# Should I rethink my decision to get a hamster? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [October 21, 2009, 3:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-rethink-my-decision-to-get-a-hamster/514614 "2009-10-21T15:55:43Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Gustav](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/919ad9/32.png) [@Gustav](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gustav)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2009, 6:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-rethink-my-decision-to-get-a-hamster/514614/21 "2009-10-21T18:46:51Z")
I would recommend against a hamster, and frankly I question your memories of your childhood hamster as well. While I’m sure there exists some hamster that like to cuddle… It’s extremely rare. You should expect an animal that can be fun to watch during late hours, but at best can be trained to _tolerate_ being handled. And many never do. And for god’s sake don’t base an animal purchase on which has the cuter pictures on google. ---
**Author:** ![Happy\_Poster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/c89c15/32.png) [@Happy\_Poster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Happy_Poster)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2009, 6:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-rethink-my-decision-to-get-a-hamster/514614/22 "2009-10-21T18:47:53Z")
They absolutely reek… if you want a rodent get a rat or rabbit ---
**Author:** ![Soylent\_Juicy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/82dd89/32.png) [@Soylent\_Juicy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Soylent_Juicy)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2009, 6:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-rethink-my-decision-to-get-a-hamster/514614/23 "2009-10-21T18:50:43Z")
Count me in with the “get a rat instead” crowd. Back in my Pet Store Days I talked countless people out of getting a hamster and into getting a rat, and many people came back to thank me and tell me how great of a pet the rat was. It’s been 14 years and I still miss my own pet rat. ---
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2009, 6:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-rethink-my-decision-to-get-a-hamster/514614/24 "2009-10-21T18:56:12Z")
Yes, if you don’t have a snake, what do you need a hamster for? ---
**Author:** ![Freddy\_the\_Pig](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/a587f6/32.png) [@Freddy\_the\_Pig](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freddy_the_Pig)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2009, 6:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-rethink-my-decision-to-get-a-hamster/514614/25 "2009-10-21T18:57:25Z")
> [@Procrustus](#): > > Hamsters aren’t too bad, but I don’t see getting much pleasure from owning one. Kids will enjoy them for about a week, but that’s it. Ahem. I had hamsters for years and found them endlessly fascinating. Of course, I was more obsessive and less easily bored than most kids. In grade school, all my book reports were about hamsters, every science project was about hamsters, most of my conversation was about hamsters. My teachers probably thought I was a future Willard. ---
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2009, 7:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-rethink-my-decision-to-get-a-hamster/514614/26 "2009-10-21T19:07:46Z")
The problem is that hamsters look cuddly but they really aren’t. It’s kind of like having a fuzzy goldfish. They’re also not low-maintenance pets. They stink. ---
**Author:** ![Gustav](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/919ad9/32.png) [@Gustav](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gustav)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2009, 7:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-rethink-my-decision-to-get-a-hamster/514614/27 "2009-10-21T19:08:11Z")
> [@Freddy\_the\_Pig](#): > > Ahem. I had hamsters for years and found them endlessly fascinating. > > Of course, I was more obsessive and less easily bored than most kids. > > In grade school, all my book reports were about hamsters, every science project was about hamsters, most of my conversation was about hamsters. My teachers probably thought I was a future Willard. Out of curiosity, what exactly did you do with them? Afaik they can’t learn _any_ kind of behavior, and they don’t really play, they just run in the wheel all night and sleep all day. I guess watching them crawl around those tunnels can be amusing for a while… ---
**Author:** ![Freddy\_the\_Pig](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/a587f6/32.png) [@Freddy\_the\_Pig](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freddy_the_Pig)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2009, 7:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-rethink-my-decision-to-get-a-hamster/514614/28 "2009-10-21T19:27:54Z")
> [@Gustav](#): > > Out of curiosity, what exactly did you do with them? Afaik they can’t learn _any_ kind of behavior, and they don’t really play, they just run in the wheel all night and sleep all day. I guess watching them crawl around those tunnels can be amusing for a while… When I started, they didn’t even have the tunnel cages. We just kept the poor things in a wire cage with a shelf and a wheel. It was so cute after I’d clean the cage and replace the litter, how they’d make the new litter into a “burrow” by stuffing it into their cheek pouches until they were three times their normal size. Mmm, the fresh smell of cedar hamster litter . . . it completely masked any odor from the hamsters themselves. What did I do with them? Well, let’s see . . . I’d carry them around the house, pet their little heads, hold treats over their heads and make them stand for food. I’d let them romp on my bedroom floor. Sometimes I’d get them to crawl up my shirt, or the side of my bed. When I got older I tried to breed them, but without success. My hamsters weren’t horny. I guess they weren’t real high on the variety meter . . . but they’re _animals_. They’re cute. They’re fun to watch. And I never had any problems with biting, except maybe right after a hamster came home from the pet shop. ---
**Author:** ![BleizDu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/9dc877/32.png) [@BleizDu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BleizDu)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2009, 7:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-rethink-my-decision-to-get-a-hamster/514614/29 "2009-10-21T19:36:50Z")
I have a great fondness for hamters, I had several as a kid and they were nearly all very cuddly, and didn’t bite. I don’t like the dwarf ones, I only like the “normal”, big ones. I love how a hamster looks! And those little hands and feet and tails! One of mine got a tumor though, he didn’t look so cute in the end. I’m thinking someday of picking up one again but we have birds and I’m not ready for another cage to clean, another critter to think about when we want to travel someplace (Though you can always load the cage with food and water and let it alone) or when the cats are in the house. You can train your hamster to, say, pee in a bocal put on its side, it helps spacing cage cleanings. My last rodent was a rat and I didn’t really like it, it was huge, not cuddly at all, and I could barely pet its head, couldn’t pick it up or anything, whereas I have fond memories of doing errands with my hamster in a pocket or my shoulder (heck, I did my first or second gay pride with my hamster!). ---
**Author:** ![Surly\_Chick](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ec9cab/32.png) [@Surly\_Chick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Surly_Chick)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2009, 7:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-rethink-my-decision-to-get-a-hamster/514614/30 "2009-10-21T19:43:19Z")
Get a degu - they’re cute to die for… ---
**Author:** ![Zeriel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/58956e/32.png) [@Zeriel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeriel)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2009, 7:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-rethink-my-decision-to-get-a-hamster/514614/31 "2009-10-21T19:51:26Z")
> [@Lazz](#): > > My last rodent was a rat and I didn’t really like it, it was huge, not cuddly at all, and I could barely pet its head, couldn’t pick it up or anything, whereas I have fond memories of doing errands with my hamster in a pocket or my shoulder (heck, I did my first or second gay pride with my hamster!). How very odd, I guess it’s more down to individual animals than anything else. My rats loved being held/petted and getting shoulder rides, while I’ve owned lizards more cuddly than my russian dwarf hamster. ---
**Author:** ![BleizDu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/9dc877/32.png) [@BleizDu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BleizDu)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2009, 8:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-rethink-my-decision-to-get-a-hamster/514614/32 "2009-10-21T20:15:04Z")
I attribute his personnality to the fact I got him from the lab at my university. We were doing some experiments (the rats were to learn to push on something to get some water) and the prof told us the rats were to be killed after that since they wouldn’t be anymore in a “blank” state. So me and several other people decided to take one or two. They would be picked up by their tails and such when handled, so I guess this didn’t make for a happy childhood around humans. But since then I’m skittish about rats ☹ ---
**Author:** ![Zeriel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/58956e/32.png) [@Zeriel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeriel)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2009, 8:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-rethink-my-decision-to-get-a-hamster/514614/33 "2009-10-21T20:20:39Z")
> [@Lazz](#): > > I attribute his personnality to the fact I got him from the lab at my university. We were doing some experiments (the rats were to learn to push on something to get some water) and the prof told us the rats were to be killed after that since they wouldn’t be anymore in a “blank” state. So me and several other people decided to take one or two. They would be picked up by their tails and such when handled, so I guess this didn’t make for a happy childhood around humans. But since then I’m skittish about rats ☹ That actually really bothers me–it takes about a month of solid work a few times a day with rewards and whatnot to socialize a rat to not be skittish about touching, and I can’t even imagine it with all that past reinforcement that hand=tail yanking. ---
**Author:** ![nikonikosuru](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/5f8ce5/32.png) [@nikonikosuru](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nikonikosuru)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2009, 8:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-rethink-my-decision-to-get-a-hamster/514614/34 "2009-10-21T20:41:21Z")
> [@The\_Hamster\_King](#): > > You should absolutely get a hamster. Better yet, get two or three! Breed them! Spread hamsters over the entire globe! I was going to say “no no no NO **NO**! Don’t listen to this fool!!!” until I saw your user name. 😛 ---
**Author:** ![Kalhoun](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/3bc359/32.png) [@Kalhoun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kalhoun)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2009, 8:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-rethink-my-decision-to-get-a-hamster/514614/35 "2009-10-21T20:46:55Z")
Breed them and sell them to pet stores and snake owners. You could even deliver (for a nominal fee). I’m just sayin’… ---
**Author:** ![DigitalC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ebca7d/32.png) [@DigitalC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DigitalC)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2009, 9:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-rethink-my-decision-to-get-a-hamster/514614/36 "2009-10-21T21:41:21Z")
Rats don’t look cute at all, whats the point of a rodent thats not cute. ---
**Author:** ![xanthous](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/x/53a042/32.png) [@xanthous](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/xanthous)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2009, 9:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-rethink-my-decision-to-get-a-hamster/514614/37 "2009-10-21T21:42:24Z")
> [@Freddy\_the\_Pig](#): > > When I started, they didn’t even have the tunnel cages. We just kept the poor things in a wire cage with a shelf and a wheel. It was so cute after I’d clean the cage and replace the litter, how they’d make the new litter into a “burrow” by stuffing it into their cheek pouches until they were three times their normal size. > > Mmm, the fresh smell of cedar hamster litter . . . it completely masked any odor from the hamsters themselves. > > What did I do with them? Well, let’s see . . . I’d carry them around the house, pet their little heads, hold treats over their heads and make them stand for food. I’d let them romp on my bedroom floor. Sometimes I’d get them to crawl up my shirt, or the side of my bed. When I got older I tried to breed them, but without success. My hamsters weren’t horny. > > I guess they weren’t real high on the variety meter . . . but they’re _animals_. They’re cute. They’re fun to watch. And I never had any problems with biting, except maybe right after a hamster came home from the pet shop. I am this kind of person. Look at what [hamster cages look like these days!](http://jodyspets.com/site/images/ovosuite1.jpg) ---
**Author:** ![Washoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/ecae2f/32.png) [@Washoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Washoe)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2009, 9:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-rethink-my-decision-to-get-a-hamster/514614/38 "2009-10-21T21:47:21Z")
Hamsters are Satan’s pocket pet. They’re foul-smelling, dim-witted, and vicious. And never forget that they’re prodigious escape artists. They can get out of _any_ cage, no matter how well designed. And when they do escape, they will roam your house for days or weeks on end, eating drywall, electrical insulation, carpet, your shoes—_anything_. Any molecule which can exist in real three-dimensional spacetime can be digested by a hamster’s gastrointestinal system. And then they get cancer. Oh Lordy, do they get cancer. We had one that ballooned up to four times her normal size from all of the tumors growing out of her. She had tumors growing out of tumors which were on top of tumors. We tried to euthanize her by feeding her peanut butter laced with Phenobarbital, but it didn’t work. We fed her enough phenobarb to take down a Great Dane and she just kept lapping it up. The vet wanted $45 to punch her ticket. Fortunately she succumbed before we had to avail ourselves of his services. When we buried her in the backyard, nothing would grow in a two-foot diameter circle directly over the grave site. They are truly evil incarnate. Get a [bearded dragon](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pogona_vitticeps). Beardies are the perfect pocket pet. They’re cute, docile, low-maintenance, and great conversation pieces. They do all sorts of cute, easily anthropomorphizable things which will easily endear themselves to you, like scampering up your shirt for an Eskimo kiss or riding around on your shoulder for hours on end, surveying their fiefdom. Just remember—in the world of pocket pets, herps rule and mammals drool. ---
**Author:** ![Telperien](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/65b543/32.png) [@Telperien](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telperien)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2009, 9:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-rethink-my-decision-to-get-a-hamster/514614/39 "2009-10-21T21:59:55Z")
> [@Zeriel](#): > > I also realized I was breaking the rules on pet threads: > [Clarissa, aka Mrs. Dalloway, and my wife.](http://athertonia.org/clarissa1.jpg) Clarissa was our first rat, she was a rescue from a pet store that had her in entirely too small a cage. > > [Galina and Svetlana, and my wife again.](http://www.flickr.com/photos/8129025@N05/1526012924/) This is a mom and daughter team from the same pet store, they’d been returned by their first buyer because they were “vicious biters” and “hated people”. Yep. Mom (Galina) is on the left. Aww, their little ratty ears. Cute! ---
**Author:** ![thelurkinghorror](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7c8e57/32.png) [@thelurkinghorror](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thelurkinghorror)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2009, 11:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-rethink-my-decision-to-get-a-hamster/514614/40 "2009-10-21T23:34:21Z")
Bearded dragons are cool but require a more expensive setup. Non-mammals peg a lot of people’s “ick” meters when they really shouldn’t. xanthous can’t get a gerbil without breaking California law. It’s stupid, but it’s California. Another vote for a rat or guinea pig, but the choice is ultimately yours if your heart is set on a hamster. I just find them a bit less interesting. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-rethink-my-decision-to-get-a-hamster/514614.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-rethink-my-decision-to-get-a-hamster/514614.md?page=3)