Owning a hamster is a fantastic experience, and there are few drawbacks. They are usually happy enough on their own, albeit even more thrilled when you decide to get them out and play with them. As long as you stay on top of food and water, your efforts need to extend no further ? until the time comes to clean out the cage.
We covered hamster bedding recently, and it is no secret that this is often the most challenging part of the cleaning job overall. However, the whole cage usually needs a tidy to keep the little guy both happy and healthy.
As we have covered elsewhere, you should clean out the cage as often as you can ? most people feel that once each week is ideal, and once a fortnight is about as long as you can leave it, even if you have a larger cage.
In a recent feature on hamster cage sizes, we suggested starting small and building outwards with a kit like the Kaytee CritterTrail Two. We stand by that recommendation as it stands out among the most flexible and downright enjoyable hamster habitats that you could possibly hope to lay your hands on. However, while we love it, and you will too, it is nowhere near the most accessible cage to clean.
What Makes a Hamster Cage Easy to Clean?
Given what we just talked about, it is perhaps easier to say what makes a hamster cage challenging to clean. The beauty of the Kaytee CritterTrail range comes from the fact that you are only limited by your imagination. However, you can soon find yourself with a bit of trouble and having to take things apart to reach various bits of dirt, food and worse!
Effectively, complex rarely means easy to clean, and you will have a better time of things if you keep it simple when you choose the cage. You?ll have to sacrifice the expansion potential to keep everything nice and easy when it comes to cleaning time, and we have taken a look at some of the best cages for anyone that wants to make it as easy as possible to freshen up your hamster?s home.
The main considerations include:
- Easy access. If you cannot reach a particular part of the cage, you?re less likely to be able to clean it effectively. This is why expansion kits are the antithesis of this feature, as fiddly parts that are designed to connect in all sorts of ways can leave you scrambling around for a small vacuum fitting or bending your fingers in a way they were not designed for.
- Liquid resistant. There are various wooden hamster cages out there that look great and work really well too. However, unless treated particularly well, they are often susceptible to being gnawed and also won?t take too kindly to any kind of wet clean.
- Solid structure. The majority of hamster cages combine a plastic bottom with a wire top. If you find that much of your time spent cleaning the cage involves cleaning around it as much as in it, you may want to consider an aquarium hamster cage instead. It cuts down on your pet?s ability to climb around for obvious reasons, but it can serve to keep both odours and debris in the cage rather than spread around the surrounding surface.
The Best Easy-Clean Hamster Cage
If you are happy to spend on your hamster and want him to have a great time both in his cage and out, then we would look no further than the Rosewood PICO Hamster Home. As you?ve probably noticed on the site in the past, we?re big fans of allocating as much space as possible to your pet, and the Rosewood is considered an extra-large hamster cage for a reason.
As is often the case, it expands upwards rather than outwards, ensuring plenty of natural climbing space between the bars and trails. It also includes just about everything that you could possibly want from within your hamster cage, including a wheel, bottle and food bowl.
Last update on 2020-03-19 / Affiliate links / Images from Amazon Product Advertising API
What we particularly like about this cage, and what warrants its position at the top of this ranking is the fact that all of the components are attached directly to the cage. When the time comes to clean it out, you simply transfer your hamster into its ball or another container, remove the lid, and you?re good to go. The base is always the most challenging part to clean, and you?ll have free and easy access to it without any difficulty at all.
The one area that would ordinarily be tricky to manage ? the bedroom ? opens up independently too so you can really get in there, change the bedding and refresh any food that your pet may have stored away out of sight.
We love being able to personalise cages, so it also helps that it comes in silver and pink variants, as well as the one featured here. When it is this easy to clean, the colour matters as it will have every opportunity to show through, so you will not want to miss out!
The Aquarium Hybrid Easy-Clean Hamster Cage
While the Rosewood model sticks with tradition, if you want the aquarium style without plumping for an actual aquarium, the Little Friends Mayfair Gerbilarium Cage is supremely highly regarded and checks all the boxes we look for in an easy-clean hamster cage.
Last update on 2020-03-19 / Affiliate links / Images from Amazon Product Advertising API
It is large enough for any breed of hamster, and we know of some people that use it for even larger pets. It stands out through the fact that the base is overly large, all but guaranteeing that bedding and food will remain where it is supposed to be rather than all over the floor. At the same time, if your hamster decides its time to climb or just fancies a change of scenery, a quick scamper will take him to the second floor, which benefits from a more traditional design.
There are two doors on this cage, so you do not necessarily need to remove the top entirely if you?re just there for some spring cleaning. Importantly, they are easy enough for a person to open but will remain firmly in place if your hamster tries to make his way out.
The wooden extras with this cage mean that they are easy on the eye, although some hamsters will be tempted to go to work on them to keep their teeth in check. This can be delayed or avoided altogether through the use of hamster chews and other toys. If you have a good eye for the right kind of toy, you can make it far more appealing than the ramps and other fixtures here and keep the cage going for longer.
Even something as simple as a hamster log cabin at the bottom of the cage should catch the eye of your hamster before he gets to work on the bits he shouldn?t be chewing.
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