Hamster article

[Elendil_s_Heir]

@Colibri

Yes, it turns out that both mice and humans are able to recognize differences in genes for the “Major Histocompatability Complex” through their sense of smell, and avoid mating with individuals whose MHC genes are too similar (who are also likely to be related)…

Oedipus and his mom must have both had bad head colds.

[chorpler]

@DSYoungEsq

Unless parthenogenesis was involved, presumably they are descended from four individuals, not just one. There may have been a single member of one of the genders, but there were apparently three members of the other gender in the gene pool.

They’re all descended from the one mother hamster who died in the bottle of cyanide, though, right?

[Colibri]

@chorpler

They’re all descended from the one mother hamster who died in the bottle of cyanide, though, right?

Correct. That’s the “one individual” I was referring too. Of course, actually they are descended from the male parent as well. I phrased that a bit sloppily.

[Colibri]

To expand on that a little, the effective gene pool would have been two individuals, unless more than one male had sired the litter.

Another case of a population descended from a single female is the Chatham Island Black Robin of New Zealand. The population was reduced to five individuals, but only one of the two remaining females was fertile. As in the case of hamsters, this seems to have caused no severe problems due inbreeding, even though the population now numbers only 250 compared to millions in the case of domestic hamsters.

Incidentally, Don Merton, mentioned in the article, was a colleague of mine when I worked for the NZ Wildlife Service in the 1980s.

[Chronos]

Interesting that the first captive hamster had the unfortunate trait of cannibalizing her young. Is it possible that this is actually a somewhat rare trait among wild hamsters, and that that momma hamster just chanced to luckily find herself in an environment (being raised by humans) where it wouldn’t be a major handicap to breeding? It seems like it would be a rather counteradaptive trait, in most circumstances.

[Colibri]

No, the behavior is not limited to hamsters but is quite widespread among rodents and some other mammals. There are various theories as to why it occurs. It could be adaptive (e.g., the disturbed female assumes the probability of the young surviving is very low, and consumes them in order to make use of the nutrients in case she has the chance to breed again) to pathological.

See here for an abstract of an article discussing the subject.

http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0033-5770(198503)60%3A1<1%3ACPITSO>2.0.CO%3B2-9#abstract

[Colibri]

@Colibri

to pathological.

That should read, “or it could be pathological.”

[balok]

@chorpler

http://www.straightdope.com/mailbag/mhamsters.htm

I did see a typo: the end says “Although golden hamsters have been often been considered rare in the wild…”, which I believe contains one “been” too many.

And yet you missed the paragraph where “Aharoni” is consistently misspelled as “Arahoni”. . .

                                                      -- Balok

[balok]

But where do Siberian Filigree Hamsters come from?

                                                                               -- Balok

[Holger]

The article says:

The name hamster comes from German and means “hoarder,” an apt description considering the animal’s habit of storing large caches of seeds in burrows as a reserve food supply.

Although my trusty Kluge etymological dictionary isn’t quite explicit in the details, it indicates that the noun came first (describing the animal), and the verb “hamstern” (to hoard) was coined later, alluding to the hamster’s behavior als explained by Colibri.

The noun came into German from one of several possible Eastern European languages, most likely via Old Church Slavonic (see also h | Search Online Etymology Dictionary ).

BTW, that website also says “The older Eng. name for it was German rat.” I’m trying hard not to take that personally…

[Colibri]

@balok

And yet you missed the paragraph where “Aharoni” is consistently misspelled as “Arahoni”. . .

                                                      -- Balok

Thanks. My bad. I´ll have it fixed.

[Colibri]

@Holger

The article says:

Although my trusty Kluge etymological dictionary isn’t quite explicit in the details, it indicates that the noun came first (describing the animal), and the verb “hamstern” (to hoard) was coined later, alluding to the hamster’s behavior als explained by Colibri.

The noun came into German from one of several possible Eastern European languages, most likely via Old Church Slavonic (see also h | Search Online Etymology Dictionary ).

BTW, that website also says “The older Eng. name for it was German rat.” I’m trying hard not to take that personally…

Thanks for that as well. I didn’t have a German etymological dictionary available, but just used an English-German one, which did not make the distinction.

[Arnold_Winkelried]

@Colibri

No, the behavior is not limited to hamsters but is quite widespread among rodents and some other mammals. There are various theories as to why it occurs. It could be adaptive (e.g., the disturbed female assumes the probability of the young surviving is very low, and consumes them in order to make use of the nutrients in case she has the chance to breed again) to pathological.

OK, if I remember right, rabbits are lagomorphs, not rodents, but readers of Watership Down will recall the author describing how, under conditions of overpopulation, mother rabbits will “reabsorb” the fetus. Is that true? Or was the author misinformed?

[John_W.Kennedy]

No, it’s true.