Chinchilla Tail Biting

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Cole1987

Active member
Joined
Jul 28, 2022
Messages
43
Location
New Jersey
Hello all, my chinchilla Chip recently starting pulling hair out of his tail leaving two prominent bald patches. I don’t think it’s ring worm because he lives with his brother and he has show no signs of tail biting and it is definetly not his brother biting his tail because I’ve seen him do it. He does t seem to breaking any skin just pulling out his tail fur and leaving it around the cage. Does anyone have any experience with this and why it would come on all of the sudden ?
 
Is the skin discolored at all? Sometimes chins will chew and pull fur out when they have pain, and tail injuries are not uncommon. If you think that might be the case, the tail looks swollen or the skin looks red, or any other off color it's best to get it checked out by the vet to make sure there is no break or sprain. Small cuts as well as wood slivers you may not see can also cause pain and itching and become infected, though in that case I would think he would more likely break the skin.

Another common reason I've seen for chewing bald spots on the tail is if you have horizontal cage bars and he sticks his tail out of the cage. Their tail rubbing on the bars can damage and break the hairs in those spots, as well as make it itchy from the broken and out of place hairs, which can cause them to chew at it creating bald spots.
 
Thank you for the reply . His tail looks normal and pink. But he does have horizontal bars on his cage and he does back his bit up to them for some reason when he is sleeping .
 
Cole1987 said:
Thank you for the reply . His tail looks normal and pink. But he does have horizontal bars on his cage and he does back his bit up to them for some reason when he is sleeping .
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Just a follow up: his tail biting got worse and I took his to the vet. The vet suspects ringworm and is doing a PCR test so we are waiting for the results . In the meantime , I was given miconazole to put on his tail to help treat the ring worm . The vet also noticed that his temp was a little high. 101. It may have been from the stress of the vet visit but to keep an eye on it. He showed me how to take the temp rectally but I was not really comfortable doing it myself as I afraid I might hurt him. He also suggested an ear thermometer that they use for pediatrics will work. Has anyone had experience with any of this?
 
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