Can a bar chewer ever go back to barred cages?

[kyrilliondaemon]

lol thanks
We're pleasantly surprised that so far Scamp isn't sulking about no bars as much as we expected. She even excercised yesterday! Ran around her cage lots for a while, and thats not like her lol
She walked in a wheel too, but only for a few seconds and then declared the other wheel to be her new store location.
(We have two syrian sized wheels so have given her both for a while. I'm being optimisic and hoping two wheels doubles the chance of her using one lol)

We're still discussing the options of what to do after this week is up. Later I'm flavouring a few chew things (with hamster treats) and hoping they get her gnawing, as if she doesn't start chewing something else she'll end up back on the bars just to keep her teeth down.
If we can get her chewing other things I think we'll give the puppy stuff a go (trusting I can find it somewhere), but if we can't we may have to accept that she needs to be away from bars for good. I know from experience that shes a stubborn little hamster, so if she won't chew other stuff she'll just end up sulking and refusing to deal with us until she wins and gets her bars washed lol

[kyrilliondaemon]

Well we're three or four days in to Scamp living in her temporary bar-free cage and so far she's er... changing behaviour a lot lol
At first she just ran around the cage looking for things to chew, but now she's calmed down a little and started chewing her chew things and digging through things sometimes, and today we actually heard her on a wheel for the first time in ages
She's also destroying chew things at absurd rates, to the point where her loofah was left alone until today and now we want to know how she's taken so much off it lol
She never used to chew this much before her bar-chewing addiction, but I think she's definetly having a healthier and better life than she had with her bars, so taking them off her to break the habit was the right thing to do.

We're still debating if she ever gets many bars back, and will hopefully have a decision on that within a week now.

[kyrilliondaemon]

Er... Final update for this, but for anyone who cares.
We left her without bars until a few days ago, and so far she has only chewed to tell us off
Like when we stole parts of her cage that she wanted lol
Ignoring her is working fine, and she's not chewing very often at all, the few times she has chewed we've easily been able to see what we've done to irritate her.
Looks like the chewing is sorted, so fingers crossed she stays this good

[Lougarry]

That's great news, Sam.

[kittycatcat5]

My hamster is a bar chewer for attention, but after a while she stoped beacuse i stoped paying attention to her so if she wants attention she just sits on her house near the door and then i hold her and cuddle her

[kyrilliondaemon]

Thanks Lougarry
We were fully prepared to buy something to spray on the bars, so her behaving herself is a pleasant surprise lol

Kittycatcat - We tried ignoring Scamp... It was probably what kicked it from "oi!" to an addiction because she never quite got that there was no point if we were ignoring her, she's better now though so we're happy

[kyrilliondaemon]

Well Scamp had behaved perfectly between then and last night, but now the dopey rodent may be starting again... She chewed last night a bit but my partner stopped her and tonight she started, got taken away, we had her out for a while... And she chewed again briefly.
I'm going to start the campaign to stop her, and after that we'll just have to see. If we can stop her, great, if not... I start wondering if the hams are trying to bankrupt us with cage requirements lol

Ah well...
*goes to start making good friends with ebay and preparing to make her bank statements hate her again*
I guess our hams'd been doing so well it was inevitable that something'd go wrong really lol

Back to this we go, and once again I'll update when we get developments. Hopefully the daft girl will behave though. Hopefully...

[Zsjzoe]

My poppy has had many cages from plastic to metal bared ones and she constantly chews on both she had a x large 2 level bared hamster cage and all she did was chew she evenly chewed thought the bars then she had a mini duna cage chewed though the plastic and chewed the hinges on the cage door so that came off now she has a habitrail ovo cage that has tubes and dens that goes round the entire ceiling of my room and she has chewed tough this as well she has all the toys and chew sticks she wants every thing in cage is wooden so I think it comes down to the temperament of your hamster if it's determined to chew then nothing will stop it

[Flamestriker]

Like Kyrilliondaemon I had to take Squeak out of the iMac Fantasy due to severe bar chewing. For Christmas she was put in to two bin cages, one big one for burrowing, the other for nesting, water and potties with her 12 inch flying saucer. She was reintroduced to the iMac a week or so ago (I think) and although she still bar chews it is nothing to worry about. I'm still keeping an eye on her nose tho. Now she chews the dog biscuits, grass and woven tunnels, gnaws at her wooden houses and spends hours fighting to get the millet out of the wood rolls hooked on to her cage.

[kyrilliondaemon]

Zsjzoe - I know if she's determined enough I'll be forced into buying an aquarium, but for now I'm hoping the dopey girl can behave again. She behaved in an all plastic cage though, and stayed off her bars for a month, so with a bit of luck she'll stay behaving.
I was prepared to buy an aquarium the first time around though, and will be again if she gives me no choice. Am really hoping she lets me keep a choice though - I don't like aquariums lol
Half the frustrating thing this time is that something did stop Scamp lol, now she's possibly going back to it is all. I have a plan and if it fails, I have hamsters in tank style cages big enough for syrians. A nice rearrangement and sorting of a cage we'd be ok keeping a robo in, and voila! Scamp not chewing unless she starts on plastic which I doubt she'll do

Flamestriker - Well Scamp lasted a month before I started getting concerned, but to be fair I may have been overreacting to it a bit last night. I'm still getting anti-gnaw spray though, at worst it doesn't work and I try the other options lol. It might be not much chewing now but I'm stubborn that she doesn't chew bars at all if I get my way.
Since she goes for the same bit of her cage most of the time, I'll buy more cable ties and new mesh and re-mesh that bit if she plays up enough. Am sure she'll love 6mm square mesh replacing her 1cm mesh lol