Features of the winter white hamster include a typically thick, dark grey dorsal stripe and furry feet.

In captivity, this does not usually happen as animals maintained as pets are generally housed indoors and exposed to artificial light that prevents the recognition of short winter daylengths.

In the wild, they originate from the wheat fields of Kazakhstan, the meadows of Mongolia and Siberia, and the birch stands of Manchuria.

Winter white dwarf hamsters are common as pets in Europe and North America, and exhibit greater variance in their coats than those found in the wild.

They reproduce often—more so than Syrian hamsters, and as they have no fixed breeding season, can continue to produce some numbers of offspring all year round.

The average lifespan of the winter white dwarf hamster is one to three years in captivity, though they can live longer.

[16][17] The bright coat the bottom extends to the shoulders, flanks, and hips in three arches upward.

It is distinguished from the darker fur on the top of the existing black-brown hair, three curved line.

Other colorations are available, but these are strongly suspected to appear only in hybrid crossings with Campbell's dwarf hamsters.

[9] Moulting both run jobs on the head and the back of the spine to the sides, the legs and the underside.

[22] The change to the winter coat can be triggered in the summer by the short day lengths.

[9] The hamster digs tunnels one metre deep leading to ground burrows where they can sleep, raise their young and hide from predators.

[23] In 1968, the first four examples of the hamster were caught in Western Siberia and brought to the Max Planck Institute in Germany.

[13] Winter white hamsters are often found on the pet market in Europe, Japan, and North America.

They can also receive injury in the cheek pouch by sharp objects damaging the fragile inner lining.

This is done as a survival strategy to produce large numbers of offspring in a short period of time.

Hamsters maintained indoors that get artificial illumination during autumn and winter are likely to breed all year round, whereas in the wild and in animals maintained in captivity but under entirely natural light-dark cycles, breeding is restricted to the long days of spring and summer.

The male usually hides in holes or caves to escape the vicious bite of the female.

In addition, the widespread breeding and distribution of hybrids could threaten the existence of both pure species and subspecies of the ecosystem, resulting in only mongrels.

Hybridizing causes each litter to become smaller and the young begin to form congenital problems.