CroΓ»ton let me stroke her a bit! βon three occasions now.
I did in the end have to buy some metal moulding strips and glue them to the chewable edges around the bottom of the enclosure to stop her chewing, which made her depressed again for a day, but it’s solved the problem! I think the chewing started as a stress behaviour and just became something she did because she could, especially since she’d already made good progress π. Anyway she doesn’t show signs of stress and barely even uses her wheel (which apparently is a sign of a content hamster!). Although I really have no idea what she’s doing now that I’m not awake during the night!
And now she’s letting me stroke herβ¦just a little bit, whilst giving her treats. Now I’m waking up at 6am she’s even started waking up shortly after she hears me making breakfast, in anticipation of treats. I have to give her a continuous stream of treats to distract her whilst I stroke herβ¦but they’re not filling at leastβ some dandelion root twigs and timothy hay biscuits broken into small pieces. It began with me feeding her from my finger tips and progressing to placing the treats further back on my fingers so she needed to put a paw on them to get the treats π. She’s now comfortable with two paws and getting used to me stroking her with my other hand, but it’s a fine line! She’s got her specific ‘safe’ places where she’s happy to receive treats (poking her head up between two tunnels or out of a hole I made in her cork log). But sometimes in her eagerness she’ll climb right on top of the cork log, before later changing her mind and scurrying back inside the log π.
She’s so ideally coloured amongst the various browns in her enclosure, it can be hard to spot her or easy to mistake random things for her.
I’ve forgotten to take any new pictures or videos of her as I’ve been focused on trying not to surprise her, but probably will again soon!
πͺ
π»πππππ
π πΆπ πͺππππ πͺ 
She is feeling more safe and secure. π
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Yeah! π₯²
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Does she have enough wooden things to chew on? And btw, how is the whole nocturnal thing working out?
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She does! I am making her destructable chew toys too with food inside. Since buying her cork log I have seen her chewing that a bit which was nice :). Generally though I haven’t seen her chew anything except the enclosure or for food!
I’m gradually adding more things tooβ I just ordered a bamboo root piece. It’s a surprisingly large financial investment having a hamster from scratch, I already spent Β£400 on the initial setup and will easily end up at Β£600. And if you want to DIY things that’s also a lot of cost in tools/wood, so I’m gradually acquiring those.
And I’ve learnt that the free-roam area needs to be set up like a cage too and WITH DIFFERENT ITEMS to the ones in the enclosure. You can’t move the ones out of the enclosure π€¦ββοΈ that stresses them out, I had no idea before.
Our generation is screwed lol, it used to be so normal for previous generations to have all kinds of tools and space for them, garages/gardens/sheds etc. It’s so much easier to be resourceful when you have more to start with.
Oh yeah sorryβ nocturnal thingβ me or the hamster? I have been managing to self-correct my waking time to 6am but ideally needs to be 5am to get to see CroΓ»ton. She goes to sleep around 7am, so I’m hardly seeing her now!
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