Chumley

[Socks' Mum]

Yes, I think they are a bit less feisty out of the cage. I used to stroke or touch Socks' scent gland so my fingers smelled more familiar. But Socks was also a great ham for cleaning very vigorously after I had touched him, even behind his ears. Does your ego no good He sort of grew out of it a bit, but not entirely. If there are distractions in the playpen he seems less fastidious about washing my smell off his coat

 

[Hammy Chum]

So weirdly, Chum (being Chum!) seems much happier being stroked inside the cage than in his playpen hahaha! Obviously he's the opposite to normal hamster behaviour.

It seems to be the actual 'picking up' he hates - he will go 'on' a hand briefly but scoots off super fast (so even if we tried raising the hand he's be off first. I wonder if he's had some early trauma being picked up. You never know do you? He's otherwise so inquisitive, loves being talked to, straight to bars to say hi if we come up to cage etc... like i said will tolerate a stroke if hes distracted...

I will get a Carrot house @Maz - wheel arrived too so will get him out today in the playpen.

I did read that some hamsters just kinda prefer their cages... maybe thats him!

 

[Maz]

Higgins is a bit like that as well actually. He gets quite skitty out in the playpen. It's great he likes being stroked in his cage. I think most hamsters don't like actually being picked up in the cage. Even with tame ones I offer "the tube" rather than attempting to pick them up on their territory But that's just to come out of the cage. Higgins seems happier on the sofa than in the playpen though. I have the playpen butted up against the sofa just in case he decides to jump off yet, and if he gets as far as the top of the sofa arm I pick him up and bring him back again.

Our first Syrian, Charlie, spent a lot of time on the sofa and seemed to prefer it to the playpen. Sometimes he'd sit between us while we were watching TV! He used to enjoy his carrot cottage on the sofa too - but that did tend to be a bit messy!

 

[Socks' Mum]

Lovely, they all have their favourite ways, clever hammies