Good Afternoon! Salutations from NJ! We are new owners of Chinchillas, all gray, varying shades and sizes. We named them Biggie, Blaze, Zippy and Tesla. They are all of the same litter, all brothers. My daughter had a big weight on picking the names, they're simple but that's fine, they're all identifiable by their names. There are 2 who are heavyset and 2 who are long and thin. Its funny, one of the heavyset boys (biggie) was super social from moment #1. The other, Tesla, not yet. Zippy and Blaze are basically the description of their name, everything they do, they do at 100mph and its cool, they're fun, they approach easily, eat from our hands and are social. They're fun but seem competitive, should make for a cool next decade or 2.
So its been about 4 days in total so far and wow they're a lot of fun, we've set them and their living quarters up in our basement, mid to low 60's in temp, we have a large and effective air purifier I bought some time ago for this purpose (1400-2000sqft capacity), cracked it open and air quality is fantastic and their environment is very neutral, we tried to make it easy for them to adjust without too much clutter, fuss or people trying to bug them all the time. We have a big cage, they seem to love it and are either all doing something different, or at times, just huddled up together in one of their living quarters sleeping, its cute. We got them a bunch of cool stuff for their cage etc... even though they broke the exercise wheel already so we ordered the 14" silver surfer wheel, should have that this week! Wont make that mistake again!
They're active, especially in the late evening into the early morning, definitely nocturnal. They're very curious and all but one are happy to come to one of the cage doors, eat from our hands, smell us, take a little nibble and just kinda do their own thing. They're slowly not bothered by us and its only been 4 days, I bet as time goes on and they get comfy in their space, they'll get even cooler. We do have one, Tesla, who seems to just shy from us, hide behind one of their enclosures and kinda cower a bit, but we figure we'll leave him alone, he'll get around to it as the other 3 seem to have no problem with us. He's very jumpy, I almost feel like either someone has been mean to him or he's really afraid and needs a lot of time to adjust.
We are doing a lot of reading online and this forum has been priceless (thank you all). Its all about learning and its also my personality, I like to read everything on a subject, I wanna master it and understand it, so its been occupying my time over the last few weeks just soaking it all in. We wanna do it right, make sure they live long lives and are happy, most importantly though, happiness. So that's where we are. I'm going to be buying an even bigger cage and connecting the two, we're thinking this one we have which is large will be their sleeping quarters, then the larger will have all sorts of cool obstacles and challenges for them to enjoy, build an environment for them that they love.
Any input, info, anything, would be well appreciated and if you see us posting the wrong thing, please, let us know, their safety and love come first as I'm sure it does for all of you and your little chinnies. Thank you for having us on your forum, we look forward to building lots of cool friendships over the years!
So its been about 4 days in total so far and wow they're a lot of fun, we've set them and their living quarters up in our basement, mid to low 60's in temp, we have a large and effective air purifier I bought some time ago for this purpose (1400-2000sqft capacity), cracked it open and air quality is fantastic and their environment is very neutral, we tried to make it easy for them to adjust without too much clutter, fuss or people trying to bug them all the time. We have a big cage, they seem to love it and are either all doing something different, or at times, just huddled up together in one of their living quarters sleeping, its cute. We got them a bunch of cool stuff for their cage etc... even though they broke the exercise wheel already so we ordered the 14" silver surfer wheel, should have that this week! Wont make that mistake again!
They're active, especially in the late evening into the early morning, definitely nocturnal. They're very curious and all but one are happy to come to one of the cage doors, eat from our hands, smell us, take a little nibble and just kinda do their own thing. They're slowly not bothered by us and its only been 4 days, I bet as time goes on and they get comfy in their space, they'll get even cooler. We do have one, Tesla, who seems to just shy from us, hide behind one of their enclosures and kinda cower a bit, but we figure we'll leave him alone, he'll get around to it as the other 3 seem to have no problem with us. He's very jumpy, I almost feel like either someone has been mean to him or he's really afraid and needs a lot of time to adjust.
We are doing a lot of reading online and this forum has been priceless (thank you all). Its all about learning and its also my personality, I like to read everything on a subject, I wanna master it and understand it, so its been occupying my time over the last few weeks just soaking it all in. We wanna do it right, make sure they live long lives and are happy, most importantly though, happiness. So that's where we are. I'm going to be buying an even bigger cage and connecting the two, we're thinking this one we have which is large will be their sleeping quarters, then the larger will have all sorts of cool obstacles and challenges for them to enjoy, build an environment for them that they love.
Any input, info, anything, would be well appreciated and if you see us posting the wrong thing, please, let us know, their safety and love come first as I'm sure it does for all of you and your little chinnies. Thank you for having us on your forum, we look forward to building lots of cool friendships over the years!
and I think you have a great chin owner attitude - learn as much as possible and apply! I have a blog that might be of help to you, it shares a bit of my experience coming into the whole chinchilla world, care, and some tidbits of advice - 
