There’s a new office pet in town and it’s Murray the Syrian hamster. He’s just over two months old and is cute and furry.

Murray likes broccoli, pumpkin seeds, and running in his wheel. Kind of like most hamsters then, wouldn’t you say?

The Life and Times of Murray the Hamster

As we noted in our pet hamster guide years back, it takes a week or two to properly settle your little bundle of joy into your home.

They’re very timid at first. But once over this, they’ll be bossing you about expectantly for food and entertainment.

And now, with Murray we named him after the legendary Murray Walker. And there’s also a nod there to Murray the Skull, a favourite character of ours.

And although hamsters, they do have different ways of doing things to get used to. As we’ve been finding out.

Murray’s Hamster Personality Traits

Murray the hamster immediately took a shine to his flying saucer hamster wheel.

We also bought him a bigger wheel and he spends most of his time running on one or the other. The rest of the time he’s obsessed with food and foraging.

Murray is friendly and was sort of half tame when we got him. Definitely the hamster to most rapidly be happy to put up with us.

He also quickly took to various foods we’ve been offering him. Including:

• Broccoli (which he goes mental for).
• Pumpkin seeds.
• Raisins.
• Red pepper.
• Mushroom.

Initially, Murray couldn’t tell the difference between our hand and food. Which meant he felt he could bite violently into us thinking it was edible.

We still have a scar on our thumb from this. Thankfully, he’s since realised we’re not that sort of object.

And instead he’s now scurrying up to the cage doors to say hello to us. Or demand food from us, more likely.

Murray’s Hamster KPIs

Murray now has a set of quantitative and qualitative key performance indicators (KPIs) to meet ahead of Q2 in 2021.

Being a hamster is demanding stuff. A lot of pressure comes with it. As such, we want to see the following from him in the months ahead:

• Much consumption of organic pumpkin seeds.
• Total mastery of hanging upside down from the cage roof.
• 100% cessation of biting owner’s hands under the belief it’s food.
• Must improve current crepuscular habits, a waking time of 10pm is a bit off.

We have every confidence Murray, with all his guile and determination, will be able to succeed as a hamster.

Hamster-Based Conclusion

Murray is off to a strong start and we provide him with 4/5, minus a point for biting Mr. Wapojif’s thumb under the belief it was hamster chocolate.

Correction of this error in future will result in full marks.

Murray has a long road ahead of him. But with broccoli and pumpkin seeds on his side, he should flourish as a rodent and become a living legend.