This is not something that happened recently, but 2 years ago.
My hamster died peacefully 2 years ago. He was still alive and active the night before. The next day evening, I noticed that he was sleeping and as usual, I scratched on his cage to tease him, but no response.
I then realised something was wrong. He was still breathing but not moving at all.
I picked him up and placed him in my hands, and he did not move at all, but he was still breathing. I massaged his little limbs carefully, but no reaction.
I try to peel open his eyes carefully but it was closed shut.
What happened next was most interesting - I tried to open his mouth to check whether is it something stuck in his throat or what, but his mouth was tightly clenched - really very tightly shut. I couldn’t open them at all. I heard hamsters sometimes store too much food in their pouches and the food inside could rot, causing health problems.
After a few hours in my hand, he suddenly breathed his last and I was devastated.
I am still curious till this day how he died. Suddenly healthy a day before, and the next day dead. He’s quite fat though, and drinks a lot of water - could be diabetic, but I won’t know.
What is the most probable reason he died of? He was just 1.5 years old.
Was it the typical pet hamster, the Syrian hamster? Then he pretty much got the full measure of sand in his hourglass…they only live 1.5 to 2 years, according to that website.
Pets can die at random for no reason at any age. I had a 6 year old cat that showed no signs of being sick and we just found him dead on the basement floor.
This, pretty much. I’ve kept hamsters (though we don’t have any at the moment) and read a lot about them. The common pet hamster has a lifespan of just about 36 months, although there are occasional hamsters who live longer than that. I don’t know how many hamster resources I’ve read…but all of them agree that a common pet hamster is quite old at 36 months.
Are you absolutely sure he was dead? Hamsters can go into hibernation if the room temperature drops below 60 degrees. A hibernating hamster actually does appear dead.
He’s a winter white dwarf hamster, supposedly even shorter lifespans than Syrian.
I was quite sure he was dead. After he stopped breathing, he turned cold.
I left him alone in the ace, hoping he will wake up the next day. Then, rigor mortis set in and he became stiff. My heart was broken.
He was super healthy just the day before. I’m still wondering what made him die suddenly. My late grandma loved him too and she suspects he could had fallen off from the 2nd level of the cage, or knocked his head too hard into the cage wall.
Yeah, pretty much. Hamsters excel at three things with “dying” being #1. “Pooping” is #2 (heh, I crack me up!) and “biting” is #3. But nothing dies as well as a hamster.
“Old age” isn’t really an answer to the OP’s question. “Old age” doesn’t cause things to die directly–rather it causes other conitions which in turn cause death. OP is asking for speculation about that intermediate condition.
Or a heart attack. Or a systematic infection. Or something poisonous fell into his cage. Or he ate something non-poisonous which caused a blockage. Or he had a brain tumor.
Lots of things reasons you could be fine one day and dead the next, especially if you are really old and the size of a hamster.
“And the span of hamster is threescore fortnights and ten, or perhaps fourscore if one is strong”.
And Fiveroptic, you forgot that they’re also really good at escaping from their cage (which, in a house full of cats, can lead to the other three). And also really good at making annoying squeaking sounds all night on their wheel.
Page 39 from this well known reputable source. If any of these stories was true it would have been that the Hamster had entered a hibernation state and wasn’t actually dead to start with.