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Old 01-07-2020, 01:48 PM   #1
Elleonor
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Join Date: Dec 2019
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Question How soon can I upgrade a cage?

Hello everyone,
I got a pair of baby male winter whites about a month ago (so they are 8 weeks old now). I originally planned on only getting one, so the bin cage I made was supposed to be enough for at least a few months. It is a 30 gallon bin. Attached a pic of the original setup.

The plan was to wait while the hamster is fully grown to upgrade him to an IKEA Detolf. However, now that there are two of them, just putting in another wheel limits the space immensely. I get the feeling they would really like more.

How soon do you think I can upgrade their cage? I don't want to cause any stress to them by switching homes too often.


Additional info:
Both cuties became fully tame within a week and they are very friendly with each other. The most hostility I see from them now is shoving to get to treats, water or my hand. They sleep together and play when free roaming around the room.
One of them had a hard time at the beginning, though, and didn't come out of the tunnel for two days. It also took time for him to adjust to free roaming.
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Old 01-12-2020, 11:12 AM   #2
Kyrkogrimr
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Location: London, UK
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Default Re: How soon can I upgrade a cage?

First of all, don't want to be a party pooper, but even if your boys are getting on now doesn't guarantee that they will continue to do so. As far as I'm aware there isn't a compelling reason to keep pairs together, but if you do, you absolutely must have a contingency in place for if they have a falling out, otherwise one or both of them could end up seriously injured or worse.

That being said... I would accept correction on this but if you're only planning to move them once (ie bin cage to detolf) it's not so much an issue of moving too often as too soon. If I were going to upgrade either of my hams, I would do it around when I would be cleaning them out, make sure that I DON'T clean the toys/hides, and mix at least half to 2 thirds of the old substrate with the new (I don't usually do a full clean out and ditch all of their subtrate anyway: there's a lot of it and mixing old - CLEAN - bedding with the new stuff helps transfer their scent over and make it smell more like home. Obviously, any soiled substrate would need to be discarded.)
However, as a relatively inexperienced hamster minion, I would suggest waiting until more experienced forum members have weighed in, as I could see the change of location + cleaning out combination being stressful.

Congrats on your little ones and I hope you and your boys have lots of fun together in the future
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Old 01-13-2020, 08:35 AM   #3
cypher
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Default Re: How soon can I upgrade a cage?

Most pairs will fall out as they mature & need separating, stress can trigger that too so a cage change my cause them to become territorial & start to fall out & fight, the larger the cage the more territorial they tend to become so I would avoid moving both into a larger cage, if you think you can monitor them well enough for the time being to be sure there are no signs of dominance problems then it may be better to wait a while then get another cage for one & keep the other in the current cage.
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Old 01-13-2020, 10:08 AM   #4
Vierville
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Default Re: How soon can I upgrade a cage?

I really like their castle!
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