Do hamsters usually have such enormous balls?

[sandyballs]

Or is my Syrian unwell? They've always been quite large but over the last couple of days they look huge and he doesn't seem comfortable. When he walks they're kind of dragging along behind him. He is quite young, approx 9 months. I notice the area around his tail looks swollen too. Other than this he seems fine, eating and drinking ok and lively.

Yes, they do. If he's otherwise well in himself, then he's probably fine.

I once had a hamster who started having the most enormous balls, concerned I took him to the vets who said they might be swollen (in hindsight, they didn't have a clue), so they gave him an injection and advised me to give him a could compress every day. I did this diligently, but his balls did not get any better, in fact they seemed to be getting worse.

So my parents took the hamster to their vets, and the vet almost fell about laughing when he heard. Turns out, hamsters keep most of their balls inside of them, but my hamster was lazy, and used to let them out. Turns out he quite liked the cold compresses, so I stopped them immediately, and strangely his balls got smaller again. From time to time, he used to let himself swing loose, but held them in most of the time.

Our current hamster likes to sit on his balls and use them as a table .

The vet told us, in human terms the proportion of a hamster's balls on a human would be like having them down to your knees.

They are generally huge.

Yes.

Years ago dh called me up to see dd's hamster, said it was unwell and needed to go to the vets. Told me it had a massive "growth/tumour".

Oh how I laughed. . Typical big bollocks hamster.

Yes. They tend to descend more when the hamster is hot.

Thanks both of you, very reassuring. They just seem so out of proportion to the rest of his body, poor love. DH suggested introducing him to a lady hamster to ease the problem!!

That's interesting about hot weather. I thought being a Syrian hamster he'd be ok in this heat wave but he struggles to sleep in the day at the moment.

Mine are struggling in this heat too. We've had to bring them downstairs as the bedrooms are just too hot for them. I suspect it's nothing more than the heat.

Very reassuring thread! DD got a new hamster last week and he has suddenly developed enormous testicles. Very well in himself but does look like he's struggling to walk. I'm guessing a combination of it being spring and hot weather.