My wife & I have 1 Chin a standard male "DUKE"
We have had him in the same cage since we've had him, about 1 month.
One of our friends just gave us a larger cage to put him in but he seems
to freak out every time we try to put him in it. They used to keep Ferrets
in the cage. When we got it I washed it out and painted it. Is there some
reason he doesn't like the cage, could it be the fresh paint or the fact that there was a
Ferret in the cage before?
You do not mention how large the cage is and if he is still a baby he
may find it just too much space and become scared and feel insecure
with so much space around him. It may well be that despite your
efforts to make the cage clean and fresh for your little friend,
perhaps their is still an odour of the ferrets on the cage,
which would obviously scare him. Or perhaps it is the odour of
the paint, which if he does not know what it is, he may
find it upsetting.
I would suggest just giving it some time. You have not had him for
very long, so he perhaps needs more time to settle in and feel at home
in your house, before being moved to a larger cage. Other things you
can try is adding to the cage some of the things that are in his
current cage, so he can still smell his scent on them and recognise
the new cage as his, as it has his old playthings in it.
Also if you let him for a free run, you can try placing the new cage
on the floor as he is roaming around and leave the door of the cage
open, so he can explore the new surroundings for himself.
One other point to make is just to check on the type of paint you have
used to paint the cage. You should be aware that your Chinchilla will
chew at the bars of the cage, so if the paint is toxic, it could
possibly make your chinchilla very sick or worse if he actually
digests the paint.
Either way I wish you the best with him and hope that he does take to
the new cage, just give him some time and hopefully all will work out
for the best in a short while!
-Answered by Anjela Ross
I have read that chinchillas will only get along if one is male and the other female. Is this true?
Chinchillas don't have to be in male/female pairs to live together. They can live in same sex pairs as well. It is easiest to get same sex pairs from the same litter. The next best thing is to introduce them in the first week after weaning. Young chinchillas are usually very easy to introduce to one another.
Introducing adult chinchillas can be tricky. Its very important to understand that female chinchillas are dominant. An adult female who has never had a female cage mate may never agree to have one. Male's are pretty easy going and will usually take to another male in time.
It's important to introduce a new chinchilla slowly. Check the CCQ archives for the article on "How to Intrduce a New Chinchilla" to learn the proper way to do this.
-answered by Jamie Huggins
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