Why is the fur falling off my dwarf hamster?
I have a russian dwarf hamster which about 6 months old. Starting when he was four months old, his fur began to look a little "patchy", but we figured it was from all the scratching he had started doing shortly before we noticed the start of the fur issue. After a couple weeks of increased itching/scratching, more obvious fur loss was apparent. Mostly around his rear legs/hind quarters. We took him to a local vet who performed some "scrapings" for tests. They checked for mites and some sort of fungal culture. Both tests came back negative. They didn’t know where to go from there so we waited another week and a half to see if the condition changed and it only got worse. (more scratching and more fur loss, now on the belly too)
We then went to another vet who claimed to be an exotic pet specialist. He repeated the same tests as the previous vet and came back with the same exact results. (negative) He said it could be from an allergy to the bedding (aspen chips) or possibly a nutrional deficiency. We changed out our hamster’s bedding to a non-allergenic, organic bedding and bought some highly recommended food just for hamsters. It has now been almost 3 weeks since seeing the second vet and our poor hamster looks like he’s going bald in big patches. He’s still very friendly, lively and playful, but his unsightly pink bald spots look very dry and tender. And yes, he’s still scratching frequently. We’re not sure where to turn next. Does anyone have any suggestions??
Thanks in advance.
Dale
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