[mikatelyn]

I feel like taming is going VEEERRRY SLOOOOOOWLY. I’ve had Smokey (Male Syrian) for about 7 weeks. I think he’s probably around 4-5 months old (Petco didn’t know how old he was). I thought initially it was because of the cage being too small, wheel being too small, me changing the cage too much, me waking him up during the day the first few days, basically doing everything you're not supposed to do, I later found out. I think I got everything corrected within about 2 weeks, left him alone for a few days, and then a started bathtub training about a month ago.

I feel like I have the hamster version of that guy from Memento, or Drew Barrymore's character from 50 First Dates. Can hamsters have short term memory loss? I feel like I have to win his trust nightly. Smokey will only occasionally take food from me. He didn't do it very much at all until I stopped giving him food unless he took it from my hand. He's not very food motivated. Don't worry, I've been weighing him and he's actually gained a couple of grams since I started doing this. He'll look kind of zombie like, just sort of sitting and staring looking sleepy. Or he'll be huddled in a dark corner cleaning himself. Sometimes he'll be running on his wheel and looking more lively. I'll hold food in front of him. Once in a while he'll take it and walk away to eat it. A lot of the time he'll sniff it, then turn his back or walk right past my hand like he's too cool for that. This happens all night (I'll try a few times before I go to bed if he's up by then, then I'll usually wake up to use the restroom and I'll stop by his cage, then in the morning before I go to work), until finally, usually in the morning between 5-7am he'll all of a sudden perk up and then all he wants to do is climb up my arm and go play. I’ll walk around the house with him doing the hand version of the hamster wheel, or go to one of his play pens (yes, I have a couple of different play areas). A lot of times he's not even interested in the food until we've been playing for a few minutes, then he'll take it repeatedly from my hands and hoard as much as he can into his cheeks. If my hand is closed around a pellet, he’ll even dig his nose into my hand to get at it! We'll play for a while in the bathtub or the playpen, letting him run all over without too much interference from me (10 minutes to over an hour, depending on if I have to go to work), and when I put him back, he'll drop off his hoard in his den, then comes back out and will start pawing at the glass again wanting to come out. Last weekend he even went back to bed, presumably thinking I’d gone to work, but had his nose poking out of his den. When he saw me poke my head around the corner to look at him, he immediately climbed back out and wanted to come out and play again, but by that night he’d forgotten me and was acting skittish again. I intermittently try the kleenex with my scent on it trick, but I feel like he has enough bedding, because he stopped taking it.

Most nights I can’t get him to wake up in time to see him before I have to go to bed (I'll rustle my hands over his substrate, change his water, take the urine clumps out of his sand pit)
If I manage to get him to come out and play at night, the first time that night he's really timid and I have to use his igloo to get him out. He actually seemed more likely to get in his igloo before, now he will just calmly ignore it half the time. Then I put him back, and a few minutes later he'll get really excited and keep wanting to come out, and he’ll climb right onto my hand. If I then leave him alone for a couple of hours and come back later he reverts and he's forgotten who I am again. I've even tried not washing my hands between handling, thinking maybe it’s a scent thing, and it's still the same. I feel like I spend a ton of time just trying to get him to trust me again.
Is this normal? Do I count this as tame or not? Could his cage be actually too large (48 x 18 inch ~70 gallon aquarium)? When I first got him, I put him in 2 connected crittertrail cages. He was bar biting (which is what prompted the initial investigation into hamster forums in the first place) but he was actually easily tempted out of the cage onto my hand. In fact, the first night I really was planning to just let him be, but he kept wanting to come out. I’d open the cage door and he’d climb right out and onto my hand. I was very lucky that he's not a biter, because I carried him around in my pocket all weekend throughout the day the first couple of days I got him, and he just slept right through it (before I knew you're not supposed to do that). So I feel like he’s not really much more tame than when I first got him. Or if he is, he’s not very consistent about it.

Should I downsize his cage? Should I just pick him up when he’s in zombie hammie mode, because he seems to just need to get over that initial hump and then he’s all for play time. Or will that make him more afraid of my hands? Or is this forward/backward progress normal and I just need to give it more time? He does seem less frantic during play time and I guess he does tend to remember me in the mornings.
Thanks in advance.