First time dwarf owner questions

[Snowbuckets]

Hi!

I've been avidly researching russian dwarf hamsters for months, and the time to finally get my furry friend is soon approaching; but before I commit to a cage I figured I should ask a couple of questions just to make sure the lil bean has everything they need

First off: Cages!
I'm unsure as of yet if I will have the space for one of those Ikea Billy cages, the area I intend on having the cage is a lil high up and I'm very small, so cleaning it would be an issue if it weighs as much as I'm imagining

My current top picks are:
https://goo.gl/ENxrud
The pro's and cons I can see are that it has enough digging space if the lil dude turns out to be an avid digger (dwarfs dig a lot right? I've owned gerbils previously and they'd dig to china if you let them - if I got this cage I could also use it for gerbils later on if I wanted to? I know it's a good quality cage, I had the smaller one for my gerb Nutty in her retirement). But the bars and whatnot might catch his feet? Could I just put some felt or cardboard over it?
https://goo.gl/oH7AEc
Lil bit longer, but not as deep, also none of those bar shenanigans, not as multipurpose? Could always section off a lil bit of extra digging area, would obviously change out the wheel etc

Or are neither of these any good?

Also - semi related to the cage topic - I've read somewhere that Russian dwarf's are sociable and like to be kept in sibling pairs and I'd love to hear anyone's experience with that/what works out best? Will they get lonely? Or am I projecting my gerb experience onto it

Any help would be absolutely wonderful!

[CMB]

The second cage is the better out of the two. Zoo plus sell the Barney cage, Alexander cage, Alaska cage. All are sold at a good price and are good cages. The Barney and Alexander have narrow bar spacing. The Alaska has bigger bar spacing, but people have kept dwarf hybrids in them without escape.

Tanks are nice, as they can have deep substrate for digging, but only have top access.

[Princess Pixie]

Definitely go for either of the cages mentioned above. I had the Barney for my Syrian (who's a big girl) and she had ample space, I'd definitely recommend it for space wise. I had to move her to a tank though for bar chewing reasons. If you would rather a tank (better in my opinion), the Kerry on Zooplus is in sale at £70 from nearly £90. It's 75-45-38 so it's just the right size for a dwarf though if you're going for lots of space, the Barney is bigger.
As for keeping two dwarfs.. lots of people do but be prepared for falling outs and maybe having to separate them to separate cages. It happens a lot. I keep my dwarf alone and he's perfectly happy by himself. Though the woman in Pets At Home was pushing me to buy all three litter mates, I wasn't willing to take the risk of having to have three separate cages (plus my Syrians tank) if they fell out. But opinions differ on that matter.

[cypher]

The second cage is a really good cage for dwarf hams so that would be fine, the first one would be great for a ham that really loved to dig & burrow if you completely filled the base with substrate & either removed all the metal parts or covered them but overall the first cage is better.
The cages CMB mentioned are good too but all are taller than the grosvenor cage so you would need to take a lot of care with your set up to avoid falls as Russian hams are good at climbing up but have no clue about getting down & most often just let go!

Most pairs end up falling out as they mature & need to be separated, as a new owner you would do far better to begin with just one, keeping pairs is complex & they are generally more solitary living very happily alone anyway.

[BorisPasha]

I actually have the grosvenor cage and I've not had any problems at all with it. It's very well made. The only thing I don't like is that it only has a top opening door (which hasn't put me off as I have more than 1 lol) though it does open very quietly.

[flowerfairy]

I love the grosvenor cage. I got it for around forty pounds but cant remember where from. Worth having a google and seeing what comes up.

[alpacassei]

The first cage has platforms made of bars which can injure their feet so that's not a good cage, the other cages people mentioned are really good though.

I use the Duna Fun Large cage for my Russian and he loves it (there's also the Duna Multy which is the same cage but without the tubes and platforms and usually half the price ).

Russian's love to burrow so make sure you choose a cage with a deep base that can be filled right up with substrate

You can keep them in pairs but honestly it's not worth the stress of if they fall out and need to be separated.

[Princess Pixie]

Originally Posted by flowerfairy

I love the grosvenor cage. I got it for around forty pounds but cant remember where from. Worth having a google and seeing what comes up.

I had it for my dwarf but upgraded him to a huge tank because the little devil us SOOO active.