We mated Butterbean and Spud on 15th July and Butterbean gave birth on 30th July. We were a little worried about her on the first night after the birth as she gave birth then retreated to the opposite corner where she spent the night leaving her babies alone! I crept up into the hamster room a couple of times during the night to see whether she had started to give her pups any care but she was just sleeping soundly. I wish I could say the same! I spent a sleepless night worried about whether her poor little pups would survive or not. Finally I checked at about 6.15 am and was very relieved to spy her lying amongst her pups who were all suckling greedily.
As we lost a lot of Princess’s litter, we decided to take a very ‘hands off’ approach to this litter, and due to this have not undertaken a diary as such but have taken occasional photos.
Butterbean has 8 pups, all minks. From this we can tell that Spud (the Dad) is homozygous for Umbrous. This means that he inherited an umbrous gene allele from both his Mum and his Dad. As a hamster only needs 1 umbrous gene allele to show umbrous it doesn’t make any difference to Spud but has made his Pups all umbrous too (as he has given all of them an umbrous gene allele). Butterbean, as a cream is not umbrous, so if Spud only had 1 umbrous gene allele (heterozygous), it would have been likely that the litter was made up of half red eyed cream and half mink.
Since that first night, Butterbean has been an exceptionally good Mum. The litter has a runt and unfortunately we one day noticed that this runt had either a deformity or injury to its front right arm. After a trip to the vets we have been administering antibiotics and the runt appears to be doing well. The poor wee thing is the only pup that Mum can now pick up and return to the nest, and so, often, just as it is diving into a bowl of porridge/tofu etc. it is dragged away and back to the nest, although this does mean that it is often first to Mum’s milk and though still small and with an arm problem, it is doing well and is a feisty thing.
One of the larger pups also appears to have a small problem in that its left eye is closed. It appears that the eyelid hasn’t opened properly and so another trip to the vets is required. We can see that the eye looks fine behind the eyelid so we are hoping there is something that the vet can do to help her to open her eye. In the meantime we refer to this pup as Left-eye as in Lisa ‘left-eye’ Lopez. It doesn’t seem to cause any problems for her at the moment though.
Since day fourteen we have been handling the pups. It is quite hard, as they look alike, to ensure that each of them are handled. We have to handle them then put them in a separate carry case until we are sure that each has been handled and then return them to the main cage. They all appear quite calm and have settled into handling well.
As time went on, the runt of the litter (who we nicknamed 'Micro Ham') became stronger and stronger, although he always remained comparatively small compared to his sibblings. He still gave as good as he got, squabbling with his fellow pups, walking around unhindered, and by the time it came to re-homing time, it was difficult to tell he had a problem with his front paw.
One of our friends wanted a hamster and asked if they could choose one when ready to be re-homed. They immeditaley fell in love with Micro Ham and, after we explained his history, were more than happy to take him on having had experience of hamster care themselves. They named him Ralph. We are now told he is a little tyke, climbing the bars of his cage, full of life and energy and is thoroughly pampered and loved.
Finally, to Lisa 'Left Eye' Lopez. We decided to keep her due to her eye problem. When old enough to take to the vets for a further examination we did so. We were advised that an operation would be best to open her eye and avoid risk of infection. All went well and now she has use of both eyes. We have grown attached to her, and so is now a permanent member of our family. We decided to rename her Chip, her father being Spud and she being a chip off the old potato! You can see photos of Chip before and after her operation and read more about her in the Our Hamsters section. |
