Dirty Ears!

[AZChins]

There's a little chin named Joe here. He's been here since early December as a rescue. He was VERY dirty and extremely emaciated. So far he's put on about 150 grams and is up to nearly 550, he's got a bit to go though - I think he should be around 700 or more. His fur is evening out and losing the orange tint it had to it but his belly is still a little orange.

Today I was talking to him and giving him some scratches and I noticed he had a light yellowish spot on his ear. I thought he got some pee pee on it so I went to clean it up. I use Jojoba oil because it soaks into the ears and is edible in case the chin licks up a little. I dabbed it on and then rubbed the spot. Yeah, the spots came off but so did a bunch of black stuff. I guess I should have cleaned his ears before...but the coating was even over his ears and he just looked like he had darkish ears. Both ears were tremendously filthy...I got them clean but it took a lot of rubbing and just soaking them with the jojoba.

I have seen dirty ears before, but never black flakes like this. Do you think it is possible that people smoked around him or something and made this happen? Or, could he have been THAT neglected - to the point where I have never seen anything like that out of hundreds of chins?

I immediately went and looked at all the other chins to see if I am just missing something. None of them have disgusting dirty ears or anything like that. Joe actually seems pretty happy...his ears are light grey, not black. I'm very angry with the former owner...how hard is it to dust the chin and keep him clean? I don't get this at all. (Not that everyone here is show groomed...they're dusted a couple times a week and I'd never get anything black on them like that!)

 

[CJR]

Oh wow. You should probably find his former owners and pee on them... nasty people. Poor Joe, at least he is in great hands.

 

[AZChins]

He's a super happy lovey chin chin. I love him. He's a little older so *maybe* he'll just have to stay here with me forever.

I really don't want to be face to face with those people. I could feel every little vertebra in his little back...he was so skinny. I'm actually amazed that a chin that skinny doesn't have massive liver damage or kidney failure.

Yeah, the owners deserve to be doused with chin pee pee and then be forced to live with it for a couple months. hehe It is possible that they didn't know better, I suppose. The parrot food and whatever other garbage they fed him was just wrong...maybe they didn't know about chinchillas needing chinchilla food?

 

[Parkerspetchins]

Poor little guy, so glad you have him now! I think feeding crappy chin food is excusable because it says "chinchilla" on the bag at the pet store and you think, yeah, this is the stuff (until you learn that it's crap later). However, feeding a chinchilla bird food? That's just stupid :/.

 

[AZChins]

I see it quite a bit with the rescues. The worst is when they do the "fresh fruits and veggies" diet with no hay, no pellets. There just isn't enough that the chin needs with that...and I am pretty sure that the sugary fruit is why a lot of them end up dying from liver disease and kidney problems. None of that is excusable - feeding hamster food or parrot food is not a good thing. No one thinks it's okay to feed dog food to the cat...or at least that isn't an acceptable thing. It's not alright to give the chins food that is formulated for other species that don't have a digestive system anything like a chin. You would be surprised how many people don't understand that are are shocked when I tell them what the chin really needs.

 

[CJR]

The parrot food and whatever other garbage they fed him was just wrong...maybe they didn't know about chinchillas needing chinchilla food?

:banghead: Please tell me you were being sarcastic? Because... I mean, like Parker said, there is room for forgiveness when people feed "chinchilla" food, it does say chinchilla on the bag... but parrot food? Rodents ≠ birds!!

 

[AZChins]

Sometimes people assume that chinchillas can eat anything. Over the years I have seen people feed nothing but dried fruit, bread, assorted animal foods that are not chin foods, seeds and so many other things because they think that chins can eat these things because other animals eat them. They don't know better, seriously, they think they are GOOD owners because of what they feed the animals. The chins come in underweight, overweight, fur chewed and sometimes their teeth are malformed from poor diet (not just malocclusion, we're talking incisors that grow in misshaped.)

I don't understand how people could get an animal and then not do any research. The thing that I can't understand even more is how people will continue to feed/do really wrong things with the chins after they have been told not to do those things...generally they get angry with me and hang up or yell at me in emails. LOL

 

[starleomach]

Such a sad situation rescuing is such hard work Susan I commend you for it. All I can say for the ears is it may take several cleanings I have never seen ears as dirty as you are describing. At least he is now in good hands

 

[AZChins]

Thanks...I didn't do anything! The chins are the ones that get themselves recovered. I just clean up and give them their food and play with them...trust me, I get a lot more out of it than they do. (i.e. I don't have to have a real job and I get to play with fuzzy chinnies all day!)

I may need to clean off his ears again, there is a little bit of the black stuff on the edges. The oil does a great job at cleaning them up... This is such a cute little guy!

 

[Euphoric]

How awful, I don't know how you do it! Poor little chinnie.

 

[cindyv3737]

Poor little puff ball. Give him lots of hugs and kisses from me. I've never understood how people could treat an animal badly.