Hi. I am a newbie and I have my female syrian for three months now. She does take treats from my hand with her completely being on my hand, but she would quickly put the treats in her mouth and walk away. I don't know if that means she's tamed or not. It might be that she's still scared of me?
She lives in a cage (around 300 sqr inches.) within a playpen. I leave her cage door open at night because I know that cage is a bit too small for her.
She climbed over the playpen fence two or three times. The first time, she chewed through the base wood of the wall, but I found her in the cage afterwards. I took actions to make that part of the room inaccessible to her. The second time, she escaped the playpen while I was sleeping, I found her lying close to the ground by the fence the next morning. She looked very sad, and I have no clue how long that poor thing was out of reach for food and water.
In between the two times she escaped the playpen, she sometimes would dig and chew the "flooring" of the playpen and chew on the bars. I thought she was bored and wanted to come out to play. So I brought her out to play and she would run freely in her room. Yes I do have a saperate bedroom just for her, and I sometimes do some work or watch tv on my computer while I watch her roam around. She seemed happy, and would even climb up to my body to explore and get some treats from me. She did try to bite my ear once, but I quickly turned away.
Sometime after her second escape, I read something on the forum for "training" hamsters not to chew on bars to get our attention or to get treats by ignoring their bar chewing. Before that, I tried Olive oil, and she didn't like it so she started ignoring my calling and even refused treats from me for a bit. And for a few days afterwards, when I checked on her, she'd be lying on the ground not moving at all as if she had a stroke. (She did the same once before, when I kinda cleaned her cage in front of her.. I guess that was an traumatizing experience for her...?)
I did ignore her obsessive bar chewing that night I read that post, and I found her climbing over the fence. Very determined little one, and you could see it on her face.
As usual, she ran around the room. But she soon wanted to go home, so the obsessive chewing on bars started. Only this time, it was from the outside... I ignored her and just let her chew. For a good 20 minutes. Then she ran around a bit, and I gave her a signal with her exercise ball. She got in, and I got her home.
But ever since then, she's been "glued" to her nest. She only comes out to eat and drink and wee wee, but not even exercising -- she's got two flying saucers, the 12' outside of her cage and a 6' inside of her cage that she used to love so much. I also heard her sneezing once or twice per day. I was afraid that she's sick, or something was wrong with her, so I forced myself upon her to do a quick check with her body. Nothing seems wrong.
Another thing I thought I'd mention, is that wherever she is, she tries to get out further. I tried using a bathtub, and she would try to climb over it. When she's roaming in the room, she tries to climb the walls too...
I think it has been a rough three months for both of us.. I am not a patient person and I lost my cool with her very early. That was before I read anything about hamsters and how to care for them. I feel very bad for that. It is very frustrating to feel that whatever I do for her, she doesn't take it because I ruined it from before. But at the same time, I know she's a scared little thing and it hurts me when I know that I am not giving her what's best for her. Yet I don't know what to do.
Should I just leave her alone? Maybe she's better off no be handled at all?
If you've gotten to this point of the post, I appreciate your patience for reading. I wanted to include as much as I could so that you would have a good understanding of what's going on. Thank you for any advice you might have.