Our elusive baby hamsters

Our hamster babies are now almost one week old. Since the night that we first found the little heap of pink bodies quite visibly on display, you would hardly know that we still had them. We have only been lucky enough to catch an occasional glimpse, as captured on the video, and if it wasn't for the barely audible sqeaking sounds that we hear from time to time, we would not be certain that they are still there at all. The other clue is that we are seeing much less of the parents than before. They seem to want to bury the baby hamsters in the nesting box and guard them all day (and even night!) long, and who can blame them? I must say I am very impressed with such dedicated hamster parenting in these very young animals, who themselves are only about 11 weeks old.

The parents are also, as expected, displaying some uncharacteristic signs of aggression, which they have never done previously. When Diane was changing the water today, one of them (still unnamed, awaiting a vote result due in about a week) sunk their teeth into her finger, which luckily was gloved and hung on for a good few seconds before letting go.

Well, it is only about a week now until we can hopefully have a proper look and its hard to believe that by this time the little pink creatures should have a coat of hair and eyes wide open. They do seem very vulnerable and defenceless compared with many other animals young. We are still not sure how many baby hamsters we have but think it should be about 6 to 8 from what we saw the first night that they were born. This is about the average for a hamster litter and we hope that deep in the nest they have all survived.

John
www.animalloversweb.com

Two cockerels on the farm spells trouble

Our chicks are now 9 weeks old today and starting to look more like adults both in appearance and size. Their behaviour is also showing much more similarities to the adult chickens. They have been sleeping separately from the adult chickens since we moved them outside about 2 weeks ago but freely move around with them in the day.

We were hoping to integrate them soon into the main chicken house, but it is becoming increasingly obvious that Primrose, our beautiful chick, is not a Primrose at all. With a much larger comb and wattle and a very different posture in comparison the Amber and Velvet, Primrose is almost certainly a cockerel. The markings are almost identical to Tiger at the same age.

This poses a real problem for us because of our exisiting lovely resident cockerel, Tiger, who we hatched at Easter time last year. As a general rule, more than one cockerel is not a good idea, as they will usually fight, even to the death. I know that in larger groups, where there are more hens, having two cockerels may be OK.

We can't be sure how it's going to work out here on the farm and will have to keep a close eye on our two boys, particularly as "Primrose" reaches sexual maturity. It would be a real shame to have to keep the new chicks apart all the time and we may need to think about re-homing Primrose. It's not easy finding homes for cockerels, especially as there is no way that we would let him be used for the table.

Let's hope that these two can sort out their differences and learn to share!

Diane
www.AnimalLoversWeb.com

First look at our hamster babies

On the third day now after realising that our hamsters had babies, and having a scare thinking that the parent hamsters had eaten them, we now have concrete proof that they are still alive! Just have a look at the video, as mum or dad hamster demonstrates a little hamster baby manoeuvering skills for camera. The video is a bit blurred, as we can’t get too close at the moment and they like the room quite dark, but it is better than nothing, I’m sure you’ll agree. Aren’t they cute? Not the prettiest things in the world, they look a little like an alien or an unborn embryo still, but I’m sure they’ll improve with age ;-)

We just need now to contain our excitement to get a better look at, and play with, the hamster babies and try to restrain ourselves from interfering with them for about two week. Then we should have between six to eight cute new baby hamsters to show you in pictures and video on the web site and blog. So we may be having a few more hamster naming votes! It can seem a rather daunting prospect at first about what to do if your hamsters have babies? But we can't wait until they open their eyes and we can gently start to handle them.

We do realise that we will have to do a bit of sorting out, separating and finding new homes for most of the hamsters , if we don’t want to be overrun by hamsters by the new year. Much as we like Russian dwarf hamsters we can only handle so many!

John
www.AnimalLoversWeb.com

The hamster pups are alive!

We are very pleased to report that on checking the hamsters this morning, we could definately see a few pink little bodies wriggling around, deep in one of the hamsters bedding boxes. So our little hamster pups have not been eaten after all, what a relief!

Amazingly, what this means is that our two Russian Dwarf hamsters must have carried all of them from the box they were born in to the box they are in now, which is quite an obstacle course of a journey. I would love to have captured that on film. Unfortunately, we have not been able to get any pics yet, as we are very apprehensive about approaching the cage at the moment. We are very excited about this hamster litter and we don't want to do anything to compromise their safety. The babies have also been buried quite deeply under the bedding materials, so are very hard to get a view of at the moment.

Like rabbits, if a human scent is detected near the babies, the hamsters will kill them. So we are observing from a distance for now and will get some pics as soon as we can and upload them to our animal website.

John
www.AnimalLoversWeb.com

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

Hamster Ailments - Swollen Testicles

Our Syrian Hamster, Trouble, is over 2 years old now and entering the twilight stages of his life. Over the past month, we have become increasingly concerned about his health after he developed swollen testicles.

As any owner of a male hamster will probably concur, hamster testicles are rather
large in comparison to the size of a hamster generally. However, problems with testicular cancer and infections are also well recognised in the older hamster. Trouble was also exhibiting signs of being generally unwell. He seemed more lethargic, was spending less time awake and appeared quite disorientated at times. His testicles also felt very warm to touch.

A trip to the vets reassured us that a diagnosos of testicular cancer was unlikely. There were no hard lumps (which the vet found out to her cost as Trouble - our very placid and tame hamster - sunk his teeth into the vets finger!) and the fact that both testicles were equally swollen, suggested that an infection was the most likely cause. The poor mite had to have an antibiotic and anti-inflammatory injection and we were given 5 days worth of oral medication to put in his water.


In my ensuing discussions with the vet, it was difficult to be completely reassured that this was an easily solved medical problem. Although Trouble's medication had helped to reduce the severity of his infection, he continues to have quite swollen testicles which do affect his movement. Castration is an option but for a hamster of advancing age, any operation poses serious concerns - the vet was not keen to go down this route.

The problem for us now is whether we wait until Trouble becomes so uncomfortable that euthanasia is the best option, or do we risk putting him through an operation that he may not survive anyway?

As any pet owner will appreciate, these decisions are difficult but come as part of the responsibility of pet ownership. If only animals could talk! It is difficult not knowing how uncomfortable Trouble is but we can only keep an eye on him day to day and try to make rational judgements about his quality of life. If only keeping a pet were that easy!

Diane
www.AnimalLoversWeb.com

Are you thinking of keeping pigs?

So are we, which is why we spent today on a pig husbandry course in Northumberland. It is a fairly new course ran by a pig farmer and breeder Sarah Dodds, who specialises in Tamworth pigs. These are a gingery/golden red colour pig with a lively character and are thought to be the oldest pure English breed of pig. There are said to be only around 200 in existence in the whole of the UK.

I went on the course together with Diane and Laura, my 10 year old daughter, as we wanted to learn more about pig keeping to see if it might be for us and also to have some fun. The course kicked off with some of the rule and regulations about keeping pigs required by DEFRA and Trading Standards here in the UK, before a look at some of the equipment required in keeping pigs.

It wasn’t long though, before we got to the really interesting part – off to meet the pigs. The pigs were fantastic. They were much larger than I had imagined, although, I have been up close with pigs before I had forgotten just how large they really are. One of the many interesting facts we learned to day was that a fully grown pig will weigh up to about 25 stones! They were indeed very lively and noisy, making incredible squealing noises and they were intriguing to watch (see an example in the video below). We were then told all about the fencing, housing and feeding requirements of the pigs.

Then it was off to see the piglets and weaners and to learn about the farrowing (delivery of the pig by the pregnant mother) and to view the facilities required for the process. The young piglets were wonderful, lively and cute and must rival lambs as one of the loveliest young animal. We also had a demonstration of tattooing the weaners (marking their ears for pedigree purposes) and an offer to have a go, which we all declined, we were happy to watch the experts. Following this we fed the pigs and learned about the feed requirements at various ages.

Finally we had a demonstration of the products of a butchered pig, together with some interesting revelations about the financial difficulties in commercial pig production and why it can be fairly difficult to make an adequate living from it.

In addition to all of the interesting information and advice that we obtained on this course we were well catered for from a culinary perspective too, with a lovely lunch and afternoon tea and cakes included.

We certainly learned a lot about pig keeping and are going to go off now and do some further research before probably getting a couple of pigs of our own, possibly in the spring time. We will keep you posted on any developments, both here and on our animal website.

John
www.AnimalLoversWeb.com