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Old 06-22-2021, 10:00 AM   #1
shane
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Join Date: May 2021
Location: Essex, England
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Default Sand bath / toilet conundrum

My Syrian Tobias has a nice wooden sand bath and a little plastic toilet with a roof. He loves his sand bath and digging is his favourite form of exercise, maybe a close second to running on his wheel. He only seems to visit the toilet for a bit of digging. Instead, he pees in his sand bath, which could be convenient except it’s a nice untreated wooden thing that I paid way to much for (lesson learnt) and after only a few weeks it’s starting to get a bit minging so I need to replace it. I’m after a bit of advise on what to do next.

I tried moving some of the used sand from the bath to the toilet with no luck. I’ve considered removing the bath temporarily to try and force him to use the toilet but he loves the sand bath so much. I’ve also heard that those little toilets with a roof are too small.

He’s in a Duna Maxi and the bath and toilet are in one end. I’m thinking of replacing them both and getting a big glass or ceramic dish - about 18x40cm - that will fill the whole end of the cage and fill that with sand.

How do I then go about cleaning? Right now when I clean his sand bath I sieve the sand - which doesn’t pong (perhaps because the wood is soaking it up) - to remove the occasional bits and then I clean the wood. Maybe, if the new dish is big enough I could fit one of those corner toilets in the dish so I don’t have to remove the whole lot every time?

I guess I could just dump the sand on the floor of the cage but then, if he doesn’t pee on something like a corner toilet it’ll make cleaning even harder. Hmm, the conundrums of a new owner...
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Old 06-22-2021, 02:57 PM   #2
Ria P
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Default Re: Sand bath / toilet conundrum

For future reference, you can waterproof untreated wood with a couple of coats of plastikote, the tub not the spray available at Wickes, Hobbycraft or online.

The easiest way to scoop out the pee clumps from sand is with a small metal sieve. That way the big container the sand is in can stay in place.

I also think that the covered toilets are too small for a Syrian and a corner toilet, either the plastic ones or the large Rodipet ceramic one is far better. If Tobias pees in the same corner i'd place a toilet there.

We can only try but in the end a hamster will pee where he wants to pee.
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Old 06-23-2021, 01:58 PM   #3
shane
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Default Re: Sand bath / toilet conundrum

Ahh, I think I've finally clocked on: when I heard that you should sift the sand to clean it I assumed you had to take all of the sand out of the cage, of course I could just scoop the clumpy bits out with a smaller sieve. Doh! Thanks Ria.

The silly question I have now is how often I will need to clean whatever I put the sand in? Right now I can see that wee is soaking into the wood, if the sand was in a non-porous container would you rely on the sand soaking it all up and only wash the container occasionally? I have no idea how much a wee a hamster can produce.
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Old 06-24-2021, 03:56 PM   #4
Ria P
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Default Re: Sand bath / toilet conundrum

When it gets smelly. I'm guided by my nose so find it hard to put a time frame on it.

FYI, i also used to take the whole sand container out to sieve all the sand until one day it clicked and i started to use a small sieve to remove the clumps of wee. I'm glad that i'm not the only one, lol.
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Old 06-27-2021, 10:33 AM   #5
shane
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Default Re: Sand bath / toilet conundrum

Thanks, I’ll continue to play wee detective!
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