Food/=Poop?

Shannonmcn · 08-16-2014, 08:41 PM

Buttercup keeps putting her food in her potty. I know she uses her potty to pee and I know she also keeps food in her nest. Should I throw out the potty food? Is she's telling me it's garbage?

I gave her some cucumber earlier and she took it immediately to her potty, even though it's her fave. I'm so confused

Shana · 08-16-2014, 09:29 PM

My hamster occasionally stores her favorite food in her potty. She usually does this after a cage clean, or after I've removed perishable food from her nest. Most hamsters are particularly territorial about their food stores. Storing food in a potty or toilet corner is a way of scent marking it, and letting others know that they should stay away from it. Though gross, it's normal and not harmful (as far as I know.) I usually dump most of it out when I clean her potty out, and put a little back, or put in a little bit of fresh dry food so that she doesn't get too anxious. Everything else I've tried (moving the peed on food to a different corner, getting rid of it completely, etc.) has failed. I'm curious to know if anyone has successfully eliminated this behavior or if, like in suspect, it really is nothing to worry about.

twix and oreo mates4life · 08-16-2014, 10:34 PM

Twix keeps most of her food under her potty too. I don't know why but whenever I remove it she replaces it

NiceCrocs · 08-16-2014, 10:39 PM

I FINALLY managed to litter train Margo, but for a long time she did the same thing. There's not much you can do about it though, except clean it out every few days. :/

twix and oreo mates4life · 08-16-2014, 10:40 PM

It took me forever to litter train twix but she rufuses to store her food anywhere else

cypher · 08-16-2014, 11:04 PM

It always seems to be a bit of a random thing with mine, they suddenly do it for a few days for no obvious reason, nothing to make them feel a bit insecure or anything so I just clean it out & they give up on that idea!

Shannonmcn · 08-17-2014, 06:31 AM

Okie dokie, thanks for the response guys, I'll just keep cleaning out the potty as normal. I did just change her cage around again so hopefully she'll quit it at some point

Skeever · 08-17-2014, 06:54 AM

Yeah, it's kinda normal it seems. But if it's a fit of territoriality, changing the cage around again will amp up her feelings of invasion even more. I find Ziggy only pees with purpose on something he thinks needs to be marked from being fiddled with by the Giant Hands. Food + Urine = Mine! mine!mine! mine! MINE!

LOL

**DrKMcK** · 08-21-2014, 12:48 AM

Skeever is right about this. LOL. Hamsters do not think about poop the way humans do. They actually have to eat a certain type of poop to be healthy, so the oder or the idea of it being near their food has no negative meaning for them.

Shannonmcn · 08-21-2014, 07:46 AM

The poop I'm fine with (very inoffensive as far as types of poop goes) it's putting food where you sleep and also where you pee that has me confused.

She's still doing it and is unfortunately losing her pee-stash when I have to clean her potty so she should catch on to that soon! I have her cage all set up now with all her new stuff in it so it won't be changing much now for a while.