Much the same

These pictures are from last night. He's better again now, I think, so I don't know what's going on…

He seems as healthy as he's ever been, eating his new food and drinking his vitamin-enhanced water. Still a little less hairy in the neck area than elsewhere, but not as bad as two weeks ago.

Status Update

Lada's neck last night:

He's not worse, but I still don't know if he's any better. I'm happy as long as he doesn't go bald in the neck area again. :-)

Neck fur picture

I just took this photo of Lada's neck. Look closely and you can see a circle covering his neck where his fur is a little different.

I can't tell whether it's the same, a little worse or a little better than before his last vet appointment. Will be keeping a close eye on his neck for the next couple of weeks.

Cutie pie

So I've been trying to get a picture of this for a while, but it's really difficult… So here's a video instead. Lucky Lada has the cutest little heart-shaped black spot on his tummy. :-)

And here's a slightly blurry picture as well:

Lada is confused...

Just when I thought Lucky Lada was showing signs of brains. For three days in a row he has voluntarily approached the cage door when talked to, and then climbed into his ball.

Tonight though, about 15 minutes into his ball-running-time, he did the following. For minutes on end!

Back & forth, back & forth. I wonder what was so interesting about the balcony door! He didn't stop until I made him and returned him to his cage.

To be continued...

Taming Lucky Lada

Now, taming this little hamster has turned into a bit of a challenge, but today I picked him up and put him in the hamster ball. Nice way to get him used to the fact that my hand isn't dangerous!

He had a look around, ate some rolled oats and then peed on the floor. So then back in his Hamster Palace Cage he went.

Stand by for Take 2 tomorrow!

Lucky Lada on video

A few videos of little Lada doing his thing:

Lucky Lada; King of the Cage

Sooo my new hamster moved in last Saturday, February 8th. He was 5 weeks old at the time. Tiny!!

His name is Lucky Lada, on account of his living in a Rolls Royce cage. :-) He has a brand new rat cage all to himself. It measures a whopping 78cmx48cm, and is 78cm high! It's a gigantic hamster palace!

I haven't been able to get any good pictures yet, because he isn't quite tame and I'm trying not to give him a heart attack. I'm working on getting him to approach me. He's happy to come grab oats from my fingers, but he's still a bit jumpy. I have time. He'll come around eventually.

He's such a cutie pie though, isn't he :-D

I was supposed to get a hamster from a breeder this time, but she ran into trouble getting her hamster pregnant. I just couldn't wait until the summer... not when my local pet shop suddenly had little hamster babies. One of their employees breeds hamsters at home and then they sell them in the shop. That's practically like buying from a breeder ;-)

I do want a long haired hamster next time, but I hope Lucky Lada gets a good 2-4 years on him first. :-)

En stilstudie

Good translations of "stilstudie" welcome ;-)

Taming Tanita

Unlike Knerten and Fjerten, it actually seems possible to tame Tanita. She is so aware of her surroundings! She's always looking, looking, looking at what's around her. She'll just sit there and look at you. The roborovskis never did that, and I can't recall that Perle did either.

And it's very hard to bribe her with food. Yes, broccoli is yummy, but it doesn't make her come running into my hand the way it did with the little gang. She has taken a liking to the hamster ball thingy though, so hold the ball close to the cage door and she'll jump right in :-) I'm currently trying to teach her that it's good to be awake at 8pm because that's when the ball is there!!! So that we get to see her at all. She sleeps a lot more than the little ones and doesn't show up in the daytime half so often as they did.

A few vids from last night:








She's a cutie pie!

Syrian vs dwarf hamster - first impression

This:



You'd never see Knerten, Fjerten or Perle like that.

My very first impression is that syrian hamsters are slow. Tanita is so. very. slow. when compared to the other hamsters I've kept! Of course I lived with a roborovski for nearly 3 years, so I'm damaged. And Perle wasn't exactly slow either.

The little prisoner

Everyone; say hello to Tanita!

Knerten and Fjerten have both left us and recently Tanita moved in. She is a "standard" syrian hamster and I hope she will become quite tame given a little time and a whole lot of bribery. Broccoli and cucumber seem to work... =)