I hope this kind of frugal DIY is allowed here! I'm in the UK, and recently got a 9-week-old syrian hamster. I put him in the cage I'd previously kept dwarf hamsters in, but quickly realised it was too small. I did some research and found that syrian hamsters need 2350 square cm of floor space as a minimum! The shopkeeper told me they didn't need much space at all. I started looking at cages in local shops and online, but all the cages were so small! The only suitable cages were £250+ and postage was astronomical. I found a guide online on how to make a 'bin cage', and ordered the 145 litre Really Useful Box from amazon. It has just over 5000 square cm of floor space, and the plastic is thick so it can withstand the weight of bedding. I found some photos online of people using the 84 litre box as a cage, but that didn't prepare me for how huge the 145 litre would be!
It is massive - to put it into perspective, that wheel is 30 cm in diameter. We used a hot knife to make a hole for the neck of the water bottle, and also to cut rectangles in the lid for ventilation.
I also made a house out of lollipop sticks by following tutorials I found online. (His wheel isn't in these pictures because he broke it in the first night, but it will be back soon).
He also got a frugal sand bath which is a £3 box from The Works with the hinges unscrewed and lid removed. The most expensive thing in his tank is the wheel, and the tank itself came to £44. It felt like a lot to spend on a box, but it's so much less expensive than what you find in a shop!
The bedding I use is a mix of Carefresh Ultra, which is pretty expensive at £6.50 per bag, and aspen dust-free sawdust from my local pet shop, at £2.99 a bag. I mix these together and add Pets at Home's own brand recycled paper bedding which I think is about £1.50 a bag. I'm not frugal with his diet, but at only £6 a bag (which lasts him months) he is a very cheap pet to keep!
January 09, 2017 at 04:19PM
