How to accustom a hamster to a water bottle, why the hamster does not drink water (or drinks a lot)

So, you have a funny furry animal, you take care of it and definitely want the pet to be cozy and comfortable. A typical mistake of many novice hamster owners is not to give their pets water, thinking that succulent food is enough. In fact, water is needed. The required amount depends on the size of the animal. For example, a dzhungarik drinks from 5 to 10 ml of water during the day. Syrian hamsters are larger. The average daily water requirement for them is 15-25 ml. Sometimes owners notice that the animal used to drink very little liquid, and suddenly the rodent’s daily portions have increased. There may be several reasons for an animal’s unexpected thirst. Let's look at why a hamster drinks a lot of water and whether it is dangerous.

Diabetes

Sometimes the reason that a hamster drinks a lot is a rodent disease associated with an increase in sugar levels in the body. Signs of the disease are:

• Significant weight loss or, conversely, obesity.
• The animal looks hunched over.
• Increased appetite. The hamster becomes voracious and eats more often than usual.
• Irritability. If before the pet behaved calmly, then, having fallen ill, he
• becomes aggressive and bites.
• Long sleep.
• Constant thirst.
• Your hamster is urinating more often than before. Urine smells like varnish.

If the cause is diabetes, then the rodent can eat a week's worth of food in a day. This is a signal that you need to show your pet to a good veterinarian, who will prescribe adequate treatment. The disease can also be recognized using special tests. Wet a test strip with urine and then use the scales to measure your ketone and sugar levels.

Diseases: immune, inflammatory, enzyme disorder

A hamster that drinks a lot of water and also produces a lot of urine may be suffering from one of the following diseases: diabetes, kidney inflammation, or ketoacidosis.

Diabetes

The predisposition to this disease is genetic and is inherited. Signs indicating a metabolic disorder are as follows:

• the animal’s urine will acquire a specific smell, which contains acetone, and therefore may resemble the smell of glue or nail polish;
• Homa's behavior will also undergo a change, the animal will be either lethargic or overly active;
• Appetite and appearance may not match each other.

Eating more food and losing weight at the same time clearly indicates the development of the disease.

How to exclude or confirm hamster diabetes at home

For this procedure, you need to purchase special strips from the pharmacy that detect sugar in the urine.

Attention! These are not strips for a glucometer, but specifically for urine. They are sold in cylindrical cases about 10 cm in length. The cost of these indicators is about 200 rubles per package. Most of these strips are also marked to detect ketone bodies, that is, the presence of acetone in the body.

The strip should be immersed in the hamster’s urine for a few seconds and evaluate how the indicator has changed. Typically, the scale for ketones ranges from beige to dark pink, while for sugar there is a green scale. A normal value corresponds to a sugar value from 4 to 5.5 mmol/l; after eating, this value can be higher - up to 10-12. In this case, if there is no acetone, you need to check for sugar again after 2-3 hours, keeping the hamster without food.

Refining the analysis

For the purity of measurements, it is best to take an analysis from the animal after it has slept for a long time. Having noticed such a moment, the sleepy ham needs to be placed in a clean tray. When the animal wakes up, it immediately pees. In this case, the accuracy of the test strip readings is quite high, because the hamster had a “fasting” period, because he did not eat during sleep and the concentration of substances in the urine itself increased for the same reason.

Analysis results

1. If sugar is detected without acetone, then your hamster has type 2 diabetes. This disease is controlled by a low-carbohydrate diet and sugar-burning medications. In this type of diabetes, insulin is retained in the body, and therefore ketone bodies are not detected.
2. If sugar and acetone are detected, your hamster has type 1 diabetes. Here, a diet is also used and the issue of insulin compensation is resolved, since in type 1 diabetes, insulin production completely stops.

Despite the general word diabetes, the mechanisms of disease development are different, as is the therapeutic approach.

Kidney diseases

Kidney diseases are characterized by traces of blood in the urine, and the animal’s activity drops sharply. With a good appetite, the animal loses weight. This can be either an inflammatory or a tumor process. In any case, the reason why a hamster drinks a lot of water when there are obvious signs of illness is determined by a veterinarian. He also prescribes diet and treatment.

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Veterinarian: why clarify the diagnosis?

Why is a veterinarian necessary when a hamster drinks too much water?

A diagnostic test does not mean that you should prescribe treatment for your hamster. This is just a way to save time by visiting a doctor with a ready-made test. Because without treatment, as well as with an erroneous prescription, the chance of recovery for homa is very small.

1. Without intervention, possible conditions such as type 1 diabetes and ketoacidosis can destroy a pet in the shortest possible time - from a few days to 2-3 weeks. As a result of the development of disorders, the hamster will first fall into a coma and then die.
2. Simple carbohydrates (vegetables and grains) that will help eliminate ketoacidosis will hasten the death of a diabetic hamster and vice versa.
3. Once you put someone with ketoacidosis on a low-carb diet, you can soon say goodbye to them.
4. Type 2 diabetes develops much more slowly, but ultimately leads to a critical condition - hypersmolar coma with subsequent death of the animal.
5. Kidney diseases can be inflammatory in nature, and they can be cured fairly quickly.

Only a veterinarian can determine how to change the diet correctly, what medications to give, how to calculate the dose and method.

Hamster wheel (we make it ourselves)

Discussion: there is 1 comment

1. Denis:
   10/14/2018 at 11:06

   PAY ATTENTION TO THIS FACT! I came across this myself without knowing and not giving it much importance! As a result, my hamster, Businka, did not live even a year! I haven’t paid enough attention to this problem, there’s almost no point in searching on the forums, no one really tells anything. Regarding this problem, I will say that this is diabetes! My advice to you is that you don’t regret what happened later, as soon as you notice that you have a full drinking bowl that only lasts for one and a half to two days, look for a good specialist around the city who can help! While you are searching, constantly monitor the availability of water; its absence can have fatal consequences! The cage needs to be cleaned more often than once a week. Just don’t give up and don’t think that it will go away on its own - it WILL NOT, believe me... Take care of your baby hamsters!

   Read also:  Syrian hamster: reviews, description, keeping at home

   Answer

Water container and daily dosage

A hamster needs easily accessible water. For this, a special drinking bowl or bowl is used. Any container is sold in pet stores and is presented in an assortment. The option with a bowl is not the best; the animal can easily pollute its water by throwing pieces of bedding in there or even turning it over. Then the floor in the cage will get wet, and the homa himself will not be able to drink.

Since the choice of special drinkers is large, it is more convenient to choose the option with a dispenser.

The daily dose depends on the breed and size of the hamster. And also on the microclimate in the apartment - how hot and dry it is in the house. It is generally accepted that these rodents require 10 milliliters of water per 100 grams of weight. This is 2 teaspoons.

Causes of dry mouth that are not pathological

In some cases, dry mouth is not associated with a medical condition. For example:

• Dry mouth can occur in the morning and at night due to intoxication. This is a typical situation after drinking too much the night before.
• When nasal breathing is impaired, a person breathes through his mouth during sleep. The mouth is slightly open, and the oral mucosa dries out faster. Nasal breathing can be impaired due to a runny nose, nasal polyps, or a deviated nasal septum. A similar situation occurs with snoring. The cause of snoring in most cases is a decrease in the tone of the soft palate. Muscle weakening develops with age. This is why older people snore more often, and their oral mucosa becomes dry. This reason explains dry mouth in the morning in the elderly in most cases.
• If you don't drink enough fluids in hot weather, you shouldn't be surprised by dry mouth. A similar effect can be caused by eating highly salted foods.
• Many medications can cause dry mouth.
• Smoking is another common cause of dry mouth.
• Dry mouth can be one of the symptoms of menopause.

How to accustom to a drinking bowl

Owners rarely encounter problems with drinking water, relying on their natural intelligence. The training procedure is much easier if the hamster knows the hands of its owner. It will be enough to show him the location of the drinking bowl several times, but if you only intend to get one, it is recommended to buy all the accessories in advance so that once in a new home, a curious hamster can explore every corner. Having stumbled upon the tip of the automatic drinker, he will definitely want to try it “by heart” and understand where he can get the vital liquid.

Small individuals sometimes simply do not know how to drink from an interesting device, and then the owner will have to help them master the home:

• The container is installed low so that you can freely reach the spout;
• leave your pet alone for a while, giving him the opportunity to master the drinking bowl on his own;
• If after several hours the hamster is still not interested in the device, then you need to pick it up and bring it to the tip. By touching it with his nose, he will feel the moisture and will be able to understand what the device is for.

It may take several attempts to fully learn the process, but do not force the hamster to drink - he must take the initiative himself and master his home.

If aggressive behavior occurs, you can use a trick - lubricate the tip of the drinking bowl with your favorite treat. Having smelled the smell, he will immediately run to the drinking bowl, and then taste it.

You cannot smear your drinking straw with products from the prohibited list, which include jam, honey or processed cheese.

Choosing a drinker

Arriving at the store, the buyer may encounter some difficulties when choosing a drinker. There are 2 types:

• ball, the functioning of which occurs after licking the ball at the tip of the tube. It rotates, the liquid goes into the mouth, but sometimes they often break. The ball stops spinning, as a result the hamster cannot drink;
• The reed type is designed differently; at the end of the tube there are 2 balls and a small vertical valve, when pressed, water will flow out.

The container itself should be transparent so that you can monitor the level, and the spout should be metal so that it does not get chewed off.

What kind of water can you give your hamster?

There are also discussions on this topic - whether you can drink from a tap or not, whether you need to freeze water and the like, which in itself is already surprising. A simple and reliable way is to drink clean water from a cooler or buy bottled water in a store. Half a liter bottle of water will last the animal for more than a month.

Questionable choice

Making a bad choice when deciding what water to give is choosing the tap option. Everyone knows that such water contains a lot of chlorine and other chemical compounds. This is easy to verify if you leave the water to settle. Within about a day, flakes and a suspension of settled contaminants will appear at the bottom of the vessel in which the water settles.

Sometimes there are recommendations to freeze tap water, and then defrost and drink this water. But such advice is similar to misconception, because if freezing kills microbes, then heavy chemical suspensions will not go away. And there are no microbes in tap water as such after chlorine.

Optimal choice

Therefore, the animal needs to be given clean water from a cooler or store. Another option is boiled water, and it is also allowed to stand for a day or longer. But considering how little water hamsters drink, it is still better to buy a bottle of regular purified water and add it to the drinking bowl. The water, of course, must be still.

Symptoms associated with dry mouth

Dry mouth in most cases manifests itself as a complex of symptoms described as:

• "viscosity" or "stickiness" in the mouth;
• thirst;
• irritation of the oral mucosa (burning and itching), the appearance of a bright border of the lips, cracks on the lips and in the corners of the mouth;
• dry tongue. The tongue turns red and becomes rough. It becomes more difficult to speak, chew and swallow. Decreased taste perception;
• dry throat. The voice becomes hoarse and more hoarse;
• there is an unpleasant odor from the mouth.