Help! Bonding 2 females.

[kcebsllim]

I have 2 female chinchillas. Lucy is about 2, and Chimichanga is about a year and a half old. Chimichanga came to me from a different home about 2 weeks ago. They are currently in 2 separate cages, next to each other. They've had some play time over the past couple weeks, the first time they were both very unsure, but smelled each other. There was some urine spraying, as i was expecting. Nothing major happened. They would touch noses, and then run away from each other. Today when they were together, there was much more chasing, and a lot more urine spraying. At one point they were both standing on their hind legs, looking like they were about to wrestle. I immediately separated them, and now they are each in their cages, peacefully sleeping after eating some hay and a dust bath. I am stumped on what to do, and not sure if they will bond, or if its a lost cause. I have a close friend who has wanted a chinchilla since she met Lucy, so she would be happy to take care of Chimichanga, is that a better option for both of them? I'm so discouraged. Help!

For reference: Lucy has a large critter nation cage with multiple levels, lots of toys and huts, and multiple granite slabs. Chimichanga has a fairly large cage, about 4 and a half feet tall. Hers also has multiple levels, with lots of hide-aways.

 

[Amethyst]

If you have only had the new one two weeks that is way too soon to have them anywhere near each other let alone trying to bond them. Ideally you want to wait 30 days before allowing the new chin to interact with the current one. It's advised to quarantine a new chin in a separate room, just in case it has any illness, that part is too late now. However another reason for the isolation is to give the new chin time to adjust to the new home, everything is going to be overwhelming without adding another chin into the mix. It also allows you to get to know the new chin, what her normal awake and sleep times are, how much she eats, drinks, poops and pees, and just all around normal behavior (hyper or calm, shy or outgoing, grumpy or friendly, etc).

Bonding can take anywhere from days to years, and you can't rush it, you have to go at the chin's pace. Also females tend to be the territorial gender, meaning neutral ground for meetings is even more important. Since the new chin hasn't been there long Lucy probably just sees her as an intruder in her territory. I'd take it as a good sign that they didn't try to kill each other, and things didn't end in blood shed, so there is still hope in trying bonding, just need to go slower. At this point I would give them a month to just calm down, and forget about the squabbles. Then if after a month they aren't showing aggressive signs towards each other being in neighboring cages, then try starting the bonding process. There are several different bonding methods, if you do a search on the forum for bonding you should come up with several threads, but they don't all work for all chins, there is no one foolproof method, so you may have to try different ones to see what works for your two.

Bonding chins is never a sure thing though, some chins just don't want a cage mate, so they may need to live separately. Also even if they do bond it does happen sometimes that they decided one day (sometimes years down the line) they no longer want to be friends, meaning separate cages. If it comes to that and having two separate cages is not something that works for you then yes giving it to a friend may be a good idea. But I wouldn't give up just yet, 2 weeks in the life of an animal that can live 20+ years is not much time really.

 

[tunes]

There are a couple things you can try, but it sounds like you are already dealing with aggressive behavior with the posturing and the spraying. It may be a one time thing or may be a they are going to kill each other thing, there is no way to know. I can give you advice on how to try, but you need to be sure that you REALLY want them together because if one gets hurt, trust me, you'll never forgive yourself.

You can trim their whiskers back until they are only about a half an inch long. Clean the cage you want them to share with hot water and white vinegar. Put all new things or things that have been thoroughly cleaned that won't have either of their scents in it. Make sure there are two houses to hide in and two bowls to eat out of. You might even want to hang two water bottles. You may not need doubles of everything eventually, but at first it may help them to have their own space and things.

Here is a link where you can read more about ways to introduce. I personally use cage within a cage if I intro at all. I have had the best luck with it.

http://chins-n-hedgies.com/forums/showthread.php?t=13659