Hello!
(All measurements in this post will be in metric cm, since I'm European I really don't get the inches and feet and so on and so forth)
I just thought I'd share my very simple and quick DIY with you all. When I was in the planning-stages for bringing my winter white dwarf hamster Puff home I did a lot of thinking about the cage situation. I wanted something that would be big enough (someone suggested a 30cmx30cm EXPEDIT-square...
), and I finally settled with building something that would fit into my BILLY bookcases. Being both a book-lover and a student, space is always an issue so I thought - hey why not combine my two hobbies into the same piece of furniture? The technique for building this cage is basically the same as when you are building an aquarium, only with pieces suitable for a BILLY-bokshelf - and a lot cheaper!
The pieces I used were:
- 1 white wood 80x27 shelf for BILLY 80cm wide
- 2 glass 40x27 shelf for BILLY 40cm wide
- 2 glass 80x37 shelf for BILLY 80cm wide -
for the extra deep BILLY shelf
You are also going to need:
- Masking tape
- Silicone - use silicone free from anti-molding agents and the like
- Toothpicks or matches
- Washing-up liquid/detergent
- A big piece of cardboard or working bench to protect any furniture from silicone contamination
- Another couple of hands besides your own
Got everything? Good! Now, start by laying out all the pieces to make sure you have everyting you need.
You want to put some toothpicks or matches on the shelf you are using for the bottom, and securing them with masking tape. This will create some spacing to allow for proper "siliconing". Now comes the tricky assembly part, and this is where you will need someone helping you hold the pieces together while you are applying silicone.
Where you put which piece is quite crucial, as you need the cage to be no wider than 80cm to fit into your bookshelf. Put the short (40cm) glass shelf
onto the short side of the bottom shelf,
not on the sides. Add the two short pieces first. When you have fastened it, remove the toothpicks. Then silicone the longer and wider shelves (37cm deep) onto the sides of the bottom shelf, not onto the bottom shelf. For clarification - short glass shelves on the red line, and wide glass shelves on the green line:
When you have assembled all the sides you need to put some masking tape around all the edges to hold it together while the silicone dries. You should end up with something like this:
You now want to put silicone in the cracks of the corners
inside the cage. Apply a line of silicone to all the cracks, one at a time, and put some washing-up liquid/detergent on your finger and smear it out to make a nice line that fills the crack. Do this on all inside walls - you should end up with 8 lines that you need to smear out.
Voila! You have made a nice home-made terrarium that will fit into your BILLY-bookcase. Just leave the silicone to dry for another 24-48h before you remove the tape, wash it out and move it to the bookshelf of your choice. The end result can look something like this:
As long as you only have low toys in there and your hamster is not an athlete-jumper or you have other pets in your house that might fancy a hamster for a snack, you will not need a cover and the ventilation will be plenty.
Disclaimer: This is built for a single dwarf hamster, and I cannot speak for the suitability of this for housing syrian hamsters as I have no experience with the syrians.
Tip: If you want to protect the wood in the bottom from staining you can put some "silicone baking papers" in the bottom below the substrate. Just cut them to fit and put the substrate on top. Good to go!
DIY cage built to fit into a BILLY-bookcase (long post)
Re: DIY cage built to fit into a BILLY-bookcase (long post)
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