November 22, 2007
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.
Catherine said,
November 24, 2007 @ 3:46 pm
Aren’t they the greatest parents on the planet, after 7 years of studying them I am still impressed.Un-named is definitly the mother. She is establishing who is boss. They are matriarchal and territorial.My (80+)Dwarfies here in Canada do a full hibernation when serious cold weather hits. What do English Dwarfies do? Catherine in Toronto
John said,
November 24, 2007 @ 5:17 pm
Ours are kept in our house and we have not had any hibernating hamsters, so far. We are new to Russian Dwarfs though, so you never know we may get a surprise this year.
Although, contrary to Diane’s (my wife’s) opinion the house is usually pretty warm and rarely drops below 20oC. So I don’t think we should get hibernations, should we?
John said,
November 24, 2007 @ 5:29 pm
Ours are kept in our house and we have not had any hibernating hamsters, so far. We are new to Russian Dwarfs though, so you never know we may get a surprise this year.
Although, contrary to Diane’s (my wife’s) opinion the house is usually pretty warm and rarely drops below 20oC. So I don’t think we should get hibernations, should we?
We have got the discussion forums going now on our website at:
http://www.animalloversweb.com/cgi-bin/forum/Blah.pl?
I will be posting more about the baby hamsters there and would be very pleased if you wouldn’t mind contributing more of your expertise there.
I’m also having to move the blog to a new address, but have managed to import our old posts and comments. The new address is:
http://www.animalloversweb.com/blog
John said,
November 24, 2007 @ 5:40 pm
I don’t think the links worked properly in my last comments so just in case:
discussion fourm is:
Discussion Forum
and the new blog address is:
Blog
Catherine said,
November 25, 2007 @ 4:22 pm
My Dwarfies have never been outside and my place is warm, but they still hibernate when it gets cold outside here. I have used grow lights, heat lights and lights on timers to change day length, but when it becomes bitter cold outside they sleep. I am guessing that yours will get sleepy,but not do a full hibernation. Catherine