What Everyone Gets Wrong About Syrian Hamsters As Pets

I don't know about you but when I was young, hamsters (and especially syrian hamsters) were the hot first pet for any child. I remember going through several hamsters, same as most of my friends. They are small, but not as small as mice so you can grab them better. Their cage isn't too big so a child is able to clean them out and they "last" only two years, so in case your kid gets bored or something, you don't have to worry too much.

That is the main sentiment I get from people getting hamsters for their children. The older and more interested in proper animal care and husbandry I got, the more I realized that hamster are, for some reason, one of the most mistreated pets out there.

It's seriously insane. These are little tiny creatures and, for some reason, almost no pet shop under the sun can get the living requirement for them right!

That is my main problem. For some reason, all pet shops are stuck in this horrible mentality that all the hamster needs is little shoe box sized cage and that is it. Most of the pet shops don't give good advice about the size of wheels either - the fact that it needs to be at least 11 inches otherwise the hamster will be painfully breaking it's back (literally) when he's trying to get his daily exercise. And since his cage is painfully small, the wheel is only way to do it. Hamsters in the wild run miles and miles at night—they loooove to exercise and move. They have lot of energy and restraining them in cage so small they can hardly move is not far from animal abuse. You can add incredibly shallow substrate—given to the animal that loves loves loves to burrow —and you have that typical recipe for a first time child pet hamster...

This is not how it should look. But it often does...

Another thing that infuriates me is the notion of getting a hamster for a small child itself. As an obsessive animal owner and adopter, it took just a quick look through some of the sites where people sell animals or give them up for adoption to see that most of the parents don't really think when getting animal like this.

I saw plenty people saying how their three, four or even two year old "got bored of the hamster and they don't have time to take care of it so they are giving it away". Seriously, Linda?! Are you that surprised that your goddamn toddler is not passionate about cleaning out the hamster cage or doesn't even have patience to tame this little creature? Who would have thought!

Look. Hamsters are wonderful animals. They are. But not exactly the greatest choice for three year old. Especially if you don't even plan to take care of it as a parent! I know that this topic goes more into parenting/lifestyle and me giving advice how to parent but I really think that it is utterly idiotic to buy your child an animal to teach them responsibility and then give the animal away because you can't manage to be responsible for it when your kid just isn't that into it. Doesn't that defile the whole purpose of why you got the animal in the first place?!

All I wanted to say with this article is that hamsters deserve much more attention and people need to be more educated about them, especially parents! Their cage should be at least 700-1,000 sq inches of floor space with minimum of 4-5 inches of substrate to burrow in. No modular cages, no small wheels, at least 11 inch wheels (most medium-sized wheels in the shop, or the large one is suitable as well) and the most important thing: think before you buy an animal. When you bring a living being into your house you must be prepared to care for it even if your kid won't.

Hamsters are such tiny and cute creatures and they deserve more love and much much better lives!