If you were a hamster

[almostn9ne]

If you were our pet hamster and you'd escaped in the night, where would you be right now?

Just asking for a friend.....ahem.

I had an escaped hamster when I was a kid and we eventually located him behind the oven (I guess it was warm!) he must have got through a super tiny gap!

I would be the next flight out to Antigua with my little suitcase of swimwear, sun cream and cardboard tubes because I'm fed up with the weather.

I would make a lovely nest in the back of one of the cushions in my lovely little owners parents brand new sofa (sorry mum)

Thank you for all the replies. DS left some treats out for him this morning at about 8am (he's usually fast asleep then so thought he'd be asleep till this eve and wouldn't be findable till then). It appears while we were upstairs, he had snaffled the treats away somewhere. So he's still here and still alive!

Further scrutiny proved he wasn't far from his cage - he had made a little nest behind a Boppit on the board games shelf. Many droppings and food and those treats!

But not there now. Hmmm....

Gotta go to work now but will try the bucket idea later. Have left his cage door open on the floor with a tunnel leading up to it.

Leaving food out unattended is a rookie mistake!

I'd get into the cavity wall and run up and down the living room whilst the little people sobbed and the big people and to take of skirting board and chip away at the wall.

Bucket trap. Works well.
My hamster escaped once and climbed up onto my pillow to say hi! That was a very easy recapture.

My dd1 found hers as it walked across her in the night....

The second time hammy was climbing in an open box of lego under the bed.

Curled up asleep somewhere cosy and dark.

It'll appear at evening time.

If you know what room it's in, can you seal if off then sit it there in silence this evening? You might hear where he is as he's waking up.

Ours escaped a while back and we looked everywhere! She couldn't be found. The next day she was casually walking around the kitchen

Anywhere and everywhere in the bowels of the house walls... Happened with mine when I was a kid. The bugger dived down the hole in the bathroom floor where the sink pipe goes in. He was heard overnight scratching in my parents' bedroom walls, my bedroom walls, the bathroom floor...

He was scratching in the bathroom again the next day, luckily under a short floorboard (my dad had refused to hoick up a full-length one to look for him, on grounds of cost and hassle). He was skinny and covered in dusty cobwebs, but otherwise fine.

Under floor boards

Behind the boiler, he came out following the trail of nuts having slept all day. He got back into his cage all by himself, and straight onto his wheel. Clever boy.

Under the gas fire and into the chimney (30 years ago)

Nowadays with our hamster, we give her free reign of the living room but cover up every single gap we can find. So far so good! 🐹

Behind the cooker with my cheeks full of cherry tomatoes that had rolled under there many months before.

One of ours made her way from the ground floor sitting room up into the loft! Still no idea how she managed that. Spent two nights there before I managed to catch her.

Another was found in the back of the fridge - on the outside, not where the food is kept. He’d gone round the side and made a little nest in the hole at the back where the wires go in.

Night-time is the best time to catch them. Make sure it’s nice and quiet and then just sit and listen. Mine have all loved cucumber and it has quite a strong smell so have a chunk of fresh cucumber with you to try and coax him out.

Good luck!

Oh and once in the cavity wall behind the washing machine in the utility room. That one took some retrieving...

Next door, in cereal packets or like my previous hamster on my pillow! He used to escape, climb the stairs then climb onto my bed to say hello, that one took a while to find out exactly how he was escaping as the cage seemed perfectly intact every time I went to bed and when I put him back!
Cats are brilliant at finding hamsters unfortunately you may not get all of the pieces back

Inside a mattress having chewed a hole through the cover to get in.

When I was a kid, ours went via the airing cupboard, down the pipes and lived for a couple of weeks behind the skirting boards while my parent systematically removed every skirting board in the downstairs to get it.

I'd jump off the kitchen worktop and hide behind the tumble drier. I'd also rip apart the kitchen cupboard for wood chipping, and the tumble drier hose to remove the fluff, and I'd make a really cosy bed. I might stay there for two days and through the new hole in the cupboard I've made, I could eat the hamster food that conveniently was stored in that cupboard. Living my best life 🐹

I would hide behind some furniture in the dining room, feel that my surroundings needed cosying up a bit, and would then chew my through a metre of new carpet to make bedding. The biggest humans would then have a lively debate about my fate.

Alternatively I'd climb into the innards of a gas fire and then astonish the humans by falling out of it days latest as the sootiest article any of them had ever seen.

On a serious note though, aren't these little buggers clever?!? 😮

I knew of one hamster who found his way under the fridge by climbing over the kickboard - he was very dusty when he Scurried out
And another who thought hiding under the sofa would be a good hiding place. She was a nightmare to catch, they are very fast when they want to be and she was a biter so had to throw a towel over her to catch her
I miss those tiny furry hammys