Nibbly
What it needs every day
- Food: one or two teaspoons of hamster pellets or mix and a little vegetable. It is all in what do dwarf hamsters eat.
- Clean water, changed daily.
- Peace by day: it is crepuscular and nocturnal, so it sleeps during the day. Do not wake it to play.
- Some time with you at dusk, when it is awake, so it gets used to your smell and voice.
Its cage
The bigger the better: it needs room to run and deep bedding to dig tunnels. Inside, a house or nest, a solid-surface wheel, a food bowl, a water bottle, a sand bath and several hides. Keep it away from direct sun, draughts and loud noise. Sizes and the full list are in dwarf hamster cage size.
Cleaning
- Every day or every few days: remove droppings, wet bedding and fresh food it has not eaten.
- When the bedding is dirty or smells: change it, but not all at once or too often. Keep a little of the clean old bedding and do not pull its whole nest apart: losing its scent stresses it.
- Never bathe it in water: it cleans itself, helped by a sand bath.
Exercise and play
In the wild it covers a lot of ground every night, so at home it needs a large wheel (20 cm or more for a dwarf), tubes, things to chew and bedding to dig in. Scattering its food around the cage so it has to forage also keeps it busy.
How to earn its trust
Leave it in peace for the first few days so it can settle in. Then rest your hand inside the cage and offer a sunflower seed. Once it comes to you, pick it up from below, with both hands cupped, never from above or by surprise: that is how a predator would grab it. If it bites, it is usually fear; see why does my hamster bite.
Its health
Weigh it now and then and notice whether it eats, drinks and moves as usual. See an exotics vet if it stops eating, loses weight, has diarrhoea, crusty eyes, lumps or overgrown teeth. Russian dwarf hamsters live short lives, about two years; how long do dwarf hamsters live covers caring for one as it ages.
Practise this care in Nibbly
In Nibbly you really look after your Russian dwarf hamsters, in real time:
- You feed and water them, and their hunger and thirst keep going down even when the game is closed.
- You clean with the scoop and the sponge and change the bedding, without doing it so often that they get stressed.
- You earn their trust with treats from your hand; pick them up while they are still wary and they run off or bite.
Frequently asked questions
Are dwarf hamsters hard to look after?
Not hard, but they need a routine: food and water every day, frequent spot-cleaning, a big cage and letting them sleep by day. They suit adults, or older children with an adult’s help.
How much time does a dwarf hamster need each day?
About 15 to 20 minutes: check food and water, remove the mess and spend some time with it at dusk, when it is awake.
Can you bathe a dwarf hamster?
Not in water: it chills easily and loses the oils that protect its coat. It cleans itself, and a sand bath is all the help it needs.