An ethological approach to housing requirements of golden hamsters, Mongolian gerbils and fat sand rats in the laboratory-A review

When housing hamsters and gerbils little has been done to identify the preferences of these species. The solitary nature of fat sand rats and hamsters is often discordant with housing practices in animal laboratories. This article provides a comparison of the behaviour of wild-living animals with that of laboratory housed conspecifics, focusing on possible problems related to social structure and enrichment. More studies are needed to reveal the impact of group-housing on hamsters and fat sand rats, just as preference studies on possible enriching resources needs to be undertaken in order to optimise the housing conditions of laboratory hamsters, gerbils and fat sand rats.