Help! Hamster newbie with a narcoleptic hamster

[Lee Dowling]

Hiya,

I've just got a hamster after thoroughly researching the basics at least
and thought I knew most things about them. My girlfriend bought me a
Golden Syrian for Christmas and we have him in a cage.

For the first few days, he did nothing but run in his wheel (the cage was
all new to him, as were all the accessories) for most of the day and night
(kept the whole house awake for the first two nights). That was, I
assume, some sort of comfort mechanism to him and after a while he settled
into a pattern of sleeping during the day.

Now, however, he sleeps constantly. This has been going on for the past
few days. He sleeps day and night and I swear he's hardly touching
water/food if at all. He's not exercising. I assumed he was hibernating
but he doesn't seem to be; the cage/room temperature is a constant 24
degrees centigrade, slightly cooler at night but only by a degree or two,
he's still breathing normally and waking up to adjust his bedding
periodically. When we had a visitor yesterday he stood up and chirped at
her for about 15 minutes but otherwise he just sits in his little pile of
bedding all day and all night.

This started happening when we changed his bedding for the first time (we
put the cage in a massive cardboard box, encouraged him out, then removed
cage and cleaned it and put him back in there). If I move his bedding
about or tap the cage he *sort of* responds but not out of fear (more like
someone disturbing a teenager from their bed - rouses, sees what you are
doing, ruffles his "pillow" and goes back to sleep). He won't take any
sort of handling as we found out before we changed his bedding - an entire
hour of just trying to pick him up, get him to come to a hand, tending our
wounds, trying to capture him etc.

I understand that hamsters are nocturnal but what with New Year etc. we've
been going to bed about 5a.m. ourselves and sometimes up again at 6! He
just doesn't seem to do anything at all. He's in a quiet location,
covered from any direct lights (but even if the lights have been off all
night because we've been out he doesn't move, take water/food etc.).
We've tried encouraging him with different "treat" foods, including
cucumber which he loved the first time we gave him a bit but he just
constantly tries to go back to bed and leaves it to rot (beforehand he at
least used to store it).

We've been told that he's male, but we're not certain. I *can* wake him
up but it's very cruel, basically poking him or annoying him until he
moves, so I don't want to do it. About two-three minutes after he wakes,
he just goes back to bed and stays there, having done nothing but arrange
his bedding.

Is he hibernating? If so, why, and why does he come out for visitors he's
never seen before? If he isn't, why isn't he or drinking eating much (if
anything) and just leaving his favourite foods like cucumber (he sniffs
them at best but never nibbles)? Is he ill (he's clean and doesn't show
any other signs of abnormality)?

If he is any of the above, what can we do to make him a pet as opposed to
a interesting paperweight?

Lee Dowling

[zski]

He's not even had 2 weeks yet, and his whole world has changed around.
It really does take patience. What if you were suddenly picked up by a
giant and dropped in a plain room with a treadmill and some food &
water. Then the hand came down at random intervals and tried to grab
you - wouldn't you freak, or hide? Patience is the way to go - they're
not real smart.

If you spent "an hour" trying to pick him up, he's probably not
associating the visits from "Mr Hand" with anything positive, so he's
hiding. You really have to stick your hand in the cage when he's up and
about and just leave it there. Don't move, let him come over and sniff
you. (Wash your hands first, especially if you might smell like food)
You can try and hand-feed him a treat if he will take it. Once he does
this a time or so, then try moving your hand when he's near you. He
may climb onto your hand, he may not. If not, SLOWLY put your hand
above him till he sees it's not a threat. Next step after that would be
to gently close your hand around him, then later pick him up. I have
successfully hand-tamed a shelter ham that never had much socializing.
He's not a hand-climber, but he will hold still when I go to pick him up
- I just make sure that the hand approaches slowly and from the front,
so he sees it coming and knows what to expect.

Or, if you prefer, you can try a small container - the size of a can or
so but with no sharp edges. Hold it in the cage in front of him and put
a treat in it. When he goes in after the yummy, pick up the can,
angling it a bit so he doesn't jump out, and then let him come out and
onto your hand.

Also, see what he likes other than cucumber. Maybe it smelled better
than it tasted ;)

Other than the food and the wheel, does he have any other toys? Things
to climb or hide in? Cardboard tubes and small boxes make inetersting
and cheap playthings. Mine has a small wicker basket (well cleaned and
dried) that he likes to sit in for his daily bath, as well as two
box-things I made from plain corrugated cardboard and non-toxic hot
glue. They look kind of like when little kids make forts from big
boxes, only hamster-sized. I cut doors in them, and one of them is
secured to the side of the aquarium so that I can watch him in there.


------------------------------------------------------
Wendy Z Chicago, IL (Moo)
Wench Wear Costumes http://pages.ripco.net/~zski
Minstrosity www.minstrosity.com
Wench #525 AIM=wendylady525
http://www.livejournal.com/users/wendyzski/
"Though she be but little, she is fierce"
"It's the little ones you have to watch out for..."
"I'm not short - I'm concentrated"
--------------------------------------------------------

[Lee Dowling]

Hiya, thanks for the reply. I'm pretty sure I'm doing most of it
already! Don't take the following as criticism, I'm just filling you in
on what we've done in the hope you can suggest some more.

Post by zski
He's not even had 2 weeks yet, and his whole world has changed around.
It really does take patience. What if you were suddenly picked up by a
giant and dropped in a plain room with a treadmill and some food &
water. Then the hand came down at random intervals and tried to grab
you - wouldn't you freak, or hide? Patience is the way to go - they're
not real smart.

I do understand this but I've been incredibly gentle with him, not
approaching from above etc. and not handling him any more than necessary
(I haven't even managed to get within about 5cm of him yet, no matter how
slowly). At no point have I "scared" him by approaching too fast. I
creep the hand in and try to go under him. On one occassion (before he
took to just being asleep) he sniffed it and left it at that, all other
times he has just ran away or reared up away from it squeaking before I've
even got close. I've even tried doing it in a way that my body doesn't
approach the cage as I do it (crouched and hunched in front of the cage
like an idiot so that it's just the hand that he has to deal with). Lately
he's too fast asleep to even notice it's there and my hand goes dead
before he even spots it.

Post by zski
If you spent "an hour" trying to pick him up, he's probably not
associating the visits from "Mr Hand" with anything positive, so he's
hiding. You really have to stick your hand in the cage when he's up and
about and just leave it there. Don't move, let him come over and sniff
you. (Wash your hands first, especially if you might smell like food)

This hour was when we needed to change his bedding for the first time. It
mainly consisted of about 5 minutes of gently introducing a hand (he
freaked and ran around his cage even when the hand was still), then later
on, 55 minutes of just laying the hand on top of his bedding away from him
(he went to sleep on the other side of the cage, as far away as he could
get) and then five minutes (if that) of freak out where he ran around the
cage like a lunatic as I tried to gently pick him up so's we could change
him. In the end, I'd never even got close to him as I was moving so
gently he just ran whenever it came near, so we did the cardboard box
thing so he wouldn't panic. We left him another day before we did so,
though.

Post by zski
You can try and hand-feed him a treat if he will take it. Once he does
this a time or so, then try moving your hand when he's near you. He
may climb onto your hand, he may not.

He's asleep. If I try to hand feed him anything, he doesn't even open his
eyes to notice it's there. If he does open his eyes (if I make gentle
noises) he looks and goes back to sleep, not even moving his body. Before
this, he would nibble cucumber, carrot, hamster food, pear, all sorts if
it were offered between two fingers from outside the cage but has never
come close to approaching the hand itself.

Post by zski
If not, SLOWLY put your hand above him till he sees it's not a threat.
Next step after that would be to gently close your hand around him, then
later pick him up. I havesuccessfully hand-tamed a shelter ham that
never had much socializing. He's not a hand-climber, but he will hold
still when I go to pick him up - I just make sure that the hand
approaches slowly and from the front, so he sees it coming and knows
what to expect.

We did this before he took to sleeping - he runs. I can't even get close
enough to attempt to grab him (not that I'd want to forcefully grab him).
He treats the hand like a UFO and runs if it gets close, keeps one eye
open if he knows it's in the cage. Now, though, my hand goes to sleep
waiting for him to wake up (literally). Record so far is 45 minutes with
the hand in the cage, a gentle kissing noise to rouse him (he wakes up,
looks, go back to sleep). Since we've got him he's never come within 5cm
of any hand no matter how gently introduced. No-one has ever grabbed him,
poked him, touched him while he's asleep, approached him faster than a
snail's pace, approached him without letting him see their hand etc. (he's
been in a quiet spot all over christmas where nobody has approached him,
there are no kids about, the only other visitor didn't even need to go
near him to get him to come to the front of his cage and start "singing"
to her through the bars (she's never kept any other animal but rabbits)
when she clucked at him.

Post by zski
Or, if you prefer, you can try a small container - the size of a can or
so but with no sharp edges. Hold it in the cage in front of him and put
a treat in it. When he goes in after the yummy, pick up the can,
angling it a bit so he doesn't jump out, and then let him come out and
onto your hand.
Also, see what he likes other than cucumber. Maybe it smelled better
than it tasted ;)

Even before the sleeping, I could leave a cage door open, he won't even go
towards the hole. He did use to come for treats but only for the first
few days. He would wake up on smelling cucumber and come over to a
particular spot on the cage where I usually push treats through the bars
without any prompting at all.

When he stopped coming at the mere smell of the food, we tried several
other treats he had liked and some new ones. I tried leaving a piece of
material in the cage with a treat on it (several different ones), the idea
being he could get used to the material and I could make a sort of glove
out of it as he seems so scared of people's hands. It was still there the
next day and the day after, untouched. Now he's sleeping, the food just
rots.

Post by zski
Other than the food and the wheel, does he have any other toys? Things
to climb or hide in? Cardboard tubes and small boxes make inetersting
and cheap playthings.

It's a small wire cage (not tiny, about 2 cubic feet I'd guess) so there's
not room for much but he has got a set of stairs, a ramp thing (neither of
which he's ever sniffed/touched/stepped on despite the fact that a lot of
the time he could "escape" by running up the stairs and out the top door),
a wheel, a little house where he just sleeps in all the time (funny
because when he was active, he deliberately pulled all of the bedding out
of that house and made a nest elsewhere and never went in the house, even
to hide from us. Now he doesn't come out of the house at all and has
filled it so full of bedding to hide in that we're suprised he can move in
there at all) and we're getting him a little pot of sand. I also have
someone who is going to lend us several metres of plastic tubing to see if
that livens him up.

Post by zski
Mine has a small wicker basket (well cleaned and dried) that he likes to
sit in for his daily bath, as well as two box-things I made from plain
corrugated cardboard and non-toxic hot glue. They look kind of like
when little kids make forts from big boxes, only hamster-sized. I cut
doors in them, and one of them is secured to the side of the aquarium so
that I can watch him in there.

I'll have to try some more toys. Because he's asleep in his house 99% of
the time, I don't think I'll have too much trouble introducing them but I
doubt he'll even notice they're there or (if he does) that he'll go near
them. I have a house full of corrugated cardboard (from selling on eBay)
and odds of wood and plastic so I'll try to make the cage more interesting.

I'm also considering relocating the cage (because he's asleep it's
possible to pick up the little house, move him out and clean the cage,
then put the house back in. He doesn't shuffle, murmur or even open his
eyes) to somewhere he hasn't been (he came to the house into one room,
stayed there until just after Christmas and then went to the room he is in
currently).

Thanks a lot for the suggestions, I'll try them all again and I'm trying
to take my time as much as possible, it's just annoying that we made lots
of progress in the first few days (eating treats, teaching him a corner to
eat from, playing on "new" toys) but for the last few he just sleeps and
doesn't even try to do anything.

Lee Dowling

[zski]

Well, it certaily sounds like you're doing all the right stuff then.

I'm afraid that taps me out for suggestions. Anyone else have any ideas?
------------------------------------------------------
Wendy Z Chicago, IL (Moo)
Wench Wear Costumes http://pages.ripco.net/~zski
Minstrosity www.minstrosity.com
Wench #525 AIM=wendylady525
http://www.livejournal.com/users/wendyzski/
"Though she be but little, she is fierce"
"It's the little ones you have to watch out for..."
"I'm not short - I'm concentrated"
--------------------------------------------------------

[Lee Dowling]

Hi,

Just an update. The hamster is still sleeping most of the time. We've
tried new toys and new bedding - he just keeps curling up and going back
to sleep, showing no interest at all. The room is about 24 degree C all
the time so I don't think he'd be hibernating due to the temperature.
We've moved him into the spare room where he's completely alone all day
long and there is no noise at all. Still nothing but sleep.

Additionally, we've noticed that not only is he not eating/drinking
(though I managed to persuade him into a brief nibble of a cucumber) he is
also not leaving droppings any more. We're guessing he's probably ill
(he's still clean so that eliminates most of the nasties). We also
noticed a strong urine smell in his new bedding but I don't know if that's
good or not!

At this point, he's still alive and not showing distress, thinning or
other signs of illness or pain, so all we can do is leave him alone for a
few more days and see what happens. My bet is that he'll either die or
suddenly perk up and pretend nothing was wrong.

Lee Dowling

[EastneyEnder]

My bet is that he'll either die or suddenly perk up and pretend nothing was

wrong.

Are you really just going to wait to see if he dies... ???

If he is not eating and not pooping, and barely awake, you have a sick
hamster. Get him to a vet pronto.

After telling us the above symptoms you cannot just wait to see if he dies,
that's pure neglect.

He's a living creature, not a pot of growing herbs from Tesco's.

------
Sue
Pendragon Hams & Rats
Portsmouth, UK

[workmad3]

Hamsters were a wild animal, something that was eaten by just about
everything. They do not show when they are ill for just this reason.
They need to always look strong, a good hamster owner needs to leran to
pick up when things are not quite right. A hamster not eating, not
drinking and showing no signs of droppings is not a sign, its a great
big flashing neon sign that the hamster is not well. Keep trying him
with little bits of cucumber and babyfood without anyf onion or related
food in, and get to a vets as soon as you can. You can't just wait with
a hamster unless you really like burying them. Mosnt of the time if
they are ill, they just drop dead. You are lucky to have had any
warning, dons't just ignore it, please.

Nooboo (I'm using my fiances computer, hence the workmad3 :P)

[Spitbank Roast]

We're guessing he's probably ill ... --snip--
My bet is that he'll either die or suddenly perk up and pretend nothing was
wrong.

PLEASE! when he has gone to a better place, donate his cage, food bedding
and memory to hamster rescue and get a bloody paperweight, since you don't
seem cut out to be a pet owner.

Failing to seek veterinary treatment for a sick animal is grounds for
prosecution for neglect in UK, and you have just told everyone on this very
caring newsgroup that's what you intend to do... oh well it's only a hamster
isn't it.

You were advised days ago to see a vet, small animals have fast metabolisms.
Your car, wallet and conscience should be a lot faster to help a life that
depends on you.

SR

[Hilary]

"Lee Dowling" <***@ledow.org.uk> wrote in message news:***@p1000...

Lee

Please, please take this hamster to a vet as quickly as possible. They are
tiny but still deserve the same care as as any other pet.

[workmad3]

any chance of an update as to how the little one is?

did you see a vet? did it just recover? did it die? it would be good
to know what happened in the end.

[EastneyEnder]

Post by Lee Dowling
Hiya, thanks for the reply. I'm pretty sure I'm doing most of it
already! Don't take the following as criticism, I'm just filling you in
on what we've done in the hope you can suggest some more.

/snip/

Hi Lee,

I notice you're in the UK, so you might like to ask on some of the UK
hamster forums... There are breeders and experienced owners posting there,
who might shed some light on your hammie's behaviour and offer some tips.

Two good ones:
http://www.hamsterhouse.co.uk
http://www.hamsterforum.co.uk

One thing I don't think has been metnioned so far... how warm is the room he
is kept in? Some Syrian hamsters can go into hibernation, and in any case if
the room is chilly, they will sleep more and be far less active. My central
heating's been on the blink lately and I have noticed mine are well tucked
up in bed, even at night, when it's cold.

------
Sue
Pendragon Hams & Rats
Portsmouth, UK

[Hilary]

they're not real smart.

Eeeek!! I'll have to delete this before the girls read their posts. lol.

[Hilary]

Hiya,

Hi Lee,

You might try moving him somewhere a little warmer. Even my 2 sleep for
longer in the winter. I keep the front room at a constant 68 for them but I
think the shorter hours of daylight must have its effect.

I'm a little worried about the lack of eating his treats. Even the most
timid of hamsters will usually sneak out to get them when nobody's about. Of
course he may have stuffed himself silly and be sleeping it off.

I think a quick check at the vet may be in order. Unfortunately theres no
hamster vaccines (yet) so if he's come into contact with non family hamsters
at the pet shop he could be incubating something. If its wet tail they go
down hill very fast so its best to be ahead of the situation.

Do his poops look normal - sort of black long grain rice - shouldnt be soft,
and there should be some scattered across the flooring. If there are no
poops he may have a blockage, some hamsters eat their bedding and some types
dont digest so its an emergeny situation. A vet will be able to tell. Torn
up white toilet paper is considered to be the safest ( and cheapest - well
unless they demand Charmin like mine!). The fluffy type bedding is
considered by some to be lethal.

Does his urine smell very strong? They can get bladder infections as well.