New chinchillas help

Chinchilla & Hedgehog Pet Forum

Help Support Chinchilla & Hedgehog Pet Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

KateJ

New member
Joined
Jul 17, 2016
Messages
4
Hi, today I brought home my two new chinchillas who are a boy and girl from the same litter and are at 12 weeks old. I was always planning on getting the male castrated but not straight away as I have heard it is risky and he is still quite young, however he is already starting to try and mate. Should I be worried about this for the time being?
Thank you
 
You need to separate them now and keep them separated until he is castrated. Chins have been known to breed as early as 2 months for the male and 3-4 months for the female. Yes, you need to be worried and you need to separate them. Also be aware that any surgery for a chin is a risk - they do not handle anesthesia well and often times do not recover well. Be sure that is what you want to do and that you have an experienced vet to do the procedure.
 
You need to separate them ASAP.
Rather than neutering him, just separate them. A neuter on a chin is not a simple procedure like it is for other animals. Not only is it incredibly risky to put a chin under for anything, but you risk infection and antibiotics are hard on their little bodies.
Someone here neutered their chin and he almost died due to infection.
Others have tried it and their pair ended up ruined because of the separation for the recovery period(you can't just neuter and throw him back in, you have to cage him alone for a bit while he heals).

Rather than risking your chins life just to keep him with his sister, just buy another cage. You won't forgive yourself if you lose him over this. Chins do fine caged on their own, and you can buy same sex friends if you're worried.
 
Thank you for your replies they were very helpful! Is she not able to stay with him until she starts going into heat? Just to avoid another move straight after one has already happened


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
I neutered my previous chinchilla and it was NOT worth it. He almost died due to an infection from chewing his stitches, and they MUST be seperated for at least a month until he heals and it will break the bond. You will have to reintroduce them and they may decide they don't want to be friends anymore or worse attack eachother. It took me several months before I was able to get my male and female to accept eachother again. I seriously caution you against a neuter. I will NEVER neuter again.
 
I have no idea when my chins are in estrus. It happens when it happens. You would most likely never know when your little girl is and it takes, and I'm not kidding, just long enough for the male to hop on her and the deed is done. Seconds at the most.
 
Seeing as females can go into heat as young as 12 weeks now is when she could be able to breed (breeders tend to ween males at 8 weeks to avoid issues). Obviously she is too young so shouldn't be allowed to breed and pregnancy could kill her, but it's physically possible, meaning it's possible she has already bred with her brother (so keep an eye out for that in 111 days). I agree with not neutering, it's a major surgery, the testicles of a chin are pretty much internal, so they need to cut the chin open to get to them (like they have to do if a testicle doesn't descend on a cat or dog). Also as already said going under anesthesia is dangerous, but even if the chin survives the surgery, recover can be difficult. Chins in pain are known to not eat, so you will have to be prepared to hand feed the chin every few hours 24 hours a day until it eats on it's own. Also there is no health benefit for neutering chins, unlike cats and dogs, so it's a needless surgery if the chin is healthy, for the hope they will still get along after the recovery. I'm also pretty sure it's at least 8 week (2 month) before all the sperm is out of the system, so recovery time may be one month for healing up, but 2 months before reintroducing can happen.

I'm sorry if you already know this, but some people seem to think neutering is beneficial and a routine surgery even on chins, which it's not.
 
Back
Top