My russian dwarfs hamsters are not best friends anymore?

Question

I bought two female russian dwarfs (one white and one grey) from a pet shop 2 weeks back. Then they were the best of friends living peacefully in the same cage. My friend thought one was male, so I separated them for a week until I went to a vet and got confirmed that both are females only. But when I put them together again, they are fighting badly. What could be the reason for this? I separated them only for a week. Can someone advise how to get them back together? I want them again together since they were such great pals before and after separation, the grey one is very inactive and depressed. Please help!

Answer 1

I just got two panda bear hamsters. They now are the best of friends but when they reach ten wks. they will fight. The pet shop has no idea when they were born sooo.... They mightg be fighting over territory so i suggest buying another cage or you can buy pexiglass and seperate the cage. The cage might be too small so I would get a bigger one. Hope this helps. PS; I dont think you shold get them together.

Answer 2

The same thing happened to me. seperate them immediatly!! one of my hamsters beat the other one up and he got a rash thing. it kept getting worse even after I took it to the vet and got it medicine. the other hamster kept picking on him so I seperated them but my injured hamster ended up dying. I tried everything to make them friends again but it just didn't work.

Answer 3

take them to the vet. but you know it might be too late.

Answer 4

A week is long enough for them to forget each other. After a separation, it's like trying to introduce two hamsters who never met.

Simply putting them into one cage all at once will lead to fighting. Have you heard of the split cage method? Here's a link about gerbils, but the technique works for hamsters, too. Scroll down a bit to find the split cage tips.

http://www.twinsqueaks.com/tips.html

Russian dwarf hamsters CAN be kept in pairs and, from my own experience, are often happier that way. However, they must have their own space, which means a big cage with lots of hiding places. They will "squabble" and argue on occasion, but it often sounds and looks worse than it is - it's part of normal hamster social behavior. As long as they aren't hurting each other, it's fine. A lot of owners overreact and separate hamsters because of "fighting" when in fact the hamsters are still getting along well enough. Some dwarf hamsters do need to be kept on their own, but with enough space, most don't.

Answer 5

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Answer 6

a few months ago i had the same problem with my two females.

one of my hamsters was getting bullied without any food.

sadly the day i bought a cage to seperate them the littler one had been badly attacked and i had to get her put down.

i do advise if this gets worse you should try and seperate them.

Answer 7

You can't reintroduce them if they're fighting that bad.

Sadly, I don't feel Russian hamsters should be sold together. I work in a pet shop and all too often we hear of people who put Russians together and they rip each other apart.

It may be because you seperated them but now you can't introduce them due to the fighting- I'm afraid you should leave them split. Once animals start fighting badly, you can't keep them together as they will fight to the death.

***

They can in theory.

But Russian hamsters are the most prone out of all Dwarfs to fight, especially if you seperate them for an amount of time like you did. If you've seperated them, it is very hard to put them back together. Like I said, I work in a pet shop, and we do sell Russians together, but I don't like to as they are aggressive and likely to fight to the death.

The split cage method MIGHT work. (Google it.) I did it recently with two stranger gerbils and they get on fine but I had never put them together and let them fight- if they've already fought, they're more prone to do it again, split cage or not.

Yes, dwarf hamsters can be more happy together but they can also destroy each other. Russians are over aggressive, and will growl and nip each other, and this can lead to bigger fights.