Reptile & Amphibian Forums

My daughter's dwarf hamsters had 5 babies a while back. We've been good about not touching them and all seemed fine. From the beginning though the mom seemed to keep two nests and one baby in particular always seemed to be out of the nest running around, even when he was just a tiny pink bean. I used a spoon a couple times and put the babies into one nest but they would always end up seperated again.

A few days ago I noticed that 2 of the babies were big and three were noticably smaller, two of the smaller ones were downright tiny. The smallest of these is (I'm sure) the one who has always spent so much time out of the nest. Yesterday one of the tiniest ones disappeared (no body was found). The bigger two are almost three times the size of the tiniest one. I can't believe he's even alive. But he is. His eyes are open and he runs around all over the place. he doesn't seem really 'normal' though. His legs are super skinny and don't seem to bend quite right.

The parents are siblings left together in the same cage too long awaiting new owners. I mistakenly thought they were both girls. The grandparents are also siblings purchased from a petstore as two females. I don't know if the fact that they have been inbread for two generations is the cause or if she's just not feeding them as much as the bigger two or what. Any ideas?

Is there anything I can do or is it best to just let nature take it's course. I've read that trying to save babies that the mother has neglected is almost always a lost cause.

Not sure, but I know inbreding seems to always cause problems. Not a good thing in most cases.

Anyway, the neglect part, usually by nature they seem to know something we do not.

We find it cold and mean to neglect tiny ones or sick ones, but some animals know that they will be weaker and eliminate the young in that situation.

Birds always seem to throw out the weaker ones. They don't waste the time, or food on the weak ones.
But use the resorces/food they have available, to care for the strongest ones.

Sorry about the tiny guys! I'm like you, I would worry and have to try something

I wish you the best, let us know how they do.
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PHEve/ Eve

Contact PHEve

Thanks Eve,
We have lost all but the tinitest of the small babies. Not sure why that one is surviving. The mom surprised us by giving birth to a litter of 7! so we immidiatly took the remaining babies out and put them in a seperate cage. They seem to be doing fine on their own and even the tiniest who is only maybe an inch long is eating food and drinking from the water bottle.

We also seperated the parents and are keeping our fingers crossed that of the new litter there won't be many deformed ones.

In other news we purchased a beautiful all white pink eyed dwarf hamster to be the new mate to our long widowed daddy hamster. He seems happy!

Something not often discussed that has just as much of, if not more of an immediate effect on health than breeding, is diet.
Those commercial pellets combined with inbreeding caused several early cancers and birth defects in my russian dwarves. Not surprising, as the chemicals used to preserve them (BHA & BHT usually)are proven to cause cancer in lab rats! The only time I fed all pellets to my dwarves, half the litter was born missing appendages. I was able to save one 3 legged male but the others all died. This wasn't an inbred litter but I had a few second generation inbred litters not eating pellets that were healthy.
Some people don't advocate it because if left too long in the pouch, meats can rot, but I often fed fresh meat and small amounts of fish to my dwarves. Rather than storing it though, they ate it on the spot. They also ate fruit, veggies (cooked and raw), sunflower seeds, assorted nuts and 10% pellets.
My oldest lived to be 3.5 years old, died of old age and not cancer, and always had an amiable personality.
Hope this helped.