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Naturalists first catalogued the Syrian Hamster (Mesocricetus auratus) in the late 1700s. In the 1930s, medical researchers first obtained Syrian hamsters and further domestication led to the Hamster becoming a pet.
Their natural habitat is a small region of Northwest Syria near the city of Aleppo. Two Scottish physicians, Alexander and Patrick Russell, living in the region, wrote about the Syrian Hamster in the book "The Natural History of Aleppo". However, they incorrectly catalogued the Hamsters as the same as European Hamsters. The classification was corrected in 1902 by Alfred Nehring.
The Syrian Hamster was first recognised as a distinct species in 1839. In the 1930s, scientists bred the Hamsters they had obtained and sent their descendants to various other places around the world. Sadly this was all scientific research mostly. In the 1940s, Hamsters became popularised as pets, particularly in the US.
Most hamsters were descended from this first family that were bred from in the 1930s, but in later years, further expeditions to Syria captured more hamsters to increase the genetic diversity for breeders.
Wild hamsters were found to become tame within days after handling by humans, and settled well in captivity.
Israel Aharoni captured the first hamsters in 1931 - a family of Mother and babies. And these were bred from. Within a year there was a colony of 150 hamsters. Parasitologist Saul Adler received some hamsters from this colony and published some of the first research, along with another scientist, in 1931.
Photos of Israel Aharoni and Saul Adler from this interesting blog
zoologyweblog.blogspot.com
In 1931 also, Adler smuggled Syrian hamsters into the Uk in his coat pockets (the mind boggles!) and gave them to the London Zoological Society and the hamsters eventually went to the laboratory of Leonard Goodwin, whose Hamsters became the stock of pet hamsters in the Uk and the descendants from these spread throughout Europe.
There is also a story of a colony of Syrian Hamsters brought to the Uk in 1880 by James Henry Skyne, who was British Consul to Syria. He retired to Edinburgh and brought Syrian Hamsters back with him from Syria. Apparently the colony of hamsters remained alive until 1910 (presumably descendants).
More information about James Skene's hamsters here:
"Only when I obtained the paper by the late Rolf Gattermann and his colleagues on the collection and ecology of Golden Hamsters in the late 1990s did I get any further information. They listed the collections (dead and alive) over the years, and for 1880 listed Skene, with the information having come from a book published in 1954 by H.W. Reynolds and published by the Zoological Society of London.
I could not find a copy of Reynolds’s book (really a booklet since it is only 32 pages) for sale. But the ZSL Library has two copies and their superb service to Fellows soon had a copy on my desk. This is what Reynolds wrote:
zoologyweblog.blogspot.com
Most of the above information (other than the James Skene info above) can be found in this Wikipedia article - however, Malcolm Peaker's Zoology blog (linked above) is much more reliable than the Wikipedia article.
en.wikipedia.org
Their natural habitat is a small region of Northwest Syria near the city of Aleppo. Two Scottish physicians, Alexander and Patrick Russell, living in the region, wrote about the Syrian Hamster in the book "The Natural History of Aleppo". However, they incorrectly catalogued the Hamsters as the same as European Hamsters. The classification was corrected in 1902 by Alfred Nehring.
The Syrian Hamster was first recognised as a distinct species in 1839. In the 1930s, scientists bred the Hamsters they had obtained and sent their descendants to various other places around the world. Sadly this was all scientific research mostly. In the 1940s, Hamsters became popularised as pets, particularly in the US.
Most hamsters were descended from this first family that were bred from in the 1930s, but in later years, further expeditions to Syria captured more hamsters to increase the genetic diversity for breeders.
Wild hamsters were found to become tame within days after handling by humans, and settled well in captivity.
Israel Aharoni captured the first hamsters in 1931 - a family of Mother and babies. And these were bred from. Within a year there was a colony of 150 hamsters. Parasitologist Saul Adler received some hamsters from this colony and published some of the first research, along with another scientist, in 1931.
Photos of Israel Aharoni and Saul Adler from this interesting blog
History of the Golden Hamster: 2. Syria, Palestine and London
In 1985 Michael Ross Murphy (1945-2018) wrote an account of the capture and domestication of the Golden Hamster. All hamsters of this speci...
zoologyweblog.blogspot.com
In 1931 also, Adler smuggled Syrian hamsters into the Uk in his coat pockets (the mind boggles!) and gave them to the London Zoological Society and the hamsters eventually went to the laboratory of Leonard Goodwin, whose Hamsters became the stock of pet hamsters in the Uk and the descendants from these spread throughout Europe.
There is also a story of a colony of Syrian Hamsters brought to the Uk in 1880 by James Henry Skyne, who was British Consul to Syria. He retired to Edinburgh and brought Syrian Hamsters back with him from Syria. Apparently the colony of hamsters remained alive until 1910 (presumably descendants).
More information about James Skene's hamsters here:
"Only when I obtained the paper by the late Rolf Gattermann and his colleagues on the collection and ecology of Golden Hamsters in the late 1990s did I get any further information. They listed the collections (dead and alive) over the years, and for 1880 listed Skene, with the information having come from a book published in 1954 by H.W. Reynolds and published by the Zoological Society of London.
I could not find a copy of Reynolds’s book (really a booklet since it is only 32 pages) for sale. But the ZSL Library has two copies and their superb service to Fellows soon had a copy on my desk. This is what Reynolds wrote:
History of the Golden Hamster: 6. Golden Hamsters kept in Scotland at the turn of the 20th Century
All the captive Golden Hamsters up to the 1970s were descended from a single litter collected by Israel Aharoni near Aleppo in 1930. That s...
zoologyweblog.blogspot.com
Most of the above information (other than the James Skene info above) can be found in this Wikipedia article - however, Malcolm Peaker's Zoology blog (linked above) is much more reliable than the Wikipedia article.
Domestication of the Syrian hamster - Wikipedia
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Some interesting statistics in there. Rodipet also had a project in Syria where the Syrian hamsters are a protected species. They have some videos about it on youtube if you're interested!
. They can all have different personalities! You can get shy and maverick males and shy and maverick females and various other different personality quirks - they are each individual