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46

Health / Re: Diet or not to diet?

« on: December 02, 2014, 09:56:01 AM »

He eats plenty. I just saw some stuff on overweight chins getting health problems, but I think that's due to too many treats. I think.

He eats more hay too now that I've changed brands. Oh, and I found out why he tramples hay... IT'S MY FAULT. yeah... turns out that he always pees in the same spot, and I hadn't been changing his litter tray often enough, so he was all like "ewww... smelly!!!" so he kept trying to bury that spot under layers of hay.
Smart guy.
Smarter than his stupid owner!
Changing his litter regularly now, 90% reduction in trampled hay! ...zzz feeling guilty now... oh well, live and learn...

47

General Chat / Re: Chinchilla wheels

« on: December 02, 2014, 09:52:44 AM »

People say they have no problem with the vertical wheel ones, but I decided to play it safe and built the Ikea wheel, it's horizontal, aka flying saucer style. Overall, I think it's actually CHEAPER to build your own, Popsicle absolutely loves his wheel, and I didn't follow the instructions just made it by using industrial glue to stick the lazy susan onto some inclined pieces of wood, so it was very low effort.

Overall, people are ALWAYS posting on this board about chinchilla health problems, and not one person has posted about the wheel causing back problems. So it seems PRETTY safe.

48

Health / Diet or not to diet?

« on: December 01, 2014, 05:54:05 AM »

Hi, Popsicle seems to eat quite a bit, I read online that you should feed about 20g of pellets, but some sites say that chins will not overeat the standard pellets (I use Hachi).
I was giving him unlimitted pellets and hay since guides generally say unlimitted pellets for under 1 year old/ still growing, but now he's about 1 year old, should I reduce the amount of pellets he gets?

49

General Chat / Re: Tips for Chinchilla Playtime!

« on: November 21, 2014, 05:16:23 AM »

I gave up on teaching popsicle "no"... he's being selectively stupid about being disciplined/trained.

At one point I decided to be less subtle, and when he chewed on wires I reached over and smacked him a little. He barely acknowledged it and went back to nibbling. I smacked him again on his side, and he turned, gave me a look that made me think I was imagining him saying "hey, roughhorsing is fine but you're overdoing it mate!". ... I THOUGHT I had just imagined it... he went back to chewing, 3rd smack, and he stopped, gave me a look which clearly said "IT WAS ON PURPOSE???" and then he gave me a glare, then he ran back across the room, went into his cage, and sulked in his metal cooler house. Utterly completely sulked.
...
I gave up.

50

General Chat / Re: Sleeping in the open?

« on: November 19, 2014, 02:18:41 AM »

Who has a smart chinchilla?
And what shows that the chin is smart?

51

General Chat / Re: Chin drawing blood

« on: November 18, 2014, 09:35:38 AM »

IMHO, lifting and restraining/cuddling should be the LAST items on the "taming" menu...

ie, start small and work your way up.

Get a new chin used to you being in the general vicinity.
After a day or two, get him used to you speaking to him.
Then offer him a treat. Start off by placing the treat at a neutral distance between you then back off and let him take it. Eventually you get them taking the treat from you.
After a bit, show them the treat, put it on your hands, let him crawl up to take it.
Lie down, put treat on tummy, and let them take the treats from you.
...
And, at the end of the day, some chins are just uncomfortable being restrained... they might tolerate it, but they won't enjoy it.
And some chins are apparently scared of heights.

52

General Chat / Re: Sleeping in the open?

« on: November 18, 2014, 09:26:04 AM »

Popsicle doesn't hide from people... what he does hide from, strangely enough, is sunlight. He is fine with the flouroscent lights that keep my room lit, but he will take any hiding spot that lets him avoid being exposed to sunlight. Huh.

53

General Chat / I'm a bad parent!!!

« on: November 18, 2014, 05:25:57 AM »

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PGJqtIeukMI

... looks like he's still too young to hear the truth... Someday I'll have to come clean though...

54

General Chat / What ethnicity is everyone?

« on: November 02, 2014, 10:25:34 AM »

As for me?

I'm CHIN-ese.

55

General Chat / Re: Playtime/wheel time?

« on: October 02, 2014, 04:29:50 AM »

I'd add one more opinion... if you put the wheel in, give them extra food.
...
I've never seen human children be small cause of being too active when young... unless it's extreme, or if they don't get enough food to keep up with their exercise.

56

General Chat / Re: Chinchilla in pain?

« on: September 25, 2014, 03:47:49 AM »

If she landed on all fours, just inspect her paws one by one, if none of her legs are injured, then she probably did do a perfect landing, as you said. Unless she fell badly and landed on her head or upside down or something, 4 feet seems a comfortable height for chins to jump down from. ... Well not so sure for a 4 month old kid though.

57

General Chat / Re: Oops! I'm a bad daddy...

« on: September 25, 2014, 03:43:57 AM »

Mounting is a bit more extreme than mere grooming and that usually brings, let's just say, quite undesirable behavior. Stroking your chinchilla down the length of his back may provoke that if you are not careful. If you copy your chinchillas grooming motions he'll usually groom you back. (Personally I do that with my fingers, not my mouth, but that's just me!)

Please elaborate!
Yeah, my preferance is hands too, but Popsicle seems to think I'm his same species, so he's happiest when treating me like he would another chin. Or something. I dunno. Like he likes to make a game out of playing tag or hide and seek, and will pretend to be surprised or startled when I catch him out in the open and jump and make a frenzied dash to a hiding place. Then when I go and find him, he'll come out on his own, give me a "we're buddies!" look, bump noses with me (like a chinchilla version of fistbumping), and then it's back to playing hide and seek.
... He's a real character... lol...

58

General Chat / Re: Oops! I'm a bad daddy...

« on: September 24, 2014, 01:07:35 PM »

So... I'm a good daddy? YAY!!!

... and Popsicle thinks I'm a chinchilla too eh. ... well, yeah, I suspected as much. Other than chin scratches, his favorite form of cuddling seems to be when I rub my face on his fur (on his back usually) or nibble his ears with my lips. He's very receptive to my picking him up after his dust bath and stroking excess dust out of his fur. And he gets me to remove shed tufts of hair. ... He think's I'm his roommate/ herd mate/ whatever a fellow chin is called; and that I'm grooming him, right. ... well, I *am* grooming him, so, erm, yeah.

So, I always wondered whether he was mounting my hand or such but I've figured out he's grooming me back. lol. ... lol, after I yawn and get tears on my face, he'll come up to me and wipe away my tears, he's such a sweetheart!

59

General Chat / Oops! I'm a bad daddy...

« on: September 23, 2014, 10:54:27 AM »

So, today Popsicle was nibbling on me and he bit me too hard so I told him "ouch!" and I told him to be more gentle. And he gave me an apologetic look and resumed nibbling MUCH softer, so I petted him and called him good boy.

...

When I shared this incident with my mum, she was like "Shouldn't you teach him not to bite people at all?"

...

DOH!!! Me is a bad parent!!! OOPS!!!

60

Health / Re: Are peas and tomato juice dangerous for chins?

« on: September 21, 2014, 07:53:28 AM »

in response to:

I hardly have free time, but I'll try to make a vet appointment tomorrow I guess? ... though, by tomorrow, everything would have already gone through his digestive system already, so if no problems come up by tomorrow it's likely that I had a narrow escape?

if something is wrong, i would suggest you make time. i'm not saying this to be mean, but when chins get bad diareeah, or gas, it can go downhill every quickly.

Too true. I didn't mean I was procrastinating, it was 9pm my time when I wrote that message, so no vets were available. I meant I would cancel my other appointments and take Popsicle to the vet.
...
But as it turns out, he ate plenty of dinner that night, and has been 100% back to normal since then, so yeah, maybe he just splashed around in the stuff and he decided it tasted too sour or something. Either that or it didn't do any harm. Regardless, I'll make sure it doesn't happen again! Eeek.

So glad all is fine after all. Oh, btw, his droppings were perfectly normal as well, yeah if anything was amiss it would have been time to go to the 24 hour emergency vet or even the 24 hour human clinic... (even human doctors at private clinics will treat a sick animal if you throw enough money at them...)