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Strange urinating patterns

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Just JamJar

Hi all, I've had my female Syrian hamster (Charlie) for a 4 months now and she is around 5 months old. As of the last few days she has been urinating on the top platform of her cage leaving puddles which she has never done before. I find this especially weird as this is also the space that she eats, drinks and sleeps in. Also, and more annoyingly she has not been keeping her urine to the confines of her cage and has instead been peeing out onto the wall which her cage is up against (See images).

I can't find much online about anything similar and I was hoping someone would be kind enough to help me out.

Charlie has no difference in herself physically, is very active in the evenings and loves to be handled. She has had no changes to her diet or bedding and her cage has been the same since mid December (I have been swapping out chew toys she doesn't use but nothing mayor).

Any and all advice would be greatly appreciated, thank you!
 

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I think the problem is that her house is on the shelf! So she sees that as a toiletting area. It's a long way down from the house to the substrate. They do much better with a house that is at substrate level, and open underneath. She is then likely to choose a corner of the cage as a toilet, at substrate level and not pee on the shelf.

How big is the cage she's in as it's maybe a bit on the small side?
 
Hello and welcome to the forum. If Charlie had a one level set up then this would ensure she toilets without it going outside the cage. Hamsters do better without these kind of levels because they can fall off them. If you got Charlie a tank then this would solve the problem.

It can be really difficult setting up a hamster cage. This is a link with pictures of members set ups to help show you various set ups. :)

 
I think the problem is that her house is on the shelf! So she sees that as a toiletting area. It's a long way down from the house to the substrate. They do much better with a house that is at substrate level, and open underneath. She is then likely to choose a corner of the cage as a toilet, at substrate level and not pee on the shelf.

How big is the cage she's in as it's maybe a bit on the small side?
The cage is 79 cm L x 49 cm W x 57 cm H, its the larger of the two listed on amazon as PawHut 3 tiers hamster cage
 
Hello and welcome to the forum. If Charlie had a one level set up then this would ensure she toilets without it going outside the cage. Hamsters do better without these kind of levels because they can fall off them. If you got Charlie a tank then this would solve the problem.

It can be really difficult setting up a hamster cage. This is a link with pictures of members set ups to help show you various set ups. :)

Thanks for the advice, what tanks do you recommend?
 
The floor area of the cage is not too bad, although longer would be better - eg 100cm x 50cm. The main issue is the height is quite tall and there can be fall risks then. So really if it was shorter but wider it would be much better :) That also means they have more floor area for nesting and roaming. It's nice to have one level - eg a platform or shelf, that isn't too high, as it's good for them to have somewhere else to go and a solid shelf or platform to put heavier items on, eg a sand bath.

She has lots of lovely deep bedding there :) I think a slightly larger house would help as well, at floor level - or a shoebox house, which you can make quite easily, and that's then big enough to put a corner litter tray inside. If you give them a large house, they almost always use a corner of that as a toilet inside and will use a litter tray if you put it there. Then it's very easy - you just lift the roof of the house and empty the litter tray every few days. It seems to be a natural instinct to want their toilet not to far from their nest and ideally ensuite!

To make a shoebox house you just cut the base of the shoebox out and keep the lid as a lift off roof, then cut a hole for a door - it's best to have the door on one of the long sides, near one end, as then the other end is darker inside. The almost always choose to nest at the dark end and use the toilet at the less dark end, so then you could put a corner litter tray, with sand in, at the back corner of the door end.

If you put something like a bendy stick bridge over the door as well, then it makes it even darker inside and the tunnel entrance tempts them in - she would probably move in the first night, if you remove the old house at the same time.

There are things you could do to make the height of the current cage safer, but I would look to upgrading it to something with more floor area and less height.

I couldn't see a 3 tier pawhut on Amazon. Are you in the US or the UK or elsewhere? :) It makes a difference because tanks are much cheaper in the US but in the UK and Europe there are quite a lot of alternatives to glass tanks.

Looking at the photos, for now I would probably remove the left hand shelf and ladder and put the shoebox house (or similar) there. And lower the right hand shelf so it's not too high. This will still leave quite a drop if she happens to climb the bars at night or monkey bar across the roof and drop (we often don't see these behaviours as they can be when they're at their most active at night).

The other option is to put both shelves at the same height somewhere between the height of the left and right ones, and use the ladders to sit across them so there's just a hole in the middle, then have access to those via either another ladder or tube going up through the hole - but then you'd need something like a large hide sitting over the hole so she couldn't fall right from the top through the hole. This effectively makes a "full level" so breaks up the height. It's quite hard to make a very tall cage safe.

Another option to effectively reduce the height is make the base deeper by putting cardboard or perspex inside the bars and having double the height of the bedding and just one shelf. So effectively then you'd have a very deep base with deep bedding and less height above the bedding. If that makes sense!
 
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It looks like it is intended to be multi purpose, to house gerbils and possibly mice. Mice love climbing, but Hamsters are not climbing animals and focus most of what they do underground. I would take away the ramps and put the houses on a substrate which could be increased to as deep as the base will allow. A sand bath/hamster loo with sand sold for hamsters should solve your wee problems as they usually go straight for the sand when needing to wee. Some fairly wide tunnels (cleaned out Pringles tubes for example) and a shoe box house with the lid as a roof and the base removed should be popular. You can make a multi chamber house from a large cardboard box and it can be a very pleasant home for a hamster. If the wheel is standing on the substrate, it would be better to support it on a low level platform or shelf so that it won't fall on her if she tunnels underneath it.
 
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Thanks for the advice, what tanks do you recommend?
For a tank I would not go any smaller then 75 gallons. There are also the larger Niteangel tank style cages but if Charlie likes to chew then all glass may be better for her. :)

Choosing a set up is quite an individual choice. I prefer tanks and tank styles because they do not need any modification to add deep bedding. With a barred cage they need panels or cardboard added to them to be able to hold the deeper bedding. This is why I have a tank style. It really just depends on what you prefer.

You can often find bargains on second hand sites for tanks and enclosures.
 
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The floor area of the cage is not too bad, although longer would be better - eg 100cm x 50cm. The main issue is the height is quite tall and there can be fall risks then. So really if it was shorter but wider it would be much better :) That also means they have more floor area for nesting and roaming. It's nice to have one level - eg a platform or shelf, that isn't too high, as it's good for them to have somewhere else to go and a solid shelf or platform to put heavier items on, eg a sand bath.

She has lots of lovely deep bedding there :) I think a slightly larger house would help as well, at floor level - or a shoebox house, which you can make quite easily, and that's then big enough to put a corner litter tray inside. If you give them a large house, they almost always use a corner of that as a toilet inside and will use a litter tray if you put it there. Then it's very easy - you just lift the roof of the house and empty the litter tray every few days. It seems to be a natural instinct to want their toilet not to far from their nest and ideally ensuite!

To make a shoebox house you just cut the base of the shoebox out and keep the lid as a lift off roof, then cut a hole for a door - it's best to have the door on one of the long sides, near one end, as then the other end is darker inside. The almost always choose to nest at the dark end and use the toilet at the less dark end, so then you could put a corner litter tray, with sand in, at the back corner of the door end.

If you put something like a bendy stick bridge over the door as well, then it makes it even darker inside and the tunnel entrance tempts them in - she would probably move in the first night, if you remove the old house at the same time.

There are things you could do to make the height of the current cage safer, but I would look to upgrading it to something with more floor area and less height.

I couldn't see a 3 tier pawhut on Amazon. Are you in the US or the UK or elsewhere? :) It makes a difference because tanks are much cheaper in the US but in the UK and Europe there are quite a lot of alternatives to glass tanks.

Looking at the photos, for now I would probably remove the left hand shelf and ladder and put the shoebox house (or similar) there. And lower the right hand shelf so it's not too high. This will still leave quite a drop if she happens to climb the bars at night or monkey bar across the roof and drop (we often don't see these behaviours as they can be when they're at their most active at night).

The other option is to put both shelves at the same height somewhere between the height of the left and right ones, and use the ladders to sit across them so there's just a hole in the middle, then have access to those via either another ladder or tube going up through the hole - but then you'd need something like a large hide sitting over the hole so she couldn't fall right from the top through the hole. This effectively makes a "full level" so breaks up the height. It's quite hard to make a very tall cage safe.

Another option to effectively reduce the height is make the base deeper by putting cardboard or perspex inside the bars and having double the height of the bedding and just one shelf. So effectively then you'd have a very deep base with deep bedding and less height above the bedding. If that makes sense!
I found it on the UK site.
 
Thanks Rainbow. Just Jamjar - are you in the Uk then? There are lots of options, but I can see you've just spent quite a lot on that cage. As Socks Mum says it would be an idea cage for mice :) So one option could be to sell it to get some of the money back. You can also get some good second hand cages that are about 100cm x 50cm for about £40 or £50 :) It's a lovely looking cage too, with a good deep base - if hadn't been quite so tall and a bit wider. It's hard finding ideal cages. Some people make diy tank style cages - Ikea hacks.

For now, you could just make some adjustments - as suggested above - so there are less fall risks - and it does have a lovely deep base for bedding :)
 
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