Have you ever found yourself wondering how to find a lost hamster? Hamsters will seize any opportunity to go on a house-wide adventure. Thankfully, there are a few things you can do to make your quest for your missing hamster easier. Stay calm – they may be tiny, but hamsters aren’t as hard to find as you might think. By following our tips, you’ll be reunited with your furry friend in no time.
Why did my hamster escape?
It’s helpful to understand why a hamster would want to leave their cage in order to make a plan to find them and to prevent future escape attempts. Hamsters will usually try to escape from their cage for the following reasons:
- They aren’t comfortable in their home
- Their cage is in a noisy or stressful environment
- If they feel they don’t have enough space
If you think one of the above reasons may have contributed to your hamster wanting to seek shelter elsewhere, it may be time to upgrade your hamster’s cage. A cage with more room will make your hamster more comfortable. Choose a cage with wheels to easily relocate your hamster to a more quiet spot in the house without jostling them.
Hamsters may also take advantage of an unsecured or loose cage door, so reinforcing it with clips or other safety features may be helpful to prevent future breakouts.
6 Tips to find a lost hamster
Many hamsters can be found once they’ve left their cages. The most important things to remember are to be patient and calm – your hamster likely hasn’t gone far.
1. Don’t look during the day
Hamsters are nocturnal by nature (meaning they sleep during the day and are most active at night). During daylight hours, your hamster will be curled up in a cozy sleeping spot and will want to remain there all day. Unless you stumble across them while cleaning under furniture, you’re not likely to find your hamster during daytime hours.
2. Bring out the treats
Leave your hamster’s favorite treats in corners of the room (or rooms) where you think they may be and check to see if any get eaten. Bananas are a great treat to try and tempt them with. You can also place treats inside of a small shoebox or other cozy quarters with some snooze-worthy bedding during the day. This will help encourage your hamster to venture into your makeshift home to take a nap. Check your treats periodically throughout the day for nibbles or maybe even catch a glimpse of your elusive pet.
3. Turn the lights off
You may be able to encourage your hamster to move around if the room is dark. At nightfall, turn out the lights and sit quietly with a flashlight ready to turn on if you hear your hamster in the room.
4. Become a secret agent and look for paw prints
Sprinkle flour or cornstarch across doorways or in front of any assumed hamster hiding spots. Your little friend will pass through the powder and leave footprints on the other side – giving you a clue as to which direction they went.
5. Stop and listen
Hamsters make some tell-tale sounds like squeaking or snuffling. Listen carefully in a quiet room to see if you hear any of your pet’s sounds. If you left crunchy treats out as bait, listen for the little grinding of teeth or food pieces dropping and hitting the floor.
6. Get high-tech
If you have security cameras or baby monitors, set them at floor level to see if you can catch your escapee on film. If you’re able to narrow down your hamster’s location to one or two rooms, set up multiple cameras to catch different angles.
Finding their own way home
Sometimes hamsters will come back to their cage on their own, so try leaving their cage on the floor with the door open, with a fresh supply of food, and your wanderer may return. Eventually, they’ll get hungry and appear when you least expect it – so it helps to be prepared.
Escape-proof your cage
The best way to avoid having to track down a lost hamster is to prevent escapes from happening in the first place. But there’s more to escape-proofing your hamster’s cage than just reinforcing the doors. Hamsters need to feel safe and secure in their home, with plenty of room to burrow and explore. The Qute Hamster Cage by Omlet offers lots of space both for sleep and play, and has owner-friendly features that make taking care of your hamster fun and easy.
Placement of your hamster’s home is important. Set up their cage in a location that’s free from drafts and noisy daytime activity, but that’s also in a common area so that they feel like part of the family. The Qute hamster cage is designed to look like a modern piece of furniture that blends in with virtually any home decor style.
Bring them out for supervised play
Let your hamster enjoy time out of their cage by providing them with a playpen full of hamster toys. Make sure the playpen you construct or purchase is suitable for the size hamster you have. Smaller breeds of hamsters require smaller bar spacing than larger breeds. Get creative and make a maze for your hamster from cardboard boxes or paper tubes, or construct an obstacle course from wooden blocks or other hamster-appropriate household scraps.
Omlet and your hamster
Like all of our pet products, Omlet designed the Qute Hamster Cage to bring you closer to your pet. The Qute cage is easy to clean, goes with any home’s aesthetic, and will make your hamster feel safe and secure – never needing to feel the need to seek out other housing arrangements. It’s easy to avoid hamster escapes and enjoy interacting with your furry friend when you have a Qute cage.
This entry was posted in Hamsters
Hamsters make excellent pets – they’re fun, cute, and relatively easy to care for. Their cuddly credentials have made them popular pets all over the world. Hamsters bring a lot of joy to a lot of people, but how can we tell our hamster is happy too, or not? Like all animals, hamsters have the ability to communicate with one another and with their owners. They use body language much like we do and can display a range of emotions that include being happy, afraid, threatened, curious, startled, angry and many other emotions.
Stretching and yawning
Yawning is often a sign your hamster is feeling comfortable and relaxed, rather than being very sleepy. If your hamster stretches as he yawns, this is even more proof that he is a very relaxed hamster.
Freezing
This involves your hamster staying in one position, sometimes for a few minutes. Its ears are straight up and he is completely stiff to the touch. There are lots of potential reasons for hamsters to stop moving temporarily: they can freeze both out of fear and surprise, or they can pause their movement so that they can listen more carefully to something that they’re unsure about.
Sitting up on back legs, ears forward
Something has captured his attention. Your hamster is standing on its hind legs to see and hear better.
Grooming
Hamsters spend a large amount of their time grooming themselves. When a hamster grooms itself, washing its feet, hands and fur, it means that he is feeling secure and happy.
Chewing
If your hamster keeps biting the bars of its cage, then there may be some things that you need to do to improve your pet’s life. Gnawing on the bars of the cage can indicate one of a number of things, including boredom, a lack of space, or overgrown teeth.
Biting
Hamsters can bite when they’re scared, when they’re stressed, or when they’re confused. if your hamster bites you, then there’s almost certainly a reason for it. Maybe your hamster is in pain, or simply uncertain how to react to you. Never get angry at your hamster but try to understand the reason behind his behavior.
Ears folded back, eyes half closed
Your hamster has just woken up and is still sleepy. It is best not to take out your hamster out of its cage until it has woken up fully.
Running
Hamsters are born to run. In their natural habitat they can run up to 5 miles per night! It’s therefore important that hamsters kept as pets have the opportunity to run, usually provided by a wheel. Hyperactivity and repetitive behavior, on the other hand, can also be a sign of stress. A stressed hamster will move constantly, run on his wheels quickly, try and climb his cage and appears more nervous and alert than usual.
All hamsters will have their own personalities. Spend time watching your hamster and get to know his personality and mannerisms. As you get to know your pet, you’ll be able to recognize when they are their usual selves, and when they are not. Observing your hamster’s body language is a great way to be more “in tune” with the needs of your pet, which can be crucial to their health and well being. Visit our extensive hamster guide for more information about hamster and tips on how to keep them healthy and happy.
This entry was posted in Hamsters
Someone once said that you can train anything that has a brain that connects to a stomach, and that goes for hamsters as well. They are actually very clever little creatures and probably capable of more than you think – like learning tricks for example!
Why Should I Train My Hamster?
Training your hamster is a wonderful way to vary your daily playtime and spend time together, and it’s something that both stimulates your pet mentally and creates a strong bond between the two of you. It should be said though that this training takes a lot of time and patience, and every hamster is different, so there’s never a guarantee that your hamster will learn these specific tricks, or any tricks at all.
Can I Train a Hamster of Any Age?
As with most pets there are advantages of getting a young hamster when it comes to training and getting the hamster used to you and your family, as they have not yet developed habits and routines that can be difficult to break. This is not to say you can’t teach an old hamster new tricks, but it will take much longer to train him or her.
Where to Begin
The most important thing is that your hamster feels comfortable around you, and that your smell and your voice has a positive association. Try to always stay calm around your hamster, and avoid raising your voice, as that can cause unnecessary stress. Spend a good few weeks together with your hamster before you move on to tricks, so you know that you can trust each other!
Now you need treats. Maybe you already know what your hamster’s favorite is, but if you don’t, we recommend sunflower seeds. They are however very fatty, so make sure that you limit the intake to training sessions or special occasions. You can also try with small pieces of chopped vegetables like carrots or broccoli.
What Tricks Can I Teach My Hamster?
- STAND
Start with an easy trick, a good first one is ”stand”. Hold the treat in front of the hamster just over its head so that the hamster can see it but not reach it. As you do this, use your command ”stand”. Your hamster will instinctively stand up to get closer to the treat. When the hamster stands, give the treat and verbal praise. Only give the treat if the hamster stands, as they otherwise won’t understand why they are being rewarded. If your hamster doesn’t stand it might be because he or she is not hungry at that moment, or distracted by something else going on in the room. Try again a bit later. Repeat this a few times a day for a week or two, until your hamster stands even when you don’t have a treat in your hand. Stick to one command at the time, and still always reward the hamster for standing. - JUMP
Now you can move on to another trick. Use the ”stand” command, and then move the treat up and forward and say ”jump”. If the hamster tries to jump, praise him or her and give the treat. If your hamster is happy to jump you can add a hoop into the mix. Hold some sort of hoop between the hamster and a treat, so that they have to move through the hoop to get to it. As they go though, say ”hoop” or ”jump through the hoop”. Start with the hoop touching the ground, and then gradually lift it if your hamster seems to enjoy the game. - ROLL OVER
Another fun and easy trick is ”roll over”. All you need to do is to carefully place the seed on your hamster’s back and ask him or her to roll over. If they do it, reward them with the seed. After a while the hamster will roll over even without you putting the seed on their back.
Be consistent with the training, and let it take time, but it doesn’t hurt to shake up the routine every now and then to keep things interesting. Some tricks are easier than others, and all hamsters are different, so be patient and do not push your pet or get frustrated if it’s taking longer than you expected.
If both you and your hamster enjoy the training, there is really no limit as to how much you can teach your pet. You can use toys or build obstacle courses; make up the tricks as you go along and show off to friends and family!
This entry was posted in Hamsters
The school summer holidays are in full swing and there’s no better time to do some baking with the kids! Ruby and Harry decided they would like to make some treats for their Syrian Hamster called Ginny!!
So here’s a simple recipe to make some yummy Crunchy Honey Delights!
Ingredients:
Cheerios (sugar-free kind)
Sesame Seeds
Honey
Oats
1. Add sesame seeds and oats into a bowl
2. Crush the Cheerios in a small bag, don’t crush them into dust, just small pieces
3. Add the Cheerios to the sesame seeds and oats and mix together
4. Drizzle honey over the mixture and coat well
5. Use your fingers to mold the mixture into small balls that your hamster can hold,
then put them on a baking tray and into the fridge for 15 minutes
6. Heat your oven to 370 degrees farenheit and bake treats for 8-10 minutes and then let them cool completely
7. It’s time for the taste test….. does Ginny like the new treats….?
8. Ginny loved the Crunchy Honey Delights!
Happy Baking and remember to only give your Hamster little treats once or twice a week!
Check out the Qute Hamster House from $99.00.
This entry was posted in Hamsters
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