Worried about the hamsters at college.

[WinnieTheHam]

Hi all. I do an animal management course and they have loads of animals at college.

I'm worried about all of them to be honest, especially the hamsters. They have small cages, with insecure platforms, cotton fluff bedding, pine shavings and some don't even have a wheel. The ones that do, the wheels are way too small.

I'm wanting to report it to someone but i don't know who, i can't stand to see them live in that way. They also get 9 grams of food, when i plated it up for them it looks like less than a teaspoon! is that right? ... i put a bit extra for them and i got told off and they said that they will get overweight and that other rodents have been put on a diet because of students being kind to them.. which i understand, they will get overweight because they haven't been given the correct enrichment, cage size and wheel! but they're probably starving.

I feel that if i say anything to my tutors they will think they know best and that i'm wrong.

It breaks my heart. I just want to take them all home. What do i do?

[velma]

SinNyx runs a hamster rescue called Little Bears Hamster Rescue & has done some great hamster care sheets, which you can find over on her rescue's Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/pages/Littl...98618773703260
Maybe you could start by showing them/printing them off? The sheets are very well done & show things like suitable cage sizes (with PDSA miminum), unsafe bedding/toys etc. Also, there are a couple of photos on her rescue page of a hamster who came to her with fluffy bedding & had a very nasty looking wound to his foot where it had tangled.
It shows you have found information from a legitimate source & aren't just "ranting". If you could arrange a chat with your tutor & go with your information & talk to them calmly & maturely they are more likely to listen than if you just grab them after class. I hope you get somewhere.

[WinnieTheHam]

Originally Posted by velma

SinNyx runs a hamster rescue called Little Bears Hamster Rescue & has done some great hamster care sheets, which you can find over on her rescue's Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/pages/Littl...98618773703260
Maybe you could start by showing them/printing them off? The sheets are very well done & show things like suitable cage sizes (with PDSA miminum), unsafe bedding/toys etc. Also, there are a couple of photos on her rescue page of a hamster who came to her with fluffy bedding & had a very nasty looking wound to his foot where it had tangled.
It shows you have found information from a legitimate source & aren't just "ranting". If you could arrange a chat with your tutor & go with your information & talk to them calmly & maturely they are more likely to listen than if you just grab them after class. I hope you get somewhere.

Thank you. I'll have a look and print off what i think is best, although i have done a lot of work on hamsters. Recently just done one about health problems that can occur in their enclosure, substrate, enrichment and ventilation needs for my health assignment.

Im just worried as my college is £10million in dept. Next year Askham Bryan college is buying it out, so hopefully things might change. I will have a talk to someone about it, i just dont know who's in charge of the animals, because the college has other subjects too that are nothing to do with animals.