Circle Of Life

The phrase can never be so true for me.

Life is flourishing right in my home. Our son's hamsters are procreating like there is no tomorrow.

After we have given away about half of the 40 hamsters in 7 cages, we were left with 26 in 2 large cages. The hamsters were adopted by my siblings; given away during our Hari Raya visiting.

It was such a relief to have found them good homes and good adoptive families we can trust who will care for them. There were paired-off with the same gender so they will not multiply.

The rest are still housed in "Hamster-ville" right in our service balcony.


As an effort to stop them from breeding further, I had to invest in more hamster cages. These cages are not cheap! A decent size with the standard "amenities" like wheel, food bowl, water bottle and a little house can simply cost $25.00.

That is before the additions of their sand-bath enclosure that costs S$8.00 to S$12.00 each, the bedding of twisted recycled paper used for cat litter that costs $12.00 to $18.00 and their food of about S$7.00 that would last less than a week or so. Yikes!

So I had to invest about S$120.00 to get 3 cages to separate the males from the females. I cannot mix one from the other group nor the other way, as the "outsider" will be killed by the dominant male and female.

So for now, since most of the hamsters are still not mature yet, the extra 3 cages will do.

That was what I thought until my son found out that 2 of the adult females were already "carrying babies in their tummies!"

The nightmare continues!

The nightmare intensified when these 2 pregnant hamsters became more aggressive as they kept bullying the babies. I had to separate them into the 2 new cages to stop the incessant fighting.

Just yesterday, 8 were born. One of the babies unfortunately died, so there were 7 left. Not after a day before, when the other mother gave birth to 6 newborns.

God help us! We now have about the same number as we started... 39! Yes, 1 died, else the perfect number the same as my age!

So far, none of the neighbourhood pet shops wish to take the hamsters in, even when we offered them for free. In-breed is not a good thing to them.


So, after talking to the Pet Safari sales persons who are "Mayors of Hamster-ville" themselves had the same solution to the "infestation..." separate the males and the females! Duh!

All I need was more money to buy loads of cages, group these hamsters with their "homies" and let them live their lives out in celibacy.

I may have to do this sooner than I can afford... time and money, since this week alone we have become owners of 15 babies!

Circle of Life is spinning out of control. I need to break that circle, not the lives in my hands, and break it fast!

To the pet shop and away!