Thread: Help
View Single Post
Old 11-13-2016, 05:05 PM  
Pebbles82
Hamster Antics
 
Join Date: Sep 2014
Posts: 23,533
Default Re: Help

Hams do things like that sometimes Have you recently cleaned her cage/nest area? If you clean out their nest and remove their hoard they get a bit worried and try and hide the hoard somewhere else. Sometimes they hoard in their potty and pee on it to deter anything from stealing the food! It sounds a bit like she is doing that kind of behaviour. Hams do pee in their wheels, and they do sometimes hoard food in their wheels - but as she is doing both it does sound like she is trying to protect her hoard. It's a difficult pattern to break sometimes. I used to remove the pee'd on hoard, and put new food out - in a more sensible place! And hope our hammy would start hoarding there instead. ie near the nest area. If that doesn't work it can help to move the wheel to a different location possibly and at the same time put a handful of new food out to replace the hoard, somewhere away from the wheel/near the nest. Generally they don't like things being moved/changing - but it can help break a habit.

Not sure what your cleaning routine is, but it's best to leave the nest in tact if you can, when doing any cleaning. Unless it's been pee'd in then try and leave as much of the old nest behind as you can and put new torn up white toilet paper strips out in a heap somewhere in the case (not actually in the nest) so your hammy can forage/pouch them and rebuild the nest. Likewise with their hoards - try and leave it when cleaning unless it is soiled. If you have to remove any of the hoard, replace it with new food in the same place (not the wheel obviously lol).

Spot cleaning is usually all that's needed, with full cage cleans only needed every 2 to 3 months, and the more depth of substrate you have, the more you can do that kind of routine (the bottom half tends to stay dry).

Alternatively - just ignore it for a bit She might decide it's not a good idea when she tries running in her wheel. I like Erin's Hamsters youtube video "8 cage cleaning tips" if you don't know it - it has some great tips on cage cleaning and avoiding stress behaviours.
Pebbles82 is offline   Reply With Quote