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Platform/shelf

  • Thread starter Thread starter Frida
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Those are both good shelves & would be fine for Alberts cage.
 
elusive said:
Those are both good shelves & would be fine for Alberts cage.
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In Albert's old cage he had a plastic shelf and every night he would pee on it. It was easy to clean but I think we got into a problem of Albert marking with pee and then me cleaning it away. He's never peed on anything wood up to now.
 
Albert the Dwarf Hamster said:
In Albert's old cage he had a plastic shelf and every night he would pee on it. It was easy to clean but I think we got into a problem of Albert marking with pee and then me cleaning it away. He's never peed on anything wood up to now.
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I always paint anything wood with plastikote. This helps to keep it water proof if they wee on it. You can get plastikote from Amazon. It comes in clear or different colours. :)
 
RainbowBrite said:
I always paint anything wood with plastikote. This helps to keep it water proof if they wee on it. You can get plastikote from Amazon. It comes in clear or different colours. :)
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Thank you. I'll have a look on Amazon.
 
Only thing is - plastikote isn't any good for that rough bark wood types of wood - only for smooth wood like plywood or finished pine. So I wouldn't use it on the bark wood.

Of the two above, the shelf would probably work better in the hamster heaven - the platform on legs would probably take up too much space in the cage, due to the cage base curving in (restricts where the legs would sit. I've seen people use two of those corner shelves - one front, one back - so they overlap.

When I had that cage (it was actually a mickey 2xl but the same cage as the hamster heaven with smaller bar spacing) - I ended up having a large flat roofed house - which doubled up as a shelf - and had a smaller shelf over it. I'll find the photos to give you an idea.
 
Ok. This was for a Syrian (although I got rid of the long bendy bridge as it wobbled and our hamster didn't like it - then it snapped at one end anyway which I thought was a waste of money!) You can see the flat roofed house on the right - you can't see the very small shelf back right.

Cage Set up - shrunk 700.jpg

Same cage set up for our first Robo (the base was replaced after the blue base got broken)

He also had a flat roofed labyrinth house but it was set quite low so I had a shelf over it as well, in one corner. Those particular shelves were nice - I used to get them from Amazon in Germany - but they don't sell them any more. I'd say it was similar size to the Trixie one though. It's back right as well so doesn't show up that well. Also front right is a smaller cork shelf which butted up to the bigger corner shelf. That's just a piece of cork bark screwed to the bars and made a step between the shelf and the sputnik.

So this sort of thing would be similar to that you'd have for a dwarf hamster. He had a multiroom house with a flat roof.

Beryl has a lot of hamster heaven setups for dwarf hamsters as well :) For ideas - I think she uses that trixie shelf.

P7221100 shrunk.jpg

P7221097 shrunk.jpg
 
They use the house roof as a bit of a shelf as well and it's also a place to put something like a food bowl. In this case the house was a subterranean house (ie sat on the bottom of the cage more or less) so still quite a bit of height over it. But if you put a large house on legs so it sits level with the top of the substrate, it makes a good shelf on its own (and allows for burrowing under the house). Which is what I've done with our current Syrian and Robo.

It doesn't have to be a multiroom house (though they're nice) - it can be any reasonable sized house big enough to build a cosy nest in - there are other options for flat roof houses. Some have lift off roofs like mine, which is good as you can check inside without having to lift the house out and disturb the nest.
 
It's surprising how much you can fit in that cage for a dwarf hamster. I had the multiroom house plus a wheel and a saucer as well and still plenty of floor space. And the shelf and sputnik. Those are rat sputniks which I usually use for syrians but our robo liked it too :) Filled with bedding to make it cosier. The idea being party, that it was hanging over any hard or sharp items so they couldn't be fallen on.
 
I always use a large house as a shelf too, I usually have a fairly large 3 room house which makes quite a spacious shelf, I generally find I need at least two more shelves though, for wheel & sand bath, I tend to make my own using birch ply & dowels for legs as it’s easier to fit the space I need but sometimes I use a second house maybe a smaller one as another shelf so you have even more multi purpose items that way.
 
Maz said:
It's surprising how much you can fit in that cage for a dwarf hamster. I had the multiroom house plus a wheel and a saucer as well and still plenty of floor space. And the shelf and sputnik. Those are rat sputniks which I usually use for syrians but our robo liked it too :) Filled with bedding to make it cosier. The idea being party, that it was hanging over any hard or sharp items so they couldn't be fallen on.
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Thank you for your ideas 😊
 
I use the inexpensive Ferplast sin guinea pig (hamster size is too small) size houses and plastikote the roof. They double as a platform.

I have this Trixie shelf in Eddie's Hamster Heaven plastikoted red and the free standing platform you linked is in Bernard's tank with his sandbath on top. I agree, the platform works better in a tank because a tank doesn't taper.
 
Beryl said:
I use the inexpensive Ferplast sin guinea pig (hamster size is too small) size houses and plastikote the roof. They double as a platform.

I have this Trixie shelf in Eddie's Hamster Heaven plastikoted red and the free standing platform you linked is in Bernard's tank with his sandbath on top. I agree, the platform works better in a tank because a tank doesn't taper.
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Thank you 😊
 
Beryl said:
I use the inexpensive Ferplast sin guinea pig (hamster size is too small) size houses and plastikote the roof. They double as a platform.

I have this Trixie shelf in Eddie's Hamster Heaven plastikoted red and the free standing platform you linked is in Bernard's tank with his sandbath on top. I agree, the platform works better in a tank because a tank doesn't taper.
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Quick question. Do you put the Ferplast sin on stilts or straight onto the substrate?
 
I put it on the base with Kaytee in it. The houses end up near subterranean though with only the roof showing. You can see what i mean in this photo. The house is the red and green striped roof.

20220910_164458.webp
 
Apologies - apparently the trixie shelf can be plastikoted! The bark edges wouldn't be able to though, but it seems the surface can be.

I've also used the Ferplast sin guinea pig house before - because it's quite tall it can sit on the base of the cage with some substrate inside it to effectively reduce the interior height - and it still sits above substrate level.

Most hamster houses (even the multiroom ones) are only 10cm to 12cm tall - and need the substrate underneath them, plus they need the stilts to support the weight. With the Ferplast sin house it's supported anyway by sitting on the base of the cage and being taller (but then the hamster can't burrow underneath it). I've tried it both ways and either is ok - but partly depends on the hamster. Some hamsters won't even bother to dig under a house.

A shoebox house is the easiest option :) You just cut the base out of a shoe box and keep the lid as a lift off flat roof - and cut a hole for a door. It's light so it doesn't need supporting underneath. Raffy had a shoebox house for a while until I got him a multiroom house.
 
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