Picture of the week

This is actually not what you think it is.  Get your mind out of the gutter you dirty pig!  Actually this is a typical hamster behavior of sniffing each other out.  There are a few Russian dwarf hamsters that live amongst the Blodgett Communal.  Once in a while they are let out and allowed to interact.  Typically what happens is they ignore each other for the first few minutes.  Then they gradually get closer and sniff each other out sort of like dogs do.  They ignore each other some more looking for food crumbs and interesting things to put in their pouches to take back to the cage.  They usually end up sniffing each other again and then one of them tends to sit atop the other like in this picture.  This is not a mating thing as they are both male.  It's actually more like a hierarchical zone establishment of who's the boss.  Here Mr Chip (brown) has proven his man's worth over gentle Rabbit (white).  At this point we see aggression as Mr Rabbit doesn't like smelly Chip on top and this is when the little fuzz balls go back in the cage or when one of them is tossed aside and fighting ensues. Interesting habit's little dwarfs have.