Is it unusual for a hamster to go from healthy, running about, to dead!

[BigSandyBalls2015]

Our last one deteriorated slowly but just found this one dead in her bed 😢

Are you sure it isn't hibernating ?

Yes it happens, hamsters are notorious for just dying out of thin air. I honestly don't know why they became seen as a good pet for kids. I used to work in a small independent pet shop and the amount of hamsters that didn't even make it out of the shop before they died was astounding.

Sounds pretty standard for hamsters. Dying's their favourite hobby. Like sheep.

Yes check it's not hibernating there was a post going around fb about hamsters at this time of year where you think they are dead and they're not!

Cold and stiff and she hadn’t put all her the sawdust and bedding in front of her door like normal which I’d presume she’d do if hibernating?

Pop it in a box in the airing cupboard for a few hours - at least two of ours were revived that way

Hibernating was my first thought.

I've had many hamsters, most living long lives. When they are approaching the end of life, they make their nest flat to the 'ground', so if they're on sawdust, they dig in and pull the bedding over, as camouflaged as they can make it. You might get a week or two warning if you look for this.

My hamster did this. We found her on her hamster wheel cold and stiff. We wrapped her in a towel and cuddled for an hour and she came round. Kept her cage in the warmest room in house from then on.

Yes, we had this once years ago.
Completely stiff & cold & then there was the tiniest whisker twitch - so glad I noticed it!
Warming up did the trick but it was FURIOUS to be woken

If he got cold he will be hibernating. Put him somewhere warm and he will come out of it.

I feel worried that we buried my dead hamster with the thought now that maybe he was hibernating. Eek.

I'm sorry, I know nothing about hamsters but I'm weeping with laughter here. 🐹

I hope no hamster was accidently buried.

She was near a radiator so she wouldn’t have been cold, I had the opposite worry that she may overheat.

Ok I’ll get her out in a bit and see , weird how attached you get to the little rodents, she was such a gentle soul.

I buried a hamster last week - cold, stiff and not breathing. Now wondering if it was actually hibernating it did make a bed on the floor of her cage for a few days before though... And wasn't putting any bedding over herself.
You do get surprisingly attached to them.

@Tinselette really?!

Our last one was literally running on his saucer when he just keeled over and died still in his running pose.

pineapple it was the image of the furious hamster. I had just watched a comedy on TV and was in a giddy mood. I'd no idea that hamsters went cold when hibernating...

OP I hope she's okay. We can't have an animals in our house due to asthma but we'd dearly love to have a pet.

I need to know now!!

I've never known a hamster die a natural death but maybe my sibling and I just had a bad run.

I am astonished at these cold stiff hamsters that revive!

Someone did once tell me that small prey animals are programmed not to show that they are ill/hurt so that they don't become visible to predators, so that fromm the outside they look as if they go from fine to dead overnight

My 2 little Russian dwarf hamsters have just died recently ☹️ of old age. They were both over 2.

The last one we knew she was going to die. She had got very thin and less mobile and I was not surprised to find her dead in her bed. She had started sleeping in random places not her nest too just on the floor of the cage with no bedding but when she died she was in her bed. She was still running in her wheel a bit right up to when she died though.

The one who died first it did seem very sudden and she's been gaining weight if anything and appearing her usual self. A bit of Googling led me to conclude it might have been heart failure.

I do miss 'em. Cute little buggers. Undemanding enough for me but charming. DD has grander ambitions and wants us to get a dog now but I was happy with hamsters.

Well she def seems dead rather than hibernating … cold and stiff.

Funny you should say that DougRoss about putting on weight, we were joking that she had chubbed up a lot in recent weeks.

What do you do with them, bury in the garden?