Honey, my hamster ate the kids!

We bought our two beautiful Russian dwarf hamsters, Sunny and Unnamed (awaiting the outcome of a hamster name vote on our website) in October, when they were only eight weeks old. The pet shop couldn't guarantee their gender at the time and as they have matured, we have tried to accurately identify whether we had boys or girls. Although, this isn't theoretically difficult to do, in practice, keeping the hamsters still long enough has made the job more complicated than we thought.

We had convinced ourselves that both hamsters were probably boys and, as they seemed to be getting on so well together, assumed that they were happy in each other's company. We didn't realise just how happy they were, until last night when Laura went in to see them. It was tempting to think that she was trying to wind us up when she shouted "the hamsters have had babies". In disbelief, the rest of the family rushed in to investigate and were shocked and suprised to find somewhere between 6-10 wriggling, scrawny, pink hamster babies inside the hamster's sleeping quarters!

Clearly our attempts to sex the hamsters were well off the mark and it took a while for this news to sink in. This was an area of animal care we knew very little about - breeding chickens really doesn't prepare you for caring for hamster babies! A collective rush for advice on the internet and from our hamster books ensued and reassured us that, in the short term, there was very little for us to do, other than leave the hamsters in peace for the night.

We awoke today to another shock, of a different kind. Apparently, no hamsters! On the spot where they all lay last night, there was nothing. We knew from everything that we had read on the subject of hamster babies, that there was a potential risk that the new babies could be eaten by the parents. When we went to check again, and again, on the new arrivals, they were no longer there and the sleeping area was devoid of any evidence that there had ever been any baby hamsters at all. It was a real heart sink.

It was difficult to believe that all the babies had been eaten, and without a trace! We were holding out that maybe the parents had moved them into another area of the cage. The only other place that we couldn't see into properly ourselves was a long cardboard box that the hamsters would often use as a sleeping area. It seemed a long shot that the parents had taken the babies into this area of the cage, as it would require carrying them, presumably by mouth, along quite a stretch of tubing to the other nesting box. Some of the literature that we had read did say that the parents may move the hamsters, so this hypothesis wasn't completely beyond the realms of possibility.

All day long we have waited to see if there were any signs of young hamster life, as both hamsters have been asleep inside the elusive box! Finally, this evening, they came out of their box and I managed to shine a torch in. You can imagine my relief and surprise to make out a little pink wriggle!

I'm not sure just how many "pups" are in there and obviously, their future is still quite precarious. Sunny and Unnamed are very young parents and, ideally, we wouldn't have bred from them at all and certainly not at such a young age. Our poor male hamster is going to have to be removed from the cage because he will mate again ASAP and we don't want another unplanned pregnancy. Our problem at the moment is identifying who is mum and who is dad!

We can't disturb their cage or handle them as this could definitely cause the parents to eat the pups. Both hamsters are doing such a lovely job of parenting at the moment it really is difficult to tell just who is the daddy! Hopefully, over the next few days, I'll be able to catch a glimpse of the pups feeding - problem solved - I hope!

Diane
www.AnimalLoversWeb.com