Mikhail J. Bentham

Mikhail J. Bentham is a male Syrian hamster who was put up for adoption at a Petco store after having been badly mauled by other hamsters in the store. Though his physical injuries healed, his psychological ones did not: he became extremely aggressive to humans and it was obvious that he was unsuitable for an average "pet" home. While one might applaud Petco for putting Mikhail up for adoption rather than trying to make a profit off of him at the expense of some poor child, it is important to emphasize something: Syrian hamsters should never be housed with others of their species once they are sexually mature. A solitary, territorial, aggressive species, housing this species together is a recipe for injury or death. Mikhail was very lucky to have made it through his ordeal alive, and should have never been placed in this dangerous situation to begin with.

It is tragically quite common for pet stores to house incompatible animals or even species together for the sake of being able to stock more animals. In addition to the grave risk of physical injury in the store, these habits are often passed on to unwitting pet owners, resulting in injuries and deaths. Male mice (US lines), all varieties of Syrian hamster, pacman frogs, male canaries, countless species of fish, crayfish, and many others are put at risk in pet stores across the country every day, typically unchallenged. Some stores even foster dangerous interspecies pairings, like bettas with guppies or rabbits with guinea pigs. The result is something akin to housing a trained fighting dog with a cocker spaniel puppy: disaster waiting to happen.

Were groupings physically dangerous to animals not bad enough, it is equally common for animals to be housed and sold in improper groupings: finches, degu, female mice, rats, and gerbils are routinely sold singly. Schooling and social fish like otos, cories, guppies, and goldfish are often sold in insufficient numbers to foster natural behaviors. Though the result may not be as dramatic as a sudden mauling death, it makes its mark: when denied proper social groupings, animals become stressed and neurotic, often developing stereotypical behaviors, or abnormal repetitive stress behaviors. Pacing, obsessive digging/wheel running, self mutilation, or simply languishing are all regularly observed in deprived social species.

It is easy to point fingers at pet stores, and indeed they are at least in part liable for housing animals inadequately and being ill-educated on their husbandry. However, the bottom line is that individuals who purchase animals from pet stores, particularly stores demonstrating incorrect husbandry, are directly responsible for the mistreatment by continuing to support it. Every species available in pet stores and more is available either from a responsible breeder, or better still, from a rescue organization. In fact, rescues are inundated with pocket pets and exotics who are purchased without thorough husbandry knowledge, so for every hamster crowded in a cage with others in a pet store, dozens of other hamsters are patiently awaiting homes in rescues that could really use to free up the space that individual caging demands for other needy animals!

So, next time you consider a new pet, Mikhail would like you to remember the following:
1. Always research your companion's social needs. The best cages, toys, and nutrition on the planet mean nothing to a social animal deprived of companionship or a solitary animal stressed by it.
2. Think adoption first; it isn't just dogs and cats suffering a homelessness crisis, but virtually every species in captivity today. Besides, wouldn't you rather have your dollar support animal rescue efforts over animal exploitation?
3. Speak up if you notice fighting. Bring it to an employee's attention; it could mean the difference between life and death. Likewise, if you see a social species languishing in solitude, let the store know what you think. Bad conditions persist only because they are allowed to.
4. Avoid anthropomorphism. One of the reasons that solitary animals like bettas, hamsters, horned frogs, and other species wind up being injured from improper social groupings is that we tend to humanize animals and assume that they, like us, need company. There's nothing wrong with valuing an animal as much as you would a human, but equal respect & consideration does not equate equal needs - do what is right for that species, not your species!