Helloooo. I was encouraged by @Unicornblast5000 to share pictures of my hamster. He doesn’t exactly have a name yet, but I thought I would share his story and some awful photos!
My brother was spending the night at a friends house, and they decided to run to the gas station down the road to get some snacks and drinks. They’re walking back out to the car, and a college age girl sticks her head out the window of her car and goes “Hey, you guys want a hamster?” And allll my brothers friends were like “nah man don’t take it. You don’t want a hamster!” But my brother decided to take it, and the girl hands him a small green hamster ball with this fluffy Syrian hamster in it. The ball was half full of bedding, he had clearly been living in it a long time because there was SO much poop, and he had been being fed cheese crackers! So he texts my mom and goes “hey mom, look what I got the girls“ (“girls” referring to my sisters and i) so my mom drove us to our LPS and we bought the only cage they sold, which was an itty bitty critter trail one, but we figured it coukd work temporarily. Then we drove out to my brother’s friend’s house and picked up the hamster. We get him home and are actually looking at him for the first time, and he’s half bald, has a slightly bent spine (from running in such a small ball) is basically skin and bones, and has these nasty scabs.
He is now completely bald basically (we put him in pine shavings, we didn’t know how bad they were for small animals, but he’s in paper bedding now) but now he is in clean, soft paper bedding, he is free fed a hamster food pellet and seed mix with occasional fruits and veggies, and he gets play time to run around the floor under supervision. He’s gained weight and has a new cage being planned. One of the scabs got really big and nasty, but we are treating it with an ointment to help it heal. I am not experienced with hamsters, but I am learning all about their care as I try to give him a good, happy life!
My brother was spending the night at a friends house, and they decided to run to the gas station down the road to get some snacks and drinks. They’re walking back out to the car, and a college age girl sticks her head out the window of her car and goes “Hey, you guys want a hamster?” And allll my brothers friends were like “nah man don’t take it. You don’t want a hamster!” But my brother decided to take it, and the girl hands him a small green hamster ball with this fluffy Syrian hamster in it. The ball was half full of bedding, he had clearly been living in it a long time because there was SO much poop, and he had been being fed cheese crackers! So he texts my mom and goes “hey mom, look what I got the girls“ (“girls” referring to my sisters and i) so my mom drove us to our LPS and we bought the only cage they sold, which was an itty bitty critter trail one, but we figured it coukd work temporarily. Then we drove out to my brother’s friend’s house and picked up the hamster. We get him home and are actually looking at him for the first time, and he’s half bald, has a slightly bent spine (from running in such a small ball) is basically skin and bones, and has these nasty scabs.
He is now completely bald basically (we put him in pine shavings, we didn’t know how bad they were for small animals, but he’s in paper bedding now) but now he is in clean, soft paper bedding, he is free fed a hamster food pellet and seed mix with occasional fruits and veggies, and he gets play time to run around the floor under supervision. He’s gained weight and has a new cage being planned. One of the scabs got really big and nasty, but we are treating it with an ointment to help it heal. I am not experienced with hamsters, but I am learning all about their care as I try to give him a good, happy life!
hopefully his hair grows back nicely!
