Any suitable good cages in uk?

[racinghamster]

If you have decided on the Barney cage on Zooplus, they also sell wheels, so if the wheel is for a Syrian, you need to look at the larger sizes, not the 20cm ones as those are for dwarf hamsters. Look around the Zooplus website before you complete your order because once you pay, you can`t add more to the order and their postage and packaging is free above a certain amount, so use that fully.

You need:

Cage
Wheel
Water bottle (Classic bottles are the best)
Low sided ceramic food dish

Everything else can be made or added later. Look at the cages on here for ideas. If you like the Wonderland wooden wheel, these usually need painted using Plastikote to make them cleanable and sometimes they need a light sanding as they can cause splinters. They are very good, silent wheels though. Or look at the plastic options. I think Zooplus do a Trixie type wheel? Although I would imagine this will be flimsy and rattle a lot. x

[Pebbles82]

Hi - great choice the Barney! If you're getting that from Zooplus you could add this wheel to the order - it needs to be the 28cm one. It's actually the Trixie wheel although they don't call it the Trixie wheel. Many Syrian owners use this. It's easy to clean and a good size. The Wonderland wood wheel is also a great wheel, spins well and is very quiet - but you might need to sand it inside (and maybe out) and plastikote it before using it. Their quality has been a bit suspect recently and people have had splinters and hamsters with bleeding feet. Sanding the inside and plastikoting it to waterproof it would solve this, if you don't mind a bit of diy - but then you have to wait longer for your wheel. I ordered a Trixie wheel recently and would have kept it if I'd had an average sized Syrian, but Charlie is big and heavy and I decided to get something bigger and stronger for him. The front panel pulls off for cleaning, the holes in the front are attractive to hamsters for jumping inside and help stop them falling out, and the stand is a good height so your substrate doesn't end up having to be too low round the wheel area.

Small Pet Exercise Wheel | Free P&P on orders £29+ at zooplus!

On the other hand - the wheel that comes with the Barney is 8" and would do as a stopgap for a baby syrian while you are sanding and plastikoting! I used 100 grade and 240 grade sandpaper on mine recently. The 100 grade sanded off rough bits and splinters, and the 240 grade is very fine and left it with a nice smooth finish. The splintery bits seem to be round the ends of the struts inside the wheel and sometimes on the struts themselves, plus the rear stand - the rest is just plywood and is ok. You might be lucky and get a splinter-free one, but I had two sent recently and both had rough edges, plus a third one (cork lined one from Germany) which also needed sanding round the edges.

The Barney comes with a great house and a platform, so with a wheel, water bottle and food dish you will have the basics. Some kind of tube on the floor as a toy could be good and sputniks are popular with hammies too.

Rat sized tubes and sputniks are best for Syrians. Zooplus has the sputniks in two colour choices.

Product Search - Over 8.000 Products

If you hang it from the roof near the shelf it will clear the top door and he can climb in from the shelf side and jump out of the other side! So you need to either make sure there is nothing hard to land on on the other side or have something else on the other side (I have a tube tied to the roof on the other side). Deep substrate to land in on the other side would be nice though.

These boredom breaker cardboard tubes are good in the 10cm size, either on the floor of the cage, or you can punch holes in them and tie them to the side or roof using sisal string.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Boredom-Brea...m+breaker+tube

One of these cork tunnels could be nice for the floor of the cage - they are kind of like a natural landscape feel to climb over and make a tunnel as well, but they sometimes need cleaning out if they are dusty and I would put it in the freezer for a couple of days to make sure there is nothing living in it!

Medium size 10-14 cm diameter. They are quite big/long but can make a good divider for a higher level of substrate on one side and a lower one on the other side.

Tunnels & Dens: bargain prices at zooplus: Trixie Cork Tunnel

I had a bit of a faff with water bottles and food dishes at first and found this one good. It's not that cheap but seems to be the perfect size and not too high or difficult to eat out of. I had a living world one that was too high-sided even though it sloped down at one side.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B...rch_detailpage

These are quite cute though and it says they are endorsed by the RSPCA

http://www.amazon.co.uk/fantastic-st...h+hamster+bowl

I get the mouse sized classic bottles - get two in case one fails and it can be an idea to have two bottles in the cage anyway. They are quite cheap to get.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Classic-Delu...c+mouse+bottle

[Jen250]

The Barney is such a great choice. I wish I'd gotten that one orginally! It's large and comes with some good accessories.

As for the wheel, I got the Zooplus Trixie type wheel for Hubble, and he loves it. He has as much fun climbing in and out of the holes as he does running on it! It does rattle a bit, but it's not so bad.

Other favorites in the cage are his sand bath, a Sputnik, and hanging chew toys. I got the Supreme Science bathing sand, and a corner loo from Viovet. Sometimes he likes to just chill out in there, the little weirdo. He also really, really loves the extendable tuff tube (I believe I got this from Viovet as well), though I don't have this one in his cage. I save it for out of cage time. Oh, and another hit has been the bendy wicker bridge, which they have on Zooplus.

[Pebbles82]

Ooh yes I forgot about sand bath and toilet! I would say a potty litter tray is a number one purchase! I got one for Charlie after we'd had him two weeks and he started using it straight away (put it in his wee corner). So I've had a year of clean dry cages and just emptying the potty and refilling it once a week. Recently he seems to have got into bad middle-aged habits - he still uses it and the rest of the cage still stays clean and dry but he has started weeing in his nest sometimes. I looked at all the potties and took the advice that this open one works best.

Hamster Potty corner Litter Tray for Mice Hamster Gerbil Cage House. Size: 16 × 7 × 12/12 cm: Amazon.co.uk: Pet Supplies

This is the Chinchilla sand Jen referred to

Supreme Petfoods Science Bathing Sand 1.5 Litre: Amazon.co.uk: Pet Supplies

You can use anything really as a dish to make a sand bath - a pyrex dish or a ceramic one or an old ice cream tub.