Bonding with your hamster is the result of a process called "Hand-Training." Hamsters, wild by nature, have been "house-pets" for less than a hundred years. Yet, they still must be caged. Why? Because hamsters are born WILD. If you do not hand-train your hamster, it will STAY wild! "Hand-training" means you are teaching a wild rodent to TRUST you, which results in BONDING.
WHY HAND TRAINING IS CRUCIAL FOR A HAMSTER'S HAPPINESS IN CAPTIVITY:
Wild hamsters live to do the following: Wake up after sundown, groom, eat, drink, run for hours/miles each night, EXPLORING the entire journey, hoard food and bedding along the way, return to nest in the AM, (or build a new one) empty cheek pouches, stash food, eat once more, groom, drink water, sleep all day. (Repeat cycle every 24 hours...) This is all it takes to make a wild hamster happy!
For a "pet" hamster who has never been hand-trained, there is only one option: to be sold, caged for the rest of it's days, and to run in a wheel each night, going nowhere- ever. It's curiousity is stifled, it's freedom stolen against it's will, and this large "Human" that he desperately tries to hide from is constantly lurking around his cage.... He cannot even sleep soundly, because the human makes him nervous... What a life...
This is what most pet hamsters have to look forward to-- NOT because people are purposely cruel to them, but simply because they do not know the missing link between keeping a hamster prisoner, and keeping a vibrant, tame, active hamster--- is a thing called "Hand Training." So.... Now that we have established what can happen to a hamster who never is able to bond to it's owner, let's get to that missing link- and make our hamster's little lives worth living.
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