Storm is put to sleep..

[eringoesmoo]

He was suffering. The vet said there wasn't much hope and that we should put him to sleep, so we did
Here are some pictures. He was the sweetest thing!

[mylittlechinchilla]

What happened to him???

Didn't you just loose another chin too?

I am SO sorry

[mylittlechinchilla]

I just looked up the other thread over loosing another chinchilla...

How long have you had ALL of them?

Did you purchase them all at once from the same person or seperately?

I know you said you had one for 2 weeks and a day or so and it died.. I am SO sorry for your loss but I 'think' I see a pattern here.

You have/had 4 chins, males or females, how old are they and WHERE did you get them.

I'm NOT trying to be rude, I'm only trying to help but I see a 'few' red flags..

[eringoesmoo]

Oh I know, I understand! Well ChiChi and Jazzi live downstairs so they hardly ever see storm. I got them from a hobby breeder in kingsport, That is also where I got Samson and Delilah from. Delilah was pregnant when we got her and she had storm. Lollita was the mistake, she came from a breeder in Atlanta. They shipped her to the pet store. When we picked her up she wouldn't eat, dust, or drink, in fact the whole time we had her she drank half a water bottle and took one dustbath. I called the pet store and breeder and they didn't want to hear it, which made me think I wasn't the first Anyway Lollita and Storm lived upstairs beside my bedroom in a little room (it's very quiet). ChiChi and Samson/Delilah lived downstairs. Chi Chi only saw Lollita once, and it was only for a few seconds, I let them sniff and then I took a picture and that was that. Storm never saw her outside of the cage. Here is where I made the mistake, we are in the process of building a huge wall length cage right now. Storm was in a small cage about 18wx20h or something like that. Lollita had a bigger cage like 18wx26h I think, so we BLEACHED and I mean BLEACHED her cage and threw away everything in it. I guess that had something to do with it  maybe? I'm not for sure. The vet says she thinks it's Giardia, but we payed over 700 dollars and no one could tell us for sure. So we have been extra careful, with sanitizer in EVERY room. We have disinfected the whole house, and everyone seems to be doing great. The vet did say that if anything went wrong to give her a call and she'd check them all for free(the medicine, however, would not be free) Ok so I hope this makes since, if not just ask?

[eringoesmoo]

Oh, and storm got sick exactly a week latter.

[Abby W.]

Just a few comments...

First, I am really sorry for your loss.  Losing a chin is always difficult, let alone two in a short time period.  I am glad you have felt comfortable talking to us on the forum, and I hope everyone has been helpful.

As for the vet and her inability to diagnose your chins...that concerns me, and if I were you I would look for someone with more experience with chinchillas.  Given a fresh fecal sample, (and I mean fresh right from the chinnie's rear end), a good exotic pet veterinarian will be able to definitively say it's giardia or it's not.  The sample has to be tested within two minutes of excretion though or it's no good.  It worries me, however, that your vet couldn't say yes or no on that issue.  She should have been able to obtain some amount of fecal matter from Storm (I think that is the one you said you had taken to her) and conducted the appropriate test.  Also, the $700 cost for treatment of your little guy sounds pretty excessive to me.  That is almost what it cost me to have an emergency
c-section done on one of my pregnant mothers. 

You did the right thing disinfecting Lollita's cage.  I would be careful with bleach though, and not go too crazy with it.  The fumes from the bleach can be damaging and possibly fatal for your chinnies, not to mention they are not exactly good for you.  A light bleach solution is recommended for cage cleaning, and maybe something only slightly stronger would be appropriate for your situation.  I clean my cages with a bleach solution, 1/2 cup of bleach to two gallons of water. 

Just some observations and information.  Again, I am so sorry for all that you've been through.  I hope your remaining chins continue to stay healthy and stable.

[eringoesmoo]

Thank you Abby, we have decided that since we are building a cage we will no longer use that one, even if it is clean. As far as the vet goes there is supposed to be another "exotics" specialist near by, which I need to look into. The funny part about what you mentioned was that the emergency vet said that they recently had to do a c-section on a chinchilla and they charged them 1200 dollars(which I thought was a good deal)

[mylittlechinchilla]

If you will PM me your location, I have a list of vets in each state.

You need a good vet.  I think you may have inquired to me once about a chin, so you may not be too far away.

My last trip to the vet with 2 sick chins, one x-rayed, tests run and also a teeth filing was under $150....