And people say abortion is wrong.

My hamster is eating its babies, why?

'Occasionally a female may eat her own babies. This is not common and there is usually a reason for this behaviour. The most common reason is the breeding of a very young female (under 4 months of age).

The female is quite simply too immature to cope with rearing a litter and destroys the babies. This often happens with females that are pregnant when bought from a pet shop and only 5-10 weeks of age. Therefore it is always best to buy a female from a shop that has the males and females in separate cages as to buy a young pregnant female can be particularly distressing for young owners who find that their hamster gives birth and then proceeds to destroy the litter.

Other reasons which may cause a female to destroy her own litter are ill health of the babies (she will destroy sickly babies rather than waste effort trying to raise them), extremely large litter (she may reduce the litter size and only rear the number she feels she can cope with), disturbance (she may feel threatened by something nearby), poor condition or health of the female and interference (touching the babies and changing their scent may lead her to believe the babies are not her own but intruders to be killed).

If a female is destroying her litter it is best to leave her alone to settle and try not to disturb her too much. Feeding high protein foods such as cheese, scrambled egg, etc may help her to cope with rearing the litter. If she continues to destroy the litter fostering (see below) may have to be considered if possible.'