cage for syrian hamster

Hi all

We are already ownders of bunnies and gerbils and we have been looking into getting a hamster too. It is my daughters birthday in 3 weeks time and we have decided to let her pick one for her birthday. We have bought some hamster essentials but were hoping to make use of a hamster cage we have been given until we can afford something a bit posher/bigger after the next pay day.

It is a two tier wire cage which I owned as a teenager. But I have just read that it is not good to use wire foors as the hamsters feet can get sore. I never noticed any problems when i owned hamsters using this cage years ago, but I am worried about using it now. Can anyone advice?

Also, what cages do people recommend. I love the hamster heaven in pets at home, but we don't have the space for it. The maximun space we have is about 65 x 45cm. Can anyone recommend anything? I see the cambridge has come up in other posts, but we like the idea of getting something with a tunnel.

Thanks
Lynsey

[clairescunny55]

Ive had syrians all my life and TBH i prefer the cages without tubes, once fully grown my syrians seemed to struggle through the tubes. I have the cambridge and is fab its got £10 off at pets at home atm too xx

[heleni0]

You can cover wire floors with lino and they'll be fine for a hamster to walk on. If you have a flooring shop near you you can pop in and ask for some free offcuts they're only going to throw away anyway

As for cages, the Imac Fantasy is 58cm 38x cm x 28.5cm, and can be extended upwards to provide more floor space. The main unit alone really isn't big enough, you'd need an extension as well. It does come with a tube to get from one level to the other. To be honest, I don't like cages with *lots* of tubes (which is why I didn't opt for the HH) cos they're a PITA to clean