Because of their need to travel it is important to provide a safe, solid exercise wheel. Exercise is especially important to hamsters and a hamster cage is not a home without one. If you have more than one Golden or Syrian hamster they must be kept in separate hamster cages, at least, once they are over the age of 6 weeks. If you keep older ones in the same hamster cage, serious fighting and injury will result. If you have Chinese or Russian hamsters, these are more sociable creatures and may be kept in hamster cages in pairs of either male or female. Littermates are the best hamsters to pair up.
When considering the bedding to be used in hamster cages it is important to consider how hamsters live in the wild. There must be ample bedding for nesting so they can have some privacy. Peat is an ideal base layer and wood chippings or shavings are also acceptable. Avoid wood that has been treated with preservatives or oil and only use softwood products. On top of this base layer you should add a layer of paper, hay or cardboard. Newspaper can be poisonous so this should be avoided. If you put the paper in whole, the hamster will enjoy shredding and arranging it to his satisfaction. Beware of proprietary bedding as man-made fibres can wrapped around limbs.
Frequent cleaning of hamster cages is essential. Droppings should be cleared out daily and if you put a gnaw proof container in a damp corner this may cut down the amount of soiling. The hamster cage will need a thorough clean out once or twice a week