Chew Toy/Twigs Questions

[tlcwrites]

Is hardwood ply safe as a Syrian hamster chew toy/material to have in their home? If it is safe, can it be painted? (Specifically with Cuprinol Garden Shades, which I know is rabbit/piggie safe once dry.)

Also do hammies appreciate twigs to gnaw like rabbits/guinea pigs do? If so, are there any specific hammie safe trees to forage from?

And whilst on that matter, is there anything hammies can eat when I'm foraging for my rabbits? Ground plants, tree leaves, etc?

Thank you in advance.

tlc xxx

[cypher]

Plywood isn't really considered safe for hams, I think the problem is in the glues that are used, not entirely sure tbh but it is usually best avoided.
Some hamsters will enjoy chewing on hazel, willow & apple twigs, you can buy all those but if you want to pick your own then you would probably need to bake them first to avoid any potential issues with anything living in them & bacterial problems.
There are quite a lot of hamster safe plants but personally I think it better not to forage for hams, you can never know what may have been on the plants, mice for instance carry diseases that can kill hamsters so it's probably better avoided.

[tlcwrites]

Thank you, that's really helpful. Is pine okay for chews instead?

[cypher]

Kiln dried pine is fine for structural things like houses, shelves, things like that but not things that are designed to be chewed, it probably wouldn't hurt if your ham chewed a bit but ideally you wouldn't really want it to be chewing pine.
Cuprinol garden shades paint is fine as far as I know, it does have quite a strong smell for a while after painting though so I would air out anything you used it on for a few days before .putting it in the cage.

[SKB_Hamsters]

Kiln dried pine is safe for hamster to chew on - most hamster won’t chew on wood unless it in the form of natural twigs. The willow stick bunches from p@h have been favourite chew toys with my current Syrian Pumpkin as well as my past hamster. But they much prefer to chew on Whimzee dog chew than most chews designed for hamsters.

I also don’t recommend harvesting forage for hamsters as layou nevertheless know what might have been on the plant - instead I prefer to use the Burgess mountain forage herb mix to scatter around my hamsters cage and sprout hamster safe seed to give her instead (like in this thread Sprouts three ways!)