hamster babies cage

Question
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Followup To
Question -
Hello Katie!
I have a syrian hamster (mother) and she has 11-12 pups, I bought a small cage for her so she could have the babies there but I didn't think that she will have so many...The pups are 11 days old, they have some fur but they don't have eyes yet. Since 5 days ago she became very active and she is chewing her cage which is made from plastic, she already made some holes but I managed to coverd them up (I live in Romania and here we don't have so many accesories for hamsters but a week ago I ordered a very big cage)I am realy worried because she will escape from the cage soon if I don't do something. She has wooden toys in the cage but she is just interested in escaping. I realise that the cage is very small (27x17 cm) for the pups and her, mainly when they will start to wonder around the cage. Since I have a bigger cage now, my question is: Should I put the small cage opened, inside the big one and let her wonder in the big cage as well? ( as it is not good for me to touch the babies yet and move them) Or I should wait until they are older and move them by hand when I can clean the cage?(and in this case I must put them in the same cage or I can put them direcly in the big one?).
Thanks for your time, your answers realy helped me a lot. Have a good day! kisses and hugs!
Answer -

  Well your mother hampster is very eager to get out of her cage. After being cooped up for so long with all those babies she gets a little restless. You can remove her from the cage for short amounts of time, this will help calm her. I wouldn't put the littler cage in the big one that will take up space and they all need their space to run. At three weeks the babies should be seperated males from females, and they should be put in seperate cages. I would use the little cage for the gender that has the smallest amount. Do not put the girls in with their mother after awhile the mother gets territorial and will start fights with the younger. A suggestion for toys for your hampsters. Try using the cardboard center of a paper towl or toilet paper roll. These make great toys for hampsters.

Hope this helps good luck with the little ones


Thanks! I realy didn't know that I'm allowed to touch her. One more question please : I read on the internet that when the babies are 14-16 days old I can clean the cage, can I then move them in the bigger one then? Or I should wait till they are 3 weeks old and I separate them?

Answer

  I would wait, this way they are ready to be away from their mother. Another reason not to move them into a bigger cage yet would be the mother hampster might get mad because she would have to make a new nest for her and the little ones, which is hard work for such a little thing.

Thanks for writing hope this helps