Top tips for a healthy and happy chinchilla
Chinchillas are delightful pets, surprisingly friendly and highly inquisitive. They will be happy with their cage located in almost any room in the house, but since chinchillas are nocturnal animals, they will be active for much of the night, so a sleeping area, particularly a child’s room, may not be the best. ideal place.
Once you’ve found a good place for your chinchillas to live (and remember that they like large cages, so they’ll need more space than other small animals like hamsters), what other tips do you need to know to keep chinchillas healthy and happy? ?
Chinchillas are very social creatures and for this reason they do well in pairs. That being said, if you do get two of the opposite sex that become a breeding pair, you should expect to have several litters of baby chinchillas a year. If you don’t have room for a constantly growing population of chinchillas or to house the babies as they mature, find two chinchillas of the same sex.
Because their teeth are always growing, chinchillas will chew on just about anything they come in contact with as a way to keep their teeth in good condition. This means that you need to make sure that anything in their cage is safe to digest and that items outside of the cage are out of their reach. It is not uncommon for a chinchilla to grab curtains or covers and drag them into the cage where they will proceed to shred them. Since they need to be chewed, include items like a tree branch (apple is ideal) or untreated wooden shelves. Half a concrete building block in the bottom of the cage will give your chinchilla something to gnaw on and also a different surface to sit on. Don’t be surprised if this quickly becomes more rounded with the corners reduced to dust!
Chinchillas like to exercise and will enjoy the opportunity to explore outside of their cage under careful supervision. Remember to close the windows and doors of the room you will let them out of and block small openings through which they can explore and escape. They will also take the opportunity to chew on items they find, including baseboards, electrical cords, and loose wallpaper. This can be reduced by close supervision and by protecting vulnerable areas. Alternatively, a ladder can provide a relatively safe place for your chinchilla to run (and climb up and down), as they will spend most of their time outside of their cage hopping, with fewer distractions.
Your chinchilla pet should provide you with years of entertainment, fun, and companionship, and it will appreciate you following these little tips.