[AprilPearl]

Quigley will be 2 years and 7 months old in a few days. Poor little guy really isn’t doing too well at all.

He gave up eating hard food a while back (it’s not his teeth I’ve had them checked twice - most recently this morning) so we’ve been feeding him Harry hamster crushed up and moistened with water and baby food. Unfortunately though, he has stopped eating much of that now. He sleeps virtually all the time and isn’t very mobile at all. He seems hardly to be able to keep his head up when I spoon feed him and takes a long time to eat not very much. Eating seems to tire him out and he has to take frequent breaks.

He also doesn’t wash himself any more which has led to him developing dandruff despite my best efforts at brushing him. And because he doesn’t move around much any more his nails over grew and I had to get the vets to cut them for me.

I’ve been thinking perhaps I should start syringe feeding him to perk him up? But, I have some questions:

1. Is there any special high calorie food that I can syringe feed? Quigley has lost a quarter of his body weight and I can’t afford to have him losing any more. Would oxbow critical care for herbivores work?

2. How often should I syringe feed? Perhaps every few hours? But I don’t want to stress him out by constantly waking him up.

3. Is there a specific method for syringe feeding hamsters? I (obviously) want to avoid choking him or accidentally squirting the food into his pouches.