Hamster behavior- excessive gnawing??

Question
We have 4 month old female Teddy Bear hamster. In the last two weeks she seems to have lost all interest in running on her exercise wheel and instead seems to spend much of her time furiously gnawing on the cage bars. We've put chew blocks and sticks in the cage, but she mostly ignores these. The behavior seems to get worse after we take her out of the cage to explore for a while and then put her back in. Any ideas what's going on? Is she bored or getting too big for her cage? Thanks for anwering!  

Answer
Hi,

You're not alone with this problem, it seems to happen to most people who have syrian hamsters. I've also got 3 syrians that also do the same. Sometimes more toys and giving them hard dog biscuits with no garlic helps. But I've tried all these and it doesn't seem to help, it wouldn't do her any harm anyway. It will help keep for teeth trim. I have noticed one thing though, they only tend to do it when you're in the same room and can see you. They're possibly doing it as a way of telling you that they want out of the cage.

Deborah