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Question
I have a teddy bear hamster.her name is Rain-Bow i got her a couple weeks ago but i was wondering how old should she be to breed and if i should bring her to the pet store to get the male.she is about 2 and a half months old

Thanks

Answer
Hi Cori,

i really do not think you should be breeding hamsters or even thinking about breeding them unless you have researched them thoroughly and know lots about them!

Breeding should be about improving the breed so please do not breed from pet shop hamsters - you should only breed from hamsters which have come from responsible breeders, who know the backgrounds on all of their hamsters.

Also you should never breed from a brother and sister - hamsters from the same litter, or from hamsters which are closely related.

Teddy Bear Hamsters are actually Long Haired Syrian Hamsters - Syrian Hamsters can not be kept together - only one can be kept in one cage so if you did get another hamster then you would need two completely separate cages.

If you did want to mate them you would have to put them together every night for a few minutes to see if the female is receptive to the male - if not then they will fight!

It can be very difficult ot even get them to mate, but if they do, if anything goes wrong with the birth then you could loose the mother and all of the babies - you need to have a reliable vet ready to come to you at the slightest problem.

Even if the birth goes smoothly, there are still many things which can go wrong.  If this is the females first litter she could abandon them or even eat them - not nice to see.  If she is too young then she may be too imature to cope with the responsibility of babies and may destroy or abandon them.  If she is disturbed or feels threatened by a strange smell or sound - she will destroy them or abondon them.

These are just a few things which could happen.

Please do not breed until you are ready for the reponsibility yourself and know enough about them to be able to cope with any problems which might occur.

Please do not breed without knowing what you are doing.

Please let me know if you need any further info.

Kind Regards,

Tammy