What Treats Can Hamsters Eat?

Hamsters eat seeds, grains, small pieces of vegetable and the odd chew as treats, in amounts closer to a pinch than a spoonful. The reason is the animal: a hamster is small, and it carries away whatever it is given.

Seeds, grains and the treat mix

The Merck Veterinary Manual notes that wild hamsters eat both plants and animals, and VCA Hospitals puts a pelleted food made for hamsters at the base of the dish, with small amounts of vegetables and very little fruit. Seeds are the classic hamster treat and the easiest to overdo. Merck advises limiting them because a hamster may eat seeds in place of its pellets, and a seed is small enough that a hamster can carry off a great many.

Check the animal named on the bag. Mixes for hamsters and mixes for other small animals can look alike on the shelf, and the one made for hamsters is cut to a size a cheek pouch can take.

A hamster offered a mix will often pick out the favorites and leave the rest, so a generous mix ends up lopsided in the dish. Measure by the pinch: what you can hold between thumb and two fingers is a treat, and a full spoon is a week of them.

Most hamsters wake in the evening, which is when treats make sense. Offer a pinch by hand just after the lights go down and the hamster is awake and curious, and you teach it that your hand is a place food comes from. The same treat dropped into the dish at noon goes straight into a cheek pouch and into the nest.

Fresh foods in tiny amounts

VCA Hospitals describes small amounts of fresh or frozen vegetables as the usual addition to a hamster's pellets. Cut a sliver of cucumber, carrot or broccoli the size of a fingernail, and expect it to disappear into a cheek pouch rather than get eaten on the spot.

Fresh food spoils in a warm nest. When you clean the cage, check the corners and take out anything that was stashed. A hamster that has been given a whole slice at once tends to bury it, and a buried slice is the one you find days later. Slivers go in a cheek pouch whole and leave nothing behind.

Introduce one fresh food at a time, a few days apart, so you can tell which one the hamster took to. Rinse it and pat it dry first.

Chews and sticks

Wooden chews, hay cubes and seed sticks are sold as treats and toys at once. A seed stick keeps a hamster busy for a long time, and it is also a lot of seed in a single object, so count a stick as a serving of seeds and not as a free toy. That is the trade off: the stick entertains, and the stick feeds.

A plain wooden chew with no dye or flavoring is the simplest kind. Offer one at a time and see which shape the hamster takes to; some prefer a block, some a stick it can drag around.

Chews also give you something to watch. A hamster that works at a wooden block for ten minutes every night has told you what it likes, and you can buy the next one to match.

Hoarding and what it means for portions

The Merck Veterinary Manual notes that hamsters often store food in their cheek pouches or hide it in the cage, so what a hamster takes from your hand is not a measure of what it eats. Clean a cage after a week of treats and you may find the whole week's seeds under the bedding. That pile is the hamster telling you the portion was bigger than the appetite.

Merck also says treats should make up no more than 10 percent of a hamster's diet, which on an animal this size is a very small pile. Cut the next treat in half and see whether the hoard shrinks. If it does, you have found the portion.

Look in the usual places: the corner under the wheel, the back of the hide, a pile under the bedding. Scoop out what is fresh and leave the dry seeds, since a hamster that finds its stash gone may start another. A hamster is not being greedy when it hoards. It is doing what hamsters do, and the portion is your side of the arrangement.

A new hamster will often bolt from a hand. Leave the treat in the dish with your hand resting nearby for a few evenings, then move the treat onto your palm. Patience here pays back as a hamster that climbs on without being picked up.

The hamster treats collection on this site is small today and grows as makers join. Sniff and Shift's freeze dried and air dried treats are made for dogs and cats, so none of them belongs in a hamster's dish. Treats for pet rats covers the closest relative on the shelf, and treats for small pets sorts every small animal at once.

Common questions

Can hamsters eat fruit?

Fruit goes in tiny pieces and not often. VCA Hospitals advises only a minimal amount of fruit beside a hamster's pellets. Cut a piece to the size of a fingernail and check the nest corners the next day for stashed pieces.

How do I tell if my hamster has too many treats?

A hoard in the nest, or seeds left in the dish beside the regular food, are the two signs. Halve the next treat. If the hoard keeps growing, halve it again.

Can hamsters eat the same treats as rats?

Read the label for the animal named on the pack. Hamsters and rats share many foods, but sizes and mixes are made for one animal at a time, and a hamster sized piece is smaller than a rat sized piece.

What chews can a hamster have?

A plain wooden chew with no dye or flavoring is the simplest. Hay cubes and woven grass shapes are the other common kinds. Offer one at a time and see which the hamster likes.