Wasabi as a doodle.

I was playing with my little Wasabi Hammie today and was so taken with his cuteness I grabbed my notebook and turned him into a doodle. I hope he approves.

Dwarf Hamster Tip of the Day.

No, I'm not starting a new thing on my blog. I'm posting this info for two reasons. One, I took this REALLY cute photo of Wasabi and wanted a reason to post it.
Two, I thought this info might be helpful for someone at some point.

WHAT TO DO IF YOUR HAMSTER HAS AN OVERGROWN TOOTH:

My happy little hamster celebrated his 1st birthday and not long after that started to lose a lot of his hair under his chin and getting very skinny. He is a dwarf hamster, and everything I read on the internet said he was not long for this world. Many sites told me that they lived 1.5 years max and that the balding thing was normal for a dwarf hamster of his age.
Then one day I noticed that he could not take his treat out of my hand like he always used to. He seemed to be having trouble getting his mouth around it. I then gave him a cracker, and realized there was not a crunching sound coming from him. It kind of looked like he was gumming his cracker.
I called the Vet and she said that it sounded like he had a broken or overgrown tooth. Because of his age, and how skinny he had become in such a short time, it was dangerous to give him the anesthetics, but if I didn't get his tooth fixed, that would kill him too.
I made an appointment for a week out, and I decided to get him super healthy so he would survive. I fed him three times a day.
His diet was:
A small square of Hard tofu 2 times a day (Once in the morning and once after work
A teaspoon of either carrot or green pea and brown rice high quality baby food 3 times per day (You can only keep it in the fridge for 3-4 days and then you must throw out the rest. You do end up tossing a lot, but you don't want to feed your hammie baby food that has gone bad! I thought about freezing servings in an ice cube tray to make it last longer, but he got better before I needed to do this.)
Some all natural peanut butter (no sugar added) on my finger tip as a treat when he would normally get a snack.
Sometimes I would add a little instant oats to the carrots to make them less runny and give him some added carbs.
By the time he had his appointment, he had already gained some weight and was looking a lot more active.
He had his appointment, got his tooth trimmed, and the doctor said he popped right back awake afterwards. A perfect patient. It was only $56. People always ask how much it costs. That really is not a lot compared to what most vet visits are and it was totally worth it!!
After his appointment I kept giving him the same diet, but as his tooth started to grow in, and he started going back to his regular food dish more and became less interested in the food I was putting out for him. I still supplement about once every other day with baby food, and he demands the peanut butter as his daily treat, because he LOVES it, but he seems to be back to regular food for the most part.
He has gained all of his weight back AND His hair has all grown back! Turns out his baldness was not "Old age" but a proteins deficiency. With the tofu and the peanut butter, he got all the protein he needed.
It has been a month since all of this happened, and he has never seemed happier or healthier. No longer the skinny balding hammie, but an active fluffy happy hammie. This is not an old man on his way out. I have a feeling he will be with us for a very long time to come!
If you have a hammie in the same situation and need more specifics about the diet or anything, feel free to email me. It took a lot of internetting and separating fact from fiction for me to get all of this info together, I'd be happy to share with anyone that needs to know. I'm positive my hammie would have died if I didn't do all of this when I did it.

Bye Bye baby...

We lost a beloved pet this weekend.

One of our female gerbils died sometime on Saturday. (This photo is her with her family when she was a newborn. She is the baby on top with the white spot on her head)
I gave them all treats on Friday evening, and they all seemed fine, but on Sunday we noticed that we had not seen her since then. She went into her little house and passed away. There was nothing obviously wrong with her, so it must have been something internal. Poor little girl. Now her sister is alone. They are social animals, so I don’t think she is going to like being alone very much, she is too old for a new cage mate. Lonely gerbils tend to die soon after their cage mates. Usually from broken hearts. When they are alone they lose the will to live.

I think losing her lead me to having uneasy feelings and uneasy dreams. All night I dreamt about pets that I’ve lost along the way. In my dream they were all living at my parents house and I went to visit and told them I was bringing them all home with me. I woke up sad because for a few minutes I forgot they were many years gone.

Over the years I’ve lost as many humans as animal friends to death. Honestly, both things hurt me equally. I know some people would think that is wrong or shallow, but I don’t. Pets give nothing but unconditional love to the families that adopt them. I can’t say that same thing about all of the people that I’ve come across over the years.

In other pet news, it is so weird that our gerbil died. She was young and seemed so healthy. We have actually been bracing ourselves for our little hamster, Wasabi to pass away as he is looking very much like a Grandpa recently.
The weird thing is, he has made a complete turn around! He has been running in his wheel like he has not done in ages and his fur is looking all bright and healthy!

He started to look really skinny and was sleeping a lot about a month ago. I was starting to get very worried about him because I am told that Dwarf Hamsters don't live more than 1.5 years usually, and he is right at that age right now. He was not eating as much as he used to either, so I decided to try something out to get him to eat better. I thought that old people need soft food, maybe geriatric hamsters do too?
I bought a few different types of high end baby food and a block of tofu. 2-3 times a day I've been feeding him a small dish of baby food and a square of tofu with a thin all natural peanut butter spread on it. (I started out spoon feeding him for the first week when he was weaker, but now the dish is fine.) He has been going CRAZY for it and totally got his wee appetite back. It has been amazing!! Within a week, he was sleeping less and running in his wheel and begging to get out to play. He is a young hammie again!

I mean, I know he is at that age, and I should not get my hopes up too much, but at least I know that if he does go soon, his last days will have been happy.

March 2nd, 2008 - Wasabi Hammie

Wasabi eats his spinach so he can be strong like Popeye! Nom Nom Nom!

February 16th, 2008 - Wasabi vs Broczilla

Walnut & all of his cuteness

Just because...

Because you can...
Sing because you have a voice
rejoice in the voice you were given

Breath not only because you have lungs
but because the air is sweet and it is a gift

Run and dance and play
If your body can move, make it celebrate

Touch and hug and kiss and truly enjoy the ecstasy that is feeling

Love because you can

Hurt because sometimes you have to

Forget because that too is a gift

Baby Love! Welcome Wasabi & Walnut!

Today we got a new baby. After losing the two mice in December we had a sad and empty habitat. We were at the pet store today and totally fell in love with this little baby Dwarf Hamster. The photo is not him, but looks like him. He is just settling in, so I didn't want to give him a photo shoot just yet.
We named him Wasabi!
I'm excited to learn more about Dwarf Hamsters as I have never had one before today. Their diets are almost identical to gerbils, but they don't like to share space like Gerbils do. We were originally getting two babies but the pet store lady said they don't like sharing when they reach adulthood. Oh well.
He is so cute! He doesn't have a tail and he has the cutest little tushie when he waddles around the cage.
Hooray for cute and fuzzies!

EDIT*
We have a 2nd Dwarf Hamster now. After we got home last eve I did some research and it turns out the lady who swore that we should not have two was wrong. This is true with the more common breed, but the breed we have is a social breed and prefers to have a friend! So I had Jon run back to the pet store this morning and buy one of Wasabi's brothers. Now we have Walnut. He is a lighter color than Wasabi. I went home for lunch to hang out with them. They are so cute hanging out together. Like two fuzzy little peas in a pod!