New fella

[Pebbles82]

Oh he's lovely. Once he's got his house, nest and hoards all shaped up I'm sure he'll be ready.

[Thin Lizzy]

Well done on your progress.
Golly, he's stunning! What a beauty!
What's his name?

[don]

My daughter has named him Barnaby Banoffee.

I've taken to coming downstairs in the night at about 3-4am to have a little 'chat' with him, as that's when he's most active and when he's exploring his cage more.

I still haven't worked out where he is peeing yet. He's got an 8 inch long ceramic sand bath in one corner, as well as a potty with sand in it somewhere else. I see no evidence of him peeing anywhere. I've looked in the nest and can't see any signs. I assume I'll be able to smell it eventually, but at the moment it's a mystery.

He's quite funny in the sand bath. He's probably got about an inch depth of sand in there and digs like mad trying to get somewhere, with little chirps as he digs. Then he turns around and digs in the opposite direction.

[don]

I regularly give him fresh food - I say 'regularly', I've only had him since Friday
I therefore lift up his house each day to check his hoard to make sure there is no fresh stuff left to go rotten. Am I ok doing this ? Am I causing him unnecessary stress by invading ?

All of his hoard seems to be dry stuff. He seems to eat the fresh stuff quickly. What do you do with this hoard ? I assume clearing it all out would stress him out. Do you leave it indefinitely ?

[cypher]

lol@ the mystery pee, I have no doubt you will find it eventually!
If it was in the sand it should be easy to see clumps or darker grains if they've rolled in it, if it's elsewhere there probably will be a smell at some point, sometimes when they're still settling in the don't always pee in just one place so it can be harder to find but most settle on one spot after a while.

Most don't hoard fresh food so you can probably just check every few days if you think he may have hidden something but if he seems to be eating it quickly it may be stressing him out a bit for no real reason.
When you do a clean you can remove some of the old food but if you do just put some fresh mix back in it's place, doesn't have to be as much as they've hoarded just enough to reassure them no one is going to steal everything!
If it's all dry you can leave the hoard for quite a while though.

[Pebbles82]

Lol! Already you're in the 'sneak down in the night phase' Although you can talk to them when they're in their house early evening too - they can still hear it a bit even if dozy.

He sounds to be having fun in his sand bath. Yes the dried food can be left in the hoard. I only remove it if it is soiled by having been wee'd on - which our hamster did for a while but have broken that cycle now. If he seems to be eating the fresh straight away then he probably isn't hoarding it. You could either check say every 4 or 5 days, or just give him the teeniest bit of veg so he's more likely to eat it straight away - like a tiny broccoli floret - I tend to give pieces no bigger than about 1cm square size or equivalent if not square!

Yes they don't like things being disturbed, but sometimes we have to. As for weeing, he must be doing it somewhere. If he has been burrowing under his house as you say, it sounds like he might be doing it lower down - ie under his nest.

I would give it a few more days (sometimes they chuck out some smelly substrate for you to take away if it is in their way in the house!). Generally the advice is don't disturb anything in the cage for the first two weeks to help prevent them getting skittish and slowing up taming. Except for the odd bit of spot cleaning. If nothing smells I'd just leave it. You will soon smell it if he digs up a load of smelly substrate and leaves it in a pile by the door!

If it gets to another few days then maybe try spot cleaning inside his house. The top comes off. You could let him walk into a tube, take the top off the house, have a quick feel around near the bottom of the house and grab a handful that feels wet. Doesn't matter if you don't get all of it just now, it'll help until the two weeks is up.

If you do get any wet substrate you could put a little bit of it on top of his potty before chucking it as this might encourage him to use the potty.

It does sound like he has chose a pee spot somewhere else though and usually it's good to put the potty where the chosen pee spot is. It may well be in his house in one of the runs in there and he is being tidy and burying it! Even now our hamster will put substrate on top of his potty so it doesn't smell too much. When we got him a big house, he moved his pee corner inside the house as there was more room. So I moved the potty in there too.

It does sound like he has chosen a room or run in the house as a bathroom. So after the two weeks is up and you have a clearer idea of where he is weeing exactly, you could try putting the potty under the area of house where he is peeing (it's not likely to fit in any of the rooms or runs). So at least it makes cleaning less and easier.

[don]

Thanks for all the advice - I truly never thought owning a hamster would be such a learning curve - but it's an enjoying learning experience.

[Pebbles82]

Neither did I! Sorry posted at the same time as Cypher. It's interesting how much is known about now that wasn't 20 years ago and I do think it can give them a much better quality of life and also more interesting for us if they interact more too. I last had a hamster (a boyfriend's hamster actually) about 28 years ago. He lived in a 3 tier single cell rotostak thing, which was the new thing and had nothing but his nest in there and the odd lettuce leaf and handful of food. Terrible! But he also had free roam of the house and we left the door open. He was confined to the lounge but how he didn't get killed I have no idea! Climbed the curtains and all sorts. He lived to 2 years old and had a bit of freedom I guess, but the cages back then were awful if you didn't let them out. I now know lettuce isn't good!

The fact that they can be toilet trained is great I think! And means they need less cage cleans so less stress for the hamster. Their nest is the biggy - they don't really like that being messed with. It's personal! Sometimes it has to be removed or partially removed but I try and leave it in tact if possible.

Once you and he are in a routine, it's not a lot to think about and quite simple

[Coco61]

He is a lovely little boy don. Whatever he is he isn't a boring beige!
When you get a chance to get some more photos you might start a thread to ask what his colouring is because that should catch the eye of some HC experts.
Then you will know what his beautiful colouring is officially!

[don]

I'm told by the breeder he's probably a silver beige. It's certainly a very beautiful coat with his long satin fuzz