SYRIAN HAMSTER EXTREME LARGE LITTER

Question
um background: i bought a female syrian approx 6 months old, to mate with my 5 month old male, um panda hams, my female was at the time of purchase, already just finished nursing an 8-pup-litter at the pet shop, knowing no one prob wanted an older hamster, vs her babies, i bought her, and anyways i wanted to breed a litter of syrians, and it being my first time breeding i thought having a mum that had already raised a litter, would be a great asset, so yeah they mated starting in early june, but i didnt get any results 3 weeks later i attempted again, and 3rd mating, was successful, and they mated friday 13? of july? and she just delivered SAT/07/28/12 and she went from thursday the size of a oversized PEAR, to friday a very very oversized grapefruit, she was massive, and originally i thought she may have delivered 9-11 pups, but today, due to her easy going temperament, i was even able to swap out the entire nest material for fresh bedding, and in the process, i saw her BABIES, and visually i am now estimating shes got at least 20-28 babies cuz the pile is huge and its 2 layers deep, baby on top of baby and the pool of babies is about 5 inches rounded, its large litter, ive been since delivery feeding her every 5 hours IAMS CHICKEN AND RICE CANNED dog food, and shredded cheese, cuz i noticed she rarely ate, i have 11 hamsters, and none of them hoard at all, so knowing what i gave her in the food dish, i noticed she wasnt eating very much, so i started delivering food to where she laid, and she ate very hungrily, um now i know why, cuz her litter is massive,


can u tell me: i am hoping to assist her any way i can, to ensure her whole litter survives, so far ive had no deaths, is there anything i can feed her? aside from can dog food and cheese? that can help give her the nutrition that she needs to nurse this many babies? she looks tired, active but still she finally got a chance to groom herslef in an igloo today, she looked happy, i want to keep her comfortable, and well fed, do u know any foods i should give her to help her nurse over 20 pups? shes nursing 24/7 cuz i think she has only 8 nipples, so its a full time job

can u tell me? anything? theres nothing online sites that tell u how to deal with possible 20-28 pups, most say she has 8-14...... im absolutely positive shes got more than 18!

Answer
Hi Yan Yan

thanks for your question.

I've never had a hamster with this size litter, although i have heard of someone who had over 20 - although sadly not many survived.

Realistically I think if the litter is this large you will lose some as nature will takes its natural course. However, you can help by feeding her baby food.  I usually give the powdered type that I mix with water - creamy porridge oats variety is a favourite with hamsters.  This is easy to eat and nutritious.  Also, make sure she has plenty of other food such as: dry hamster mix, seeds (sunflower, sesame, pumpkin etc.#, nuts #raw peanuts, walnuts, brazil nuts#, raw porridge oats, small pieces of bread, cheese, scrambled egg, vegetables #not lettuce as this causes diarrhoea#.  if you drop this close to the nest and make sure her water bottle is closeby as she will need to drink in order to help produce milk for her babies.

When the babies are leaving the nest, around 2 weeks, they can eat the baby food too if you put it in a low enough dish or jam jar lid.  This will help fatten them.

Depending on how big the litter is and how many survive, at 4 weeks you need to sex them and in theory separate out the boys.  The boys can live together until they are about 6 weeks old at which time they will need a cage of their own otherwise they will fight.  However, I have found that when babies are tiny sometimes you can keep them in groups or pairs until they are little older than this.All the babies will need a cage of their own around 6 weeks of age so you will have your work cut out for you trying to find homes for this many hamsters!  At the time of sexing and separating out the boys you might want to split mum off at that stage - usually I keep her with the girls for 2 more weeks, or if there are any tiny babies, I leave her with those to help fatten them up.  However, if the litter is large - i.e. more than 12 I often split her off as soon as the babies reach 4 weeks as she is usually exhausted at that time.  With your litter, if the full litter survives she will definitely need to be separated then.  Hopefully she will be able to continue feeding the whole litter up until then as the longer they are with her the better #in the early days they rely totally on her for food and warmth but as the litter gets older - around 3 weeks- they have a much greater chance of surviving if she can't feed them as by  the age of 2 weeks they will be eating solid foods and you can supplement their food.  There is a chance she will not be able to feed them for this amount of time either through lack of milk or exhaustion, and you may well find some of the litter don't make it.

Nearer the time please get in touch with me and let me know how you are getting on and I can advise you on this.

In any event I strongly advise that you do not look to mate her ever again as pregnancy weakens the female and after producing a litter of this size her body probably will not cope with another litter.

I hope you get on Ok and the litter does well - please keep in touch.

Regards

Sheila