Shy hamster

Hello, I've got a new hamster, who I have had for 3 weeks. His name is Hugo .

I wanted to buy the savic plaza 120 for him, but my local p@h store didn't have any in stock so I ended up buying the p@h habitat 3 instead. Big mistake! The doors are so tiny! It's making it really hard to tame him because there's not enough space to take him out in a tube to his playpen. Is there a different way I can tame him? The other option is I try and sell the p@h cage and buy a different one that has a bigger door, but I really don't want to do this if there's a way round it.

He's also really, really shy. He will take food from my hand but will only stick his head out of his little wooden house to get it. I havent found any food that will convince him to come out any further than that. He won't come out of his house at all until he is sure there's no one about and then he will run back if he hears anyone moving around. I have owned hamsters in the past (about 20 years ago) but they were all rehomed ones that were older and used to being handled, so I feel very out of my depth with this.

I'd be really grateful for any advice. Thank you

Hello and welcome. I am really sorry you're having this problem and yes that cage is not going to be good for a very shy hamster unfortunately. Assume he's a Syrian Hamster? Taking the top of the cage is also risky as he could jump out (this happened to me with a shy young hamster and a cage that only had small front doors!).

I know you probably don't want this option, but I would change his cage. Maybe get the Savic Plaza 100 - it's on sale at the moment for £64 After that I would then return the current cage to PAH for a refund. Some people have done this, even if the cage has been used, and said it wasn't suitable. If you buy online it's free delivery and usually next day.

The Plazas are a better height for a syrian as well as they fit a bigger wheel above the substrate. With the Plazas you can just not use the green shelf and ladder and set it up how you want. Although the shelf and ladder could be useful. They tend to take up quite a bit of space in the cage though as the ladder is very long, so it restricts how you set it up.

The Plaza 120 is lovely. It is very big - much bigger than your current cage. I tend to think the 100 is better for a shy hamster. But then he might only be shy initially.


The Plaza 120 is also on sale for £80 at the moment too

Thanks so much for replying Maz. Luckily I've kept the receipt so I will see if I can return the cage, that's a great idea. Yes, sorry, he is a Syrian.

I had been looking at the savic aura plexi (I think that's what it's called?)as well. Do you think that would be a better option than the plaza? I think the shyness might go eventually. He seemed really confident when I first got him. Whenever I opened the cage door he would come over for a treat or sniff the back of my hand, he seemed to recognise my voice and would come out when I called his name. He seems to have got more reclusive the longer he is with us.

I have used the Aura plexi and it's a lovely cage, but I also have a rather shy syrian and it didn't work with him. I actually moved him into a Savic Plaza 100 and he seems much happier. I did find the Aura 120 a bit more awkward as well with clean outs etc, because although it does have the same larger front door, the door is higher and it's deeper to reach into. It's good that it has the perspex above the base, but the cage is very tall and to make it a safe height you need to completely fill the base to the top of the perspex (about 10" of bedding).

The Plaza 120 has been my favourite one so far. But then if you want deeper bedding you need to attach something to the bars - either perspex or grass mats or cardboard. I had it with 8" of bedding in for a Syrian, but I have to say, that with a shy syrian I start with 6" of bedding to start with and then add more later.

If you think he won't be nervous by more space but is just being more reclusive then the Plaza 120 is a good cage - even if you do have to buy perspex bedding panels for it. The height is just right. And with the extra depth I found it very easy to do clean outs through the front door and could get almost half my body through the front door! If you have the cage on a cupboard so the front door is easily accessible. It means you never need to take the bars off.

The big front door does make a big difference for interaction with the hamster.

If they aren't tamed initially they can very quickly become a bit too independent as they start to grow up so fast and develop natural territorial instincts. So I think with a different cage, you'll be able to start some taming/socialising sessions and he'll get more used to you and used to coming out regularly and then maybe start coming to the door when he wants to come out. Taming sessions are much better out of the cage than in the cage, as the cage is their territory and they behave completely differently out of the cage.

A cage change can be stressful for them, or set taming back a week or so, but not if you do it carefully - ie move everything across, including the old bedding on top of the new, without cleaning anything (it's fine for a couple of weeks) as then it all has their familiar scent. Also it helps to keep things in a similar layout - eg wheel at the back, house on the left etc. I usually give them an adjustment day as well, which speeds up the settling in period. ie let them have a play in the new cage the day before moving them over. With some substrate, and maybe the odd new item or just a couple of cardboard items in it. They explore it a bit and then go back to the familiar cage. Then when they get moved over, they're already familiar with the cage and it has some of their scent. They scent mark everything

That's a really good point about the bedding depth. In my head I was imagining him happily making all these burrows in 10" of bedding, but in reality he would probably dig down to the bottom and refuse to come out . Ok, savic plaza it is then, I just need to have a think about whether to go for the 100 or 120.

Thanks so much for all the advice about moving him over cages; I will definitely keep the same layout and move over his bedding. I'm not quite sure how I'm going to move him over to the new cage as he dives into his wooden house every time I go near his cage.

It sounds like you might need to start the moving over while he is still in the old cage. On moving day. Eg gradually take things out like house and wheel and put them in the new cage. He will either emerge to see what's going on, or hide under the bedding. My shy Syrian hid under the bedding and squeaked! I felt bad momentarily but then I realised he was just annoyed at being woken up He did walk into a tube when I found him (I had to remove quite a bit of bedding) and then had quite a happy time running around in the playpen and perked up, and then I popped him in his pet carrier and he went to sleep again while I finished off moving everything and setting things up. He wasn't phased by the move as the layout was identical to the previous cage.

The difficulty with the above though is you'd need to take the bars off with him in the cage, and he might panic and jump out. So perhaps you could put his old cage on the floor with something around it (do you have a playpen?) so if he does jump out, he can't escape.

What does his current set up look like - do you have a photo? It might help to see to advise on how it would work in one of the Plazas or what could be different to suit that cage.

I can't believe I didn't think of the playpen! Yes I have a huge playpen that I bought, set up, then realised that it was way too big to carry upstairs to where his cage is . I could try and carry his cage downstairs and put it in the playpen then he can come out and explore safely. Then I can just take the cage back out to finish moving stuff over. He doesnt have much in the cage at the moment, just a few little houses to hide in, a couple of tunnels and his wheel, plus tons of bedding. I took out the platform that comes with the cage after a couple of weeks because it was massive and I couldn't see under it to spot clean. His wheel is screwed onto the cage bars at the moment but I do have a stand I can put it on if that doesn't work on the new cage.

I'm going to go for the plaza 120 and hope it works out.

You'll need a few more things to fill it! One thing they like is a large house that's dark inside. Multiroom houses are good and double up as a shelf. Mine love theirs. Or you could make a shoebox house and put a bendy bridge tunnel over the door so it's dark inside.

You might want to look at this thread for some ideas. My Plaza 120 set up is on there as well (although I changed that set up later)

Welcome to the forum

Thanks! I have ideas about how I want it to look eventually, I'm just taking some time to decide what to buy. He's already got a big wooden house, it's not multi chamber but he sleeps in there and has his food stash in there too. One of the other boxes I'm going to turn into a dig box. I ordered a few more bits from Etsy last week so they should hopefully turn up soon.

You can make things as well Cardboard is your friend! Both mine have a pringles tube They're a good size for syrians. Wiped out obviously.

Hugo said:

Thanks! I have ideas about how I want it to look eventually, I'm just taking some time to decide what to buy. He's already got a big wooden house, it's not multi chamber but he sleeps in there and has his food stash in there too. One of the other boxes I'm going to turn into a dig box. I ordered a few more bits from Etsy last week so they should hopefully turn up soon.

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Sounds like he likes his house I love seeing other peoples set ups and ideas as well. Mine always end up a bit symmetrical

Oooo cant wait to see your new set up. I recently took a shelf out of my syrian hamster's cage because I couldnt easily spot clean with it in place.

I have bought a load of little chubby wooden shelves that easily fix to the bars.

Tulsi said:

Oooo cant wait to see your new set up. I recently took a shelf out of my syrian hamster's cage because I couldnt easily spot clean with it in place.

I have bought a load of little chubby wooden shelves that easily fix to the bars.

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This is exactly what I'm planning on doing. I'm just paralysed with indecision looking at all the shelf options at the minute . Do you mind telling me which ones you've got please?

I love the cages where they're divided up into different substrate areas, so I'd like to do something like that. Maybe have 2 or 3 separate areas. It will be nice to have a bit more space to play around with too. I'll upload some photos when I've got it set up .

The green shelf it comes with is perfectly fine and quite a lot of people use it With the Plaza 120 there is still plenty of space in the cage even with the long ladder. It does have little holes along the outside, which some people stuff up with paper - just in case a hamster got a foot caught - not that I've ever heard of that happening.

I've used different shelves at different times. I had one wood shelf cut to fit the cage from a place on ebay - it was about £15. This was originally to mimic the layout in my previous Barney cage which comes with one long wooden shelf across one end. But latterly I've used the cloud platforms from Happy Henry Homes. Normally platforms don't fit well in a barred cage because of the legs and the curved cage base - meaning they can't go up to the edge of the cage. But the cloud platforms are shaped and the legs inset at different angles and they can fit up to the edge. I tend to use two across one end, of different heights so there's a slight step up from one to the other. Or you can have a slightly lower one at an angle to the higher one so one is at the edge and one nearer the middle. I'll try and find photos to show what I mean.

These take up less space in the cage than the one long shelf I had so you can fit a bit more in but still have shelf space.

Or you could just use the green shelf the cage comes with. With the 120 there is still plenty of space even with the green shelf.

These are the HHH cloud platforms

Cloud platforms





Others my have other shelf/platform suggestions also

This was for a dwarf hamster so I had really deep bedding - mainly because the plaza cage is a bit tall for a dwarf hamster.



This is how I have them at the moment in a Syrian cage - both at one end.



This is both at one end again but in the Plaza 120 cage so you can see how much space there still is with two of them at one end



However, in some ways, shelves are easier to fit as you can screw them to the bars at any height you want - whereas with platforms you need to work out how long the legs need to be! Depending on how much bedding you're going to have. They sell the legs in all different lengths so it is possible to get different legs a different length if needed.

Some people have used these shelves as well - they come in two different sizes

Trixie Corner shelf

Thanks Maz, that's really helpful .

I had a tiny breakthrough with Hugo this evening. He came all the way out of his house and happily sat on my hand long enough to pouch the hamster food I was holding out for him. He's never done that before so I'm feeling really positive.

Thanks for your help and welcoming me to the forum.

Brilliant, clever Hugo

That's great progress Especially if it was while he was in his cage.

Hugo said:

Hello, I've got a new hamster, who I have had for 3 weeks. His name is Hugo .

I wanted to buy the savic plaza 120 for him, but my local p@h store didn't have any in stock so I ended up buying the p@h habitat 3 instead. Big mistake! The doors are so tiny! It's making it really hard to tame him because there's not enough space to take him out in a tube to his playpen. Is there a different way I can tame him? The other option is I try and sell the p@h cage and buy a different one that has a bigger door, but I really don't want to do this if there's a way round it.

He's also really, really shy. He will take food from my hand but will only stick his head out of his little wooden house to get it. I havent found any food that will convince him to come out any further than that. He won't come out of his house at all until he is sure there's no one about and then he will run back if he hears anyone moving around. I have owned hamsters in the past (about 20 years ago) but they were all rehomed ones that were older and used to being handled, so I feel very out of my depth with this.

I'd be really grateful for any advice. Thank you

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Hello! Just thought I'd say hi as this as literally us!! Habitat 2 cage, and we upgraded Chum to the plaza 100 a few days ago!!

Chumlee is quite shy but he will take food from our hand - he's got a bit shyer since cage move but the savic is SO much better! We really struggled with the Habitat - also having to take the lid off cage completely to clean etc.

The Plaza is a great cage! Welcome to your new home Chumlee Looking forward to hearing about your experiences of settling in