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Old 03-25-2011, 03:38 PM  
Gillzy
Highland Hamster
 
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Join Date: Jan 2011
Location: Scotland
Posts: 3,569
Default Review: Neon Leo or Fantazia hamster cage

So a review of this cage is needed: HAMSTER CAGE NEON LEO 3 APARTMENT GERBIL MOUSE RODENT: Amazon.co.uk: Garden & Outdoors. Here it is called the Neon Leo 3 appartment cage, and it comes as a single level too (which would probably only be good as a travel cage to the vets - it can't even be used as an upward extension as it needs the levels grooves to hold all the sides in place!). It also goes by other names such as the Fantazia (not sure what else). And it comes in different colours: blue (sides) and pink (roof, floor and levels), pink and blue, orange and green, green and orange... and possibly more...

I wouldn't advise it as a cage tbh.

When I first got it:

(the nintendo DS is there for comparison)

This is how I've got it set up:


I found for a syrian that it is FAR too small. And when I showed a picture of it to the staff at Pets at Home she said that the bar spacing was too big for a dwarf (I've measured it, it's 10mm). Although, now I know with my present knowledge that it's not. And a dwarf would probably be relatively happy in there. Although Sen (syrian) can fit her nose between the bars enough that it makes chewing fun - not the case in the 8mm spacing cage (the yellow one).

I agree it is not the best for handling as there is only the 3 hatches on the front and small one on the roof.

Cleaning is pretty difficult, if you don't want to take it apart into its individual components:


I tend to try to keep it together as much as I can and spray it with disinfectant and wipe it down, and then use a shower head to spray in and clean that all away.

It comes with 2 TINY wheels (probably only suitable for a robo, but even then) and 2 bowls which fit in circles grooved into the shelves.

The tubes are okay, size wise (and I think dwarves would only just cope with the slippery insides because it twists a lot). I never take them apart though because the connector bands are just plastic and not very flexible.

The bottle leaks (and I read that this happens with most). And I noticed that Sen can climb out the hole where it drops in when I have the water bottle out to refill, which isn't great. Oh and it's set too low for a syrian so I taped two of the plastic tube rings around the top (which don't fall through the hole) and raises it up a couple of inches.

The little house that sticks out the side was fine for Sen when she was a baby as she could fit in it kinda comfortably:


But when she grew she moved into a savic igloo because it was bigger, and now she open nests in the digging box (the purple one on the floor), because of the deeper substrate.

These are the dimensions (although it's kinda difficult because it's got deeply curved edges): 25cm x 38 cm (W x L) on each level; each levels height is different: bottom - 20cm; middle - 12cm; top - 18cm. The base is 9cm deep. The openings in front are 14 cm x 8.5 cm, and the top is 12 cm x 10 cm. These are very small, and often mean that you can't fit toys through the doors, and not easy to get hands in.

These heights are not great, for most toys...

It must be noted that the deep curved in the edges (i.e. bottom and top and sides) make it difficult to attach things to the bars. Specifically, I bought Sen a 6.5inch wheel and put it in the bottom floor (the only on it would fit) but it still scraped the curve at the bottom because it wasn't pushed out from the side it was nearly flush - I had to push stone and pencils and things to try to make it kick out at the bottom so she could run in it and then when she did run in it the vibration would change it all/knock the stone out and it wouldn't be able to turn smoothly.

With regard to connectability, it has bigger holes that the crittertrail funnels I'm using, but only marginally, so I've secured it with tape and it does the job.

Although I've spoken negatively about this cage, the reason I still have it is just for extended room to run. Sen enjoys popping between the levels. And she did learn to just walk out onto my hand (although she was really trying to escape most of the time and she CAN escape out of it from the top floor - even the roof - by climbing down the bars... she's a crazy monkey hamster though).

The plastic is ALL very brittle - including the sides, tube connectors, and clips (that keeps each level connected to the sides). I try my best to be very careful with all of it, and

I think I will keep it for maybe some future dwarves, but there are MUCH better cages out there especially for that price, and I wish I had been part of this forum before I decided to let my OH buy it for me for my birthday.

I think that's about it, if you have any more questions just ask.
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Welcome, my handsome LH syrian boy Dr Calcifer Lightman (a.k.a "Cal")!

Run free at the bridge my precious little Senpop. (10/10 - 04/12)
RIP My sweet little dwarfies - Doc and Noodle <3
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