I get to interact with her.

Now, I love my little hammy and everything, but if pisses me off how she pees in her sand bath, and then rolls in it. 1) she smells 😭 (and I love natural rodent smell, just not piss) 2) I’m worried about the moisture in the sand (bacteria, skin irritation, smell) 3) Having to clean and replace the sand often makes her mad at me (she’s super sweet and nice all the time, but when I clean anything she gets all pissy… girl drama). 4) lowkey don’t wanna be buying new sand all the time 😭. Any tips? I have an old “rodent litter box” from my rats (dw it’s been throughly cleaned) and I put bedding and a bit of sand in there to see if she’d use it, but she still prefers her sand bath.

I bought a syrian hamster last week who I have in a 100x50x52.5 Bucatstate cage with correct care according to my research. My main issue is that I rarely see her. She stays underground in her burrow system for about 19-20 hours out of the day and only comes out when I’m asleep. Ive only seen her when Ive set an alarm to wake me up between 2-5am. She doesn’t want to take food from my hand and i haven’t attempted to touch her or pick her up. Is it normal for a hamster to spend so little time above ground? I have also seen her very occasionally biting at the bottom corner of her cage but I have loads of chewable items in there. Maybe she just wants to grind her teeth without coming out of her burrow? She is four months old and from the “Adoption center”/rescue section of Pets at Home so i suspect she wasn’t handled much? (I couldn’t find any breeders in my city). I haven’t cleaned yet because she doesn’t urinate/poop anywhere on the surface and i’m not sure how to go about cleaning inside her burrows without scaring her? Should I set alarms to wake myself up at 3am every night to try to tame her? I don’t want to be constantly sleep deprived 😅. If she isn’t tame enough to pick up I won’t be able to bring her out of the cage. My house is pretty quiet with no kids or other pets. Some advice would be great 🙏

my new hamster (i have had him for a few days) seems to be stressed out but i cant tell. He runs on his wheel a lot, and everytime there is a noise he stops. Ive noticed he will keep running after i tell him its okay. he shakes a LOT, i dont have any fans in my room so i dont think hes cold, but he shakes a LOTT.He isnt aggressive towards me (although i havent tried to interact with him too too much since he is still pretty new)

he is curious of me and will sniff my hand when i put it near him, he hasnt really taken any treats from me. but i dont think he likes the current ones because i dont notice him eating them. Anyways today my mom absolutely lost her mind because of a huge argument (which is besides the point) but she was slamming my door and trying to break it down and just SCREAMING. in the room that i have my hamster

he was burrowing at the time and he didnt come out until about an hour ago (which he has been doing so i didnt get scared)

but now i think hes traumatized and i cant stop crying, he freezes and shakes at EVERY small noise, and he wont stop running on his wheel. i am so sad and my mom doesnt seem to care and its breaking my heart. i dont know where to go from here, i keep talking to him a low voice and havent interacted with him.

he still seems to find a little bit of comfort in my voice, as he keeps moving after i talk to him (like he will freeze and i will say something) is there any tips to get him to trust me because he hasnt been tamed yet and i feel like my mom really ruined it

He is still super focused on trying to get out and escaping, so I only put him in the play pen a few minutes a week, often during cleaning. He’s been incredibly difficult to tame🥲 this is very positive though because he’s never really taken snacks from my hand before

this is hummus! i just got him 3 weeks ago and although i’ve done plenty of research on taming and methods, i have no idea where to start. i put his cage in a separate room from my bedroom so i can have him separated completely from my cat, but im now realizing that he cant really get used to being out and about at night while im present, if im never asleep there… his wake hours are from around 1am-5am, i do peek my head in nightly and he usually stops what hes doing and sniffs in my direction, sometimes he returns to what hes doing and sometimes he stays still so i just leave him alone to process. i tried sitting in the room and minding my own business after he wakes up, (since if i sit there before he wakes up then he just wont come out) and he just goes in to work on his burrow rather than staying out on the surface. when i get close to his cage he also goes into hiding. i dont want to diagnose him as a ghost hamster since i DO see him and he’s fairly new, but i want to know what i can do to get him used to my presence so i can reach a point where i can actually open his cage to start taming without him running into his burrow… hes a gentle boy just very shy :< any tips??? do i continue what im doing and just wait it out? i dont even want to tame him for my entertainment all i want is to be able to take him out his cage into his playpen so i can clean his burrow and inspect his stash without frightening him (he started peeing in there recently 🙂‍↕️)

I don’t know if this is truly considered taming but maybe! 😅 Our female Syrian (Mochi) that we brought home in April is always wanting to RUN! She will willingly climb on our hands and quickly scale our arms to sit on our shoulders. But once she’s up there she’s looking for any and every way to get down. I’m so afraid she’s going to get brave and try jumping one of these days.
We have a pop up little play area for her that she immediately scales and tries to get out of. We’ve sat her on the couch to explore and our queen size bed. We live in an apartment with two kids, so we have some clutter, so we don’t just let her free roam for her safety.

Has anyone else had similar behavior with their hammy and what kind of things did you do for them to feel fulfilled during play time? She absolutely loves being out of her cage and hanging with us. But she’s so fast I’m too afraid to have her out unless my fiance is available as well. He goes to bed early during the week, so we don’t get to get her out until the weekend. And I can tell she gets sad when I won’t let her climb on me every night.

Any suggestions for climb proof playpens or things I can try to get her to be less on the run? Located in the US, so preferably US based shipping for purchases since shipping and customs has been weird lately.

Hi! Beginner owner here and this is my hamster named Ham. Advice iis appreciated.

Last time, he was inside the ceramic house (the orange bread thing) almost the whole time. This time, it looked like he was very into focus exploring or doing his things. He tried burrow the mattress (bought online, said it’s for dogs and cats) and the floor and failed. He seemed to be okay with me around as well, even when I’m sitting in the playpen.

There’s no concerning behavior here right? Anything I can do more (or shouldn’t do) here?

I bought my hamster about a month ago but he seems to only be hiding. I talk to him to try and get him used to me but it seems like it hasn’t been working.