Chin baby safe cage?

Tugaudzius · Aug 20, 2010

Guys, I need your help. Could you guide me where I can get infor of how to make the cage safe for the kits? I know I've read it somewhere but now I can't find it. They will be 4 weeks old on Monday & I think that cat carrier cage is a bit small for them. I'd want them to be able to run around more. We have: 1. a cage that is used in breeding farms - it is bigger but I don't know how to clean it. I know that chinchillas are very sensetive to the smells. So bleach is not an option... 2. we have a rabit cage (pic attached) their mom was in it - needs cleaning as well - the spaces between the wires are too big I believe. Please advise.

rabit_115 · Aug 20, 2010

In order for a cage to be baby safe the wire spacing can be no more than 1" X 1/2". Trust me I have had 6 -7 week old kits move into 1" X 2" wire cage before and I ended up chasing them around the room on more than one occassion. They eventually got put into a different cage.

With the style of cage that your pictured. You can have long spaces, as long as one dimensions is only 1/2". So 3 X 1/2 is fine.

tunes · Aug 20, 2010

You can wrap the cage with hardware cloth and that will should compensate for the large spacing between the bars. Those bars are definitely too wide for little kits to stay inside the cage.

greychins · Aug 20, 2010

I'm with Tunes, hardware cloth works wonders. No worries about kits getting out then.

Tugaudzius · Aug 20, 2010

Thanks guys. No my only problem will be to find a hardware cloth, will look for it tomorrow. Wish me luck. Do you think it is too early to move them to a bigger cage? On Monday they will be 4 weeks old?

greychins · Aug 20, 2010

Some people can find hardware cloth at Lowe's or Home Depot... when I go in, they never seem to know what I'm talking about. I found mine at Tractor Supply near the rabbit cage stuff...

It depends on the cage regarding moving them. You don't want mom to be able to get too far away from them.. like say you moved them to a bigger cage and Mom went and sat on a high ledge that the babies couldn't get to... but a cage with more floor space and not tons of ledges and stuff where mom might "hide" wouldn't be bad.