Chinchilla color question

[Daylise]

A few months ago one of my chins passed away. He was nearly 18 years old, but we were still very sad. After a while it was more and more apparent that the other was very lonely. So we ordered a pair of standard grey females but got a couple in a color we aren't sure of. We called them Fiona and Robbie. But for the possibility of letting them have babies we need to know, cause I read if they are both velvet it can easily end deadly for both the female and the babies.

https://imgur.com/a/qxWNfB2

I tried to get good enough pics from both of them. As you can hopefully see, they both have the mask. Plus the typical dark stripes on the front paws. Her belly is dark aswell while his is a light grey (not as the usual white) and the fur from their back doesn't have the usual band.
As far as I found the informations her color could be ebony velvet, not sure about his. But maybe someone with more experience in chinchilla color identification can help me with it. If more pics are needed I can try to take better ones.

 

[Amethyst]

It's hard to tell colors from those pics, the lighting is all over the place so they look different from pic to pic. Fiona looks like possibly a medium ebony and Robbie possibly a dirty standard gray (a standard with a grayish white belly) generally meaning ebony in the mix. I strongly advise against breeding if you don't even know their colors though. Do you even have pedigrees and come from a responsible breeder so you know they come from healthy lines? (I'm guessing no if you asked for two female standards and were given those two) If so their colors as well as their parents and grandparents should be listed at least.

What are you trying to achieve by breeding them? Are their parents violets or violet carriers? Breeding random chins together is a terrible idea. There are a lot of genetic issue that can arise in chinchillas, do you know for sure the breeding lines these two came from are free of genetic issues? There are things that can skip generations as well, so you should have knowledge of at least a couple generations back. Breeding chins is not for the faint of heart, or cheap. If you haven't already I would take a look at the breeding threads especially the stories of what can go wrong http://www.chins-n-hedgies.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=117 and then think if that is really something you can handle.

Personally I would separate the male and female now and hope they haven't mated, put the female in a kit safe cage anyway and watch her for 120 days to see if she gives birth or not. You will eventually need to separate them anyway, otherwise you will end up breeding the female to death. The male needs to be separated from the female shortly before she gives birth or they can breed again, meaning she will be pregnant again while nursing, which can kill her. You will also need to either get the male neutered (very risky and high likelihood of death and a long recovery if he survives) or keep them separate forever at some point. Females can breed until the day they die, but the older she gets the more dangerous it becomes.

 

[Daylise]

Thanks for the feedback.
We will probably neuter him despite the risk cause we would need to get two other chins as partners for them and a second cage for which we don't have enough space. And they really love each other, so seperating them would be mean. I just hope Fiona isn't pregnant yet cause with all the unclearity the risk is just to great to be taken lightly.

 

[aznmexaggie]

They both look like light ebonies. Since you already have them together, the female could already be pregnant and she looks quite young and small so if so, she could have some pregnancy complications and need vet assistance. I’d make sure to have a good vet fund set aside just in case. C-sections can cost around $500-1000 USD so it’s something breeders always have to be prepared for. They should be separated now though. They’ll get over it as it isn’t absolutely necessary for chins to have cagemates. They can be housed in cages near each other but shouldn’t have interaction together until after he is neutered.

 

[Daylise]

They are both pretty young, and she is definetly still growing. Since we got them she grew quite a bit. And atm. we are trying to get the breeder's phone number from the pet shop we ordered them through. There are so many questions which popped up after the wrong delivery. Like the exact age. Because we need to know if Robbie is even old enough to get neutered. We have them for around three weeks now and as I read you can hand them away with six weeks but they aren't old enough to even make babies before they are about four months old. If we are lucky Fiona is still not old enough to even get pregnant. She still watches alot of things my old chinlady does to learn how to chinchilla.