Tuesday, February 17, 2015

Do Hamsters Fart?

I've just been asked by a friends 7 year old, Do hamsters fart?
Bob, their hamster, loved Brussels Sprouts which is the reason for the question...

To be honest I have no idea if hamsters fart or not but thinking about it, I guess they do.
Hamsters are monogastric omnivores like humans and dogs and they have a very similar digestive system to us, only much smaller!

I've been using my Bargain Books as a laptop tray but now I can actually use it for reference!

The text is in Slovak and Latin (we learn all our anatomy in Latin here) and you can see hamster have a cecum;
labels 20-21 (29 is the back leg) in the first image and 16-18 in the second image (27 is the back leg).
The cecum is a blind ended sac for microbial fermentation, a bit like a cul-de-sac, in which bacteria help enzymes break down plant matter such as cellulose.
A byproduct of this reaction is gas, which I guess means, Yes... Hamsters do fart!

If anyone reading this has any thoughts, please feel free to comment!

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