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This pocket sized booklet is part of a wider pet care series. It helps to date the development of hamster care products as it pictures both Rotastak and Habitrail and mentions the plastic hamster playball as 'a recent introduction'. It also mentions Grey hamsters as new. This book is illustrated with coloured pencil drawings of different varieties which are sometimes oddly coloured (for example the 'cream' hamster is shown as pale lemon yellow instead of a rich pinkish apricot). It has some advice which contradicts the majority of other hamster care books such as feeding crisps as a treat or giving newsprint as nesting material. It recommends the NHC for showing pedigree hamsters and suggests that others be shown in a pet class.
This booklet has no date but says both that the RSPCA is 160 years old and that it was founded in 1824. It illustrated with both black-and-white photos and with orange humourous line drawing illustrations.
The booklet is very keen to point out that the RSPCA does not condone the keeping of caged animals as pets, but basically realises that people will do so anyway and therefore the booklet can at least give some basic advice to increase the welfare of these inevitable pets.
Despite looking a little aged to the modern eye, this booklet is very forward-thinking compared to many hamster books of the same period and contains advice on minimum cage size for a Syrian hamster being 75x40x40cm and the unsuitability of cotton-wool bedding (etc) even whilst it is also advertising Rotastak (albeit a large set-up) and saying that 'sometimes' same sex syrian siblings from the same litter could be housed together permanently.
The vast majority of this book describes a single Golden Hamster lifecycle, illustrated by full colour photographs of many golden hamsters living in a cut-away burrow (a little like an ant farm/wormery). A small pet section at the end briefly deals with issues not covered in the life of the wild hamster, such as caging, and mention of other hamster types (European and fancy Syrian hamster varieties). Contains a brief children's glossary of biological terms used ("rodent" "territory" "sperm" etc).
Illustrated by Nick Sharatt, published by Dinosaur.
This pretty book describes hamster care for younger children with a strong emphasis on empathy - the text is direct and focused, covering all the usual basics of day-to-day care but justifies/describes each aspect in terms of 'If you were a hamster you would like/prefer/not like....' rather than as orders from an authority figure to the reader.