Years ago, my daughter's turn to bring the hamster home from school. One morning my wife came upstairs Telling me quietly the Cat had got the hamster.
Urgent action required, hamster put into it's nest box with just a little showing. When my daughter got up over to feed boris, my wife said for her to leave it alone as it seemed to be hibernating.
Wife takes daughter out visiting so that I can take the corpse to the local pet shop & try to get a substitute. Boris had been white with brown patches
so getting a perfect match chances next to nil.
Fortunately the pet shop had a hamster but different pattern & much smaller, it will have to do.
Daughter comes home over to cage, What's happened to Boris? What do you mean I asked innocently, His patches have moved & he's alot smaller (it's a good job hamsters aren't very big or she might have noticed he has also changed sex!).
Well, said I sometimes when hamsters hibernate they shed their skin which can make them seem smaller & the new skin changes colour. She was happy with that, went out to play.
The following Monday my wife takes boris back to
school and explains in confidence to teacher, teacher says boris was an old hamster & when he died they weren't going to replace him so we shouldn't have bothered.
