by Blossom died on Thursday peacefully after what looked like heart
disease. She had been very quiet and tired for almost a week. I
thought it was just old age but after looking through one of our
hamster care books she appeared to be suffering from heart disease. I
was called in to the room where her cage is after my partner had
noticed that she was panting, finding it difficult to breathe and
appeared very lethargic. She tried to get on top of her bed but kept
slipping off as though she had no strength.
I wish I had known what was wrong with her sooner but in the end there
was nothing we could have done to have prevented this. When we first
got her we were told she was a male but it wasn't until she came on
heat a few weeks latter that we realized the truth and renamed
Blossom. Ever since then everything about her character has been more
akin to a female rather than a male hamster.
It took her a while for her to warm to us as she was extreamely
nervous when we first got her. She used to squeak if she sensed anyone
was near her cage while she was in her bed and used to keep on stoping
on her wheel as though she was on the look out for predators. She
even bit both of us and drew ***! It took months for us to win her
trust. Even after we did she still maintained a habbit of placing a
ball or a wooden block at the entrance of her bed as if she was
protecting herself from anything trying to hurt her whilst she was in
bed.
After a few months she finally come to be far more relaxed. Then she
used to love coming out to be handled. Whenever she knew we were in
the room she used to stand on her hind legs on top of her bed and hold
on to the bars where the door to her cage was. She developed a
feminine cobby body and was the cleanest hamster we've ever had as she
kept all her food in either the dish or a box I put in her cage. She
was the only hamster who used another box as a toilet area.
I've posted a picture from my mobile at this blog:
http://www.moonsgarden.com/%3A00%3...
There are some other pictures of her as well as the two other hamsters
of mine. However I don't think this picture does her any justice to
how sweet she really was. She'd be surely missed. :-(