panda bear hampsters enlarged testicles

Question
Our Panda Bear hampster is acting really weird.  he's trashed his cage like pushing wheel over, moving beddingand upturning his house.  It has been really hot here and hasn't been below 95 degrees in 2 weeks.  To cool him down we are using cold water and ice in a ziplock container, which he seems to enjoy.  is this a good idea?
second question:  Budda's testicals are bright pink and seem to be even bigger than they were yesterday.  Has he reached maturity or is something really wrong with him?

Answer
Hi Amanda

I think the heat is definitely affecting Budda.  Hamsters have no way of cooling themselves down - they can't pant or sweat like dogs.  In the wild, they would burrow underground to keep cool hence the reason why they are nocturnal - their natural habitat is in the desert and they would only come out at night when it is cool.  Therefore in captivity it is possible for them to overheat.  I am assuming his cage is away from a window/glass.  If you can keep a fan blowing near his cage to circulate the air but not directly at it, keep curtains closed and do whatever you can to keep the room cool.  Even here in the UK we sometimes get heatwaves and having a room full of hamsters is always a worry for me - as I don't have air conditioning, I connect one or two fans in the room to timer switches so that they go on and off all day, in particular during the hottest part of the day while I'm at work.  The main thing to watch with him is that you don't cool him down too dramatically otherwise this can cause hypothermia.  If he actually collapses in the heat, you can wet his coat, then using an electric fan, dry him off - but do this gently so his body doesn't go into shock.  Is he drinking water OK?  They can dehydrate - so if you buy some human oral rehydration powders, then mix one of these up with water as per the instructions - you could give him small amounts of this to drink via a dropper - a few drops at a time, several times a day until the temperature comes down a bit.  If he wants to take a bit more, then that is fine.  This will replace any lost salts in the heat.  Make sure he has plenty of clean water as well.

With regard to his testicles - in some hamsters these are large and the warm weather makes them even more so.  This sounds perfectly normal as it is very rare that they get tumors in this region. I suspect that when the weather changes and cools down a  bit these will not be quite as noticeable.

Regarding his behaviour - sometimes hamsters just go through phases where they trash things.  I've had some where they won't give up until they've turned a house upside down!  It could be because he's hot, or it could just be normal for him.  I wouldn't worry about it.  If he has a plastic house inside his cage, you might want to move this out for now as it will get really hot in there for him.  

Good luck with this.  Hope this answers your questions.

Regards