I'm slightly worried about Tiddles.

Is it (I'm deadly serious) normal for hamsters to have no fur on their belly? I suppose because they don't posess legs as such ( they only seem to have feet) their bellies scrape on the ground threfore making short work of their undercarriage fur.

Am I right, or should I call a doctor?

Well here (http://www.petwebsite.com/symptom.htm) is an online list of symptoms for almost every hamster ailment you can think of.

Fur loss is listed as caused by amongst other things, some kind of allergy, is there anything the poor little mite is allergic to?

But just to be on the safe side I'd wip it to t'vets on Monday for a check up :)

SM,

I think your Tiddles is suffering from the same affliction as us humans suffer from.

BCS (Bare Cheeks Syndrome).

Symptoms include a bald patch on each ar5e cheek. (check for yourself).

Caused by friction and pressure.

More prevalent in Forum members who spend 8 hours or more per day seated at the dreaded PC.

BCS can also effect the heads (top centre) of married men who have two or more kids.

In the case of Tiddles you must encourage him/her to run faster (a pet cat should help with this) because the faster a hamster runs, the longer its legs become. Try it and see.

Hope this goes some way to ease your concerns SM.

A belly-toupe may ease Tiddles' embarrassment.:thumbsup:

Try rubbing a little wheatgerm oil onto his fur, on his belly and also the part of his body that he grooms the most, so he also ingests it. The vitamin E among other things does work wonders for a healthy coat and in my experience with cats, helps fur grow in bald patches

Thanks everyone.

I'll phone the vet's up on Monday, that's my best bet.

hamsters (http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=fadeeva.com/Beasts/hamsters.jpg&imgrefurl=http://fadeeva.com/a48.html&h=375&w=500&sz=23&tbnid=JRjKT8yRGDMJ:&tbnh=95&tbnw=126&start=68&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dhamsters%26start%3D60%26hl%3Den%26lr% 3D%26ie%3DUTF-8%26sa%3DN)

If it will make Tiddles feel any better, show him/her this.