i don't think that they are the same age and the employee at petco said that they would co-exist. my friend just bought 2 and they get along just fine. please can anyone help me i would hate to come home and find one dead.
2006-12-30 06:08:43 · 18 answers · asked by brian d 1 in Pets ➔ Other - Pets
Please someone help me so i don't come home and find one dead.
2006-12-30 06:12:27 · update #1
my friend has 2 that are inseperable.
2006-12-30 06:13:39 · update #2
they are both female
2006-12-30 06:14:08 · update #3
keep them in diferent cages hamsters dont like 2 live 2gether
2006-12-30 06:11:43 · answer #1 · answered by Anonymous · 2⤊ 1⤋
If you've not already seperated your hamsters, please do it NOW!
Hamsters are very territorial animals and once they reach sexual maturity at about 8 weeks old, they need to be kept apart or they will fight to the death. You were misinformed by the pet shop where you bought your pets and I would reccomend that you go back and insist that you re either provided with a discounted second cage or that they take one of your hamsters back.
Very, very rarely 2 hamsters will live happily together, but this really is unlikely and anyone allowed to sell animals should know this..
The only dwarf hamsters I've ever known which are the exception to this rule are a fairly difficult to source breed called Roborowski hamsters. These little fellows are so tame its almost unbeliveable! I can't recomend these enough, but really don't know how easy they are to find any more.
2007-01-01 04:18:15 · answer #2 · answered by MH 1 · 0⤊ 0⤋
My son raises dwarf hamsters and said unless the two males are related seperating them is best. He has had this problem himself and the result was one dead. Not only will they fight, one may starve the other one. Your friends may have been related. The only males he has together in one cage are related and he never puts more then two in a cage at one time. Males not related and different ages will fight to the death over territory just like in the wild. Even with my sons dwarfs being related they still will get into a squabble every once in a while. We have syrian (large size) hamsters also and put them in with the dwarfs. These you can mix together, even a male and a female, they geneticly can't mate. My son has 5 syrians and ll are in cages with at least one dwarf. One of his dwarf females with newborns last year raised a litter of syrians as her own. We lost some, but 4 survived with the dwarf mothers care. She tried to raise 14 babies. The syrian mother died after escaping. She had nine babies that were nine days old and the pet store said it would never work, but it did. By the way my son has 11 dwarfs. Good luck.
2006-12-30 07:15:00 · answer #3 · answered by wolfinator25840 5 · 1⤊ 0⤋
My son had the same problem with his hamsters. We found out that 2 females cannot share the same nest/cage. They will fight to the end to dominate the nest. The only thing we were able to do was take one of the females back to the pet shop and trade her of a male. The male and female got a long beautifully. They had babies by the way. We didn't have trouble finding homes for then new arrivals. And, if there is a problem, Some pet stores will buy them, or give you credit in the store.
2006-12-30 06:20:35 · answer #4 · answered by Vida 6 · 0⤊ 1⤋
As a general rule hamsters hate to live together. They are solitary animals. It sounds like your friend was just very lucky or the hamsters are still very young. When they get a bit older he might end up with the same problem you have. You need to put them in separate cages or take one back to the pet shop. They lied to you when you bought them. Everyone who works with animals knows that hamsters wont live peacefully together.
2006-12-30 09:54:38 · answer #5 · answered by megz 3 · 1⤊ 0⤋
are they Siberian hamsters if so they don't live together the best thing to do is go to a pet shop and look at the hamster books for sale it will tell u what they r if they r u must put them in different cages ive got 3 and they r all have a cage of there own because they will kill each other
2006-12-30 06:48:53 · answer #6 · answered by MARIE R 1 · 1⤊ 0⤋
Hey. Well, if they're both females, technically they shouldn't fight. Are they sisters, because if not that could explain it. However, I had two Russian Dwarves, sisters, and they fought all the time. Syrian hamsters like to live solitarily, but Russians prefer to live in pairs.
Most of the time the squabbles mine had were over food and bedding, so make sure there is lots between them and there will be less for them to fight about. Handle them both regularly, one at a time. Let them eat out of your hand, if they bite put them back in the cage, but keep going back and handling them. If you show preference to one or the other, they'll just get jealous of each other. Try to make them used to people, but you have to be really gentle because if they're hurt they tend to fight more as well.
Exercise helps too, and if you can fit two running wheels into the cage it calms them down. I had a spare cage that I put one of mine into at a time, it let them burn off excess energy. Eventually they will settle down and fight less, but will still fight occasionally.
If they're not sisters, it's not reccomended to put them together, and definitely not if they're male. Have you had someone check the sex of your hamsters as sometimes pet shops can sex them wrongly?? This might be the problem.
If none of this works, the only other thing you can do is to split them up and put them in seperate cages. Hope it works out!
2006-12-30 06:38:13 · answer #7 · answered by the_happy_green_fish 5 · 0⤊ 2⤋
We had two dwarf hamsters and they cannot live together, hamsters are very bad together, especially females (not sexist).
Get another cage, and put the other one in it, one of our hamsters died because it got cancer in a scar, the other hamster attacked it.
2006-12-30 07:11:27 · answer #8 · answered by Jack 2 · 1⤊ 0⤋
Separate them straight away! Unlike other rodents such as Gerbils and Mice, Hamsters are solitary creatures and they will fight if they are left together. This goes for any breed of Hamster.
2006-12-30 06:34:43 · answer #9 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 0⤋
I would definatly separate them as soon as possible. I had a couple of hamsters in the past (littermates) that ended up fighting and one killed the other one. (He ate the other ones head) Needless to say I didn;t get anymore hamsters after that.
2006-12-30 06:31:18 · answer #10 · answered by searodent2001 2 · 1⤊ 0⤋
i had the same problem 2 yrs ago there were sisters they got on really well then all of a sudden they look like they were play fighting then realised they werent we seperated them and they were happier they were missing each other but think they were happier to have the space and there own home
2007-01-01 04:54:35 · answer #11 · answered by angel_face_01283 1 · 0⤊ 0⤋