Sleep squeaking

[shawniyatwain]

Hi, my pair of dwarves squeak in their sleep, I'm not sure if this is them snoring or if something is wrong. I check them every time I hear it as i'm worried it might be fighting but it doesn't seem to be and they are both fine otherwise.
It's making me very nervous, any ideas?

[NiceCrocs]

Plenty of hams squeak or chatter in their sleep. None of us know exactly why, we think it's from dreams or something, but it's very normal. Waking them up every time could stress them out though, so try to relax and let them sleep :)

[shawniyatwain]

Thank you for the reassurance :) will try to relax about it

[Skeever]

Pook was screaming in his sleep a day or so ago....I made some noise around the cage to wake him up....The occasional squeak, snuffle, huff and snort seem fairly common :D

Now Pook is finding his voice....I wondered if he was sleeping in a new nest tonight, and lifted some of the bedding. He was curled up in a ball on his back, opened one eye and said : Squeak... Squeak! Squeak!!!.....so I covered him back up and let him sleep....

[cypher]

One of mine squeaks & makes other odd noises almost incessantly when she's asleep, I've had others almost but not quite so noisy too, it's totally normal & something to laugh at rather than worry about :)

[Thin Lizzy]

I'm sure it's that they're dreaming, my female Syrian squeaks and when I look in on her she's fast asleep and snuggled all up in her bed.

[ShadowNinjaHamster]

Thank you so much for asking this! My dwarf hamster sometimes squeaks when he's asleep. He did it again and earlier in the morning, but I woke him up by asking if he's alright. Now he squeaked twice again. It was a high pitch squeak but not very loud.

[charlottibiscotti]

I've found that my hamster & past hamsters squeak or scream in their sleep occasionally.

It sounds alarming, but they're totally okay. They do it more often after a cage clean out, being taken somewhere new, if I have had to hold them on their backs or lightly scruff them for a necessary health check, or if I relocate the cage to a different spot in the room, so imo it's a sign of stress.

If your hamster is doing it frequently (eg once a day for more than 3 days) then you might want to consider if something is stressing them out.

given your situation with 2 dwarf hamsters, it could be that they are unhappy/stressed about being in the same cage??

if you hear the same screaming/squeaking sound at night, they are probably fighting (I owned 2 dwarves and had to separate them, they never got physical but they screamed at each other and would have eventually hurt each other) so obviously they would need to be separated in that situation!

if you want to wake your hamster up to stop the squeaking, try lightly blowing on them or tapping the bars, don't use hands to wake them up!

hope that helps!