As I took the inspiration and guidance from posts and links on Hamster Central, I thought I should post the finished creation.
We decided early on that we wanted a bin cage, to give our ham as much room as possible. When making it, my priorities were to make it hamster friendly and safe, and also hamster proof. I also wanted it to look a bit more polished than if it was just thrown together. I have to add I am a DIY novice, and learnt as I went along. Mrs Neg asked for a blue and black theme.
The house is made from 2 'really useful' boxes, joined with drainpipe, the top section has a wire mesh lid edged with gaffa tape, and attached with heavy duty velcro. It has a wodent wheel (fantastic!) attached with cable ties. There is a cut-out for the wheel as it was too tall, and Mrs Neg made me cover this as she was paranoid Chib would scale the wheel and get out of the 2mm gap
this was covered with another 'really useful' box lid. I removed one of the sides of the box and replaced it with perspex/plexiglass so we could get a better view of her.
The drainpipe has a wooden ladder to help her get up and down, to start with we had a cardboard tube in the pipe, but she didn't need it. We did have a superpet bottle but it had a leak so it was replaced with a Ferplast bottle which is much better made. Chibby has megazorb and safebed and uses an old jar with potty litter for a toilet.
to start with we had playhouse/cabin in the bottom section but she moved into it and was sleeping right by where she was going to the toilet and keeping her food in there too, we think she picked the smallest space to nest as she was just nervous of moving in, at first cleanout we removed it, and she is going to have it back soon now she is toilet trained, to see if she fairs any better.
