Chinchilla Update
There are lots of sites with information about Chinchillas a few of which are listed on the Chinchilla Links page or try the Chinchillas Unlimited forum. This page has some important information on pneumonia and anorexia in chinchillas and the story of introducing a new chinchilla to one who has been on her own for a while. There is a much more up to date page on feeding your chinchilla in an emergency here.
Fluff's Pneumonia
Fluff has suffered from weepy eyes for almost as long as I have had her. Unfortunately very early on I put this down to a dust allergy and attempted to remove all dust from her cage. This resulted in my not feeding her hay which is a really bad idea - she was getting compressed alfalfa but was not keen.
We had numerous visits to the vet and tried antibiotic and steriod drops at various times to clear the problem. I found that any kind of eye drop actually made the problem worse - this is because it is almost impossible to stop the Chin rubbing their eyes on the floor of the cage and getting dirt in. If you do have to use antibiotic drops I would recommend using a towel on the floor of the cage if you do not have a wire mesh floor and cleaning the cage daily for the week of the drops.
When Spike arrived I think it must have been quite stressful for Fluff to loose part of her cage and have an imposter around. I was also changing her diet at the time to try and clear up the constipation and realised that I had to re-introduce hay. Whatever the cause was she started to get very wet eyes and began to get a bit reluctant to come out and play. A few days later her breathing suddenly became very heavy, she became very constipated and refused to come out at all or hardly eat. We took her straight down the Vets.
The vet x-rayed Fluff and found that she did not have a gut blockage or immediately visible teeth problems (always a possibility with her weepy eyes) but had a slight pneumonia. What followed was a very worrying few weeks. The pneumonia responded very well to antibiotics but she was not feeding herself at all. Apparently if chinchillas stop eating for a few hours their gut stops working and they can just starve to death. I was reduced to feeding her rehydration fluids with a dropper at one point - please note if you do this be very careful because if they inhale fluids it can cause pneumonia.
I took to feeding her 3 or 4 times a day with a mixture of crushed chin pellets in baby milk with a high fibre gel called Questran dissolved in it. She was very good about being hand fed and after a few days would eat off of a spoon. However she still wasn't eating much and was loosing weight rapidly. The vet gave her an injection to start peristalsis and she started to eat sunflower seeds by herself. We then had to make the decision whether or not to have her anaesthetised again so that the vet could examine her teeth properly. We had this done and her teeth were fine - it was a risky thing to do but we couldn't be sure otherwise.
She started to eat again and slowly put on weight. She really looked rough and a I was quite embarrased to let people see her - she looked just like a cruelty case for some weeks. She wouldn't even eat rasins a lot of the time. Introducing her to Spike seemed to improve things no end. He now grooms her coat and her eyes so that she hardly ever looks like she has weepy eyes any more. I thought at first they had cleared up but when we temporarily kept them apart for a while after Spike hurt is leg they got worse again. She now eats Hay and Duggins Chinchilla pellets from Chinchillas 2 Home. She now weighs more than she did before she got ill and runs around like a mad thing and loves her raisins again.
If you have a sick chinchilla please take them straight to the vet. Do not attempt to hand feed fluid or anything else unless the vet has told you to. These days the best thing for sick chins is Supreme Science Recovery (a search on the internet should find somewhere that stocks it) which contains all of the nutrients and fibre that they need.
Introducing Spike
Spike is a silver mosaic chinchilla who I bought back in February. He was hanging on the bars in the cage in the pet shop and I couldn't resist him. I thought that I could get him neutered and it wasn't until I had bought him home and got attached to him that I realised that it was a major operation and I wasn't sure that I wanted to do it until he was fully grown.
So the Chinchilla Cage got divided into two cages and Spike lived downstairs. We introduced them very slowly - the whole process took several months. They could talk to each other through the bars when they were out and would call to each other from their cages. I would put them together on neutral ground regularly. Unfortunately Fluff took to pulling lumps of Spikes fur out. But Spike was growing rapidly and after Fluff was ill she became smaller than him and for a while just couldn't catch him to pull the fur out. He was very good natured and would only have a go back if cornered. One day they just started groomin each other's faces and ears and I knew that the ice had been broken. Unfortunately rather too well as Fluff had just come into season and I was forced to split them up rather rapidly.
Having a male chinchilla around meant that when Fluff came into season there was a lot of noise and bar rattling and I decided that now was the time to get poor Spike neutered. My vet is very experienced at neutering all sorts of small animals including Chinchillas and assured me that they had only lost one guinea pig in 2 years with the new anasthetic machine. When I went to pick him up he looked really miserable and it took a little while to persuade him to eat - this is the most vital thing after anasthetic. He was very dozy for quite a few days and would keep falling off of his box when he went to sleep. I would say that it was about a fortnight before he was back to near normal. My vet hadn't mentioned that they can still get the female pregnant for a month afterwards but luckily we got away with it.
Having Spike neutered improved his relationship with Fluff no end. Because he slowly stopped pestering her for sex she got to tolerate him much better and after a few weeks we converted the cage back to a 3 story condo and put them in together. Now they sit together most of the time and follow each other around when they are out of the cage. Beware though - two chinchillas are not double the trouble they are trouble squared. My skirting boards are completely ruined!! Here they are in their cat basket while I am cleaning the cage out.
There is a good article on introducing chinchillas at the Chinchillas 2 Home site
Stop Press: I've been awarded a Chinchilla Quest 'sites that share' award for this page.
