I don't know what to do

[caiti]

She likes the ground up pellets a lot more than anything. I got 10mLs in her no problem first try. I haven't had to burrito her since earlier in the day, about 10 or 11 am. I've been trying to make every effort not to since maybe some of you think she isn't sick. Gah, I'm so confused. Her poos are getting bigger but I've noticed they are moist now. I put up another coop cup on a different level to encourage her to eat her pellets. She'll eat a shreddie or an oat like there's no tomorrow though. Why would that happen? A chin won't eat pellets but treats and ground up pellets? I did put about a tbsp of apple juice in the mix which is 1/2-1 cup.

 

[mishellyshel]

Back off on the apple juice. Way too much sugar & is probably causing the softer poop. If she stil isn't eating and you continue to syringe feed switch to baby food squash.
Great idea putting another bowl in her cage. You have to get her to eat pellets.

 

[caiti]

Back off on the apple juice. Way too much sugar & is probably causing the softer poop. If she stil isn't eating and you continue to syringe feed switch to baby food squash.
Great idea putting another bowl in her cage. You have to get her to eat pellets.

Ok, I will stop giving her apple juice. I saw her munching on some hay about an hour ago, hopefully she'll try her pellets tonight. Thank you very much.

 

[Essentia]

I have had days when my girls have eaten less than usual and had smaller poos or pooed less than usual, but I've never force-fed them. Am I missing something here? :hmm:

Not eating as much and having smaller poos are is very different than not eating at all and having no poos.

 

[caiti]

Does anybody know if having a kitten would somhow have influenced this? My roommate got a kitten on monday night. He doesn't have his shots yet and he is not allowed in my room. He's snuck in there twice but I quickly pick him up and bring him back out. I wash my hands before I go into my room. I know there are some diseases cats can spread to chins and vice versa but so far what I've read I've found they are mostly respiratory diseases. Anybody know anything relevant? Just a thought.

Chloe still hasn't eaten her pellets but she took 10 mLs of ground pellet (I didn't add anything to it, just pellet and water) easily this morning. And I gave her some simethicone as well. I changed her food bowl and her hay, hopefully that will entice her a bit more. I have to go to work but will check up on her once I come back, feed her and let her out for a proper run.

 

[VolunteerChin22]

Does she seem lethargic at all? I know you said she was running in the wheel but would you say her overall alertness and activity level is the same?

 

[caiti]

No her activity level is really the same as far as I can tell. She's not as crazy at night but I think that's becasue I keep waking her up to feed her during the day a bunch. I have noticed she has layed on her side for a few moments everyday. It's not uncommon for her to lay on her side but she might be doing it more. It's hard to tell because now I am watching her all the time. She's eaten almost 40mLs so far today of pellet mush and she eats it really easily. I just fed her and vacuumed so I could tell how often she's pooing and there's a few next to her as she's laying down. They are still small but aren't moist or soft anymore.

 

[caiti]

Her poos look smaller now. Not as small as the first night (wed) but they were bigger yesterday. I think because I was feeding her too much sugar yesterday. I gave her simethicone once yesterday and three times today (11:30, 5:15, 8:20).

Does anyone know when exactly I should let her out to run? I am not sure doing it right after I feed her is best (I do it a little after) but does it help with peristalsis or exacerbate the bloat if they exercise right after eating?

 

[caiti]

Alright, tomorrow she's going to the vet and I've gotten to every other hour I'm going to feed her and really get this thing over with.

The only thing is every time I try to massage her abdomen she gets lethargic. I think I tires her out and she struggles with all the energy she has. I don't know whether to just forget the tummy massages for now because I have to wake her up afterwards to keep her moving when I do them. When I don't she acts normally. I think I'll try to see if I can do them not as often.

Her poos are getting bigger since I've been feeding her every other hour though and increasing her simethicone. The latest ones look even more normal than any ones since she stopped eating. Even though I've decided to go to the vet I just don't know if this is the kind of thing you can take take of on your own. I would rather not spend $200-300 dollars tomorrow but I do have it saved for this. I guess I just don't know where the line of recovery is. When will I know she's not in a life-threatening state anymore?

 

[caiti]

Gah--I woke up this morning and got wicked excited when I saw some poops next to her food bowl. I weighed it and it's about 4 grams lighter!!! Should I forgo the vet visit? I fed her about 5 hours ago since I fell asleep but it seems she got hungry during that time and ate for herself. I also filled her hay box with pretty much all alfalfa and she has been eating more hay than before (she just kind of occasionally nibbled on it before).

Thoughts?

 

[mishellyshel]

i would let her out as much as possible in a chin safe area, like the bathroom. grab a magazine or book or something and sit in there with her for 20-30 minutes a few times a day.

i dont know if you need to handfeed her every hour, 2 or 3 times a day is fine.

in reading back the only problem that i can understand is that she didnt eat many pellets on or two days. i am not a vet or expert or anything but it doesnt seem there is anything really wrong with her. i think you may be a newer owner who is just overly cautious. most of us have been there. when i first got my first chin, i knew nothing and took him to an emergency vet because he has soft poop one day. on the way home while making sure he was okay, i hit the car in front of me, so that day cost A LOT of money.

knowing what i know know, i would weigh her every other day. weigh her food every day because sometimes they only eat 1/2 the pellet & toss it down. offer unlimted timothy and minimal alfalfa hay. keep a few different bowls in different area of her cage to promote the foraging instinct and keep light on the treats. to encourage her to eat the pellets, i would put a small pinch of about 5 or 6 oats in her food and each day lower it down. i tried that with one of my rescues and it worked.

keep an eye on poop & urine, and try to do belly massage and extra playtime. keep up on the gas drops. 1 full cc with each feeding. but encourage her to eat pellets.

if she was in any level of gi stasis, it does take time to get them back to normal, especially with handfeeding.

she may be laying on her side more because you are taking her out more.

if you are not comfortable with all this AND you have a good qualified vet, than take her. just make sure you vet knows chins. ultimately, you know your chin best, so you have to make the right decision for her healthcare.

 

[caiti]

Michelle--that is what I have been doing. I was feeding her so often last night because I read Dawn's response to Lilanchilla's post (bloat in woman's chin which her brother was watching) and it freaked me out. Our situations were similar but there were differences. Chloe's adbomen feels exactly the same as it always has, not doughy or hard etc and when I can hear her stomach, it sounds like when water begins to boil in a pot but it sounds muffled (the description of normal and not normal gut noises is hard for me to relate to actual noises so I don't really know if muffled boiling is a good noise but I imagine it's incredibly hard to articulate what it's supposed to or not supposed to sound like). But with somewhat subjective differences like that I got very scared that people thought Lilanchilla's scenario was of utmost seriousness.

I am comfortable giving her simethicone and feeding her and letting her out. Fortunately I don't work on weekends and have a very part time job (ironically I syringe feed animals there). It seems she ate a few more grams of pellets. I looked everytime I weighed the bowl and I can't see any thrown pellets.

I did not bring her to the vet and am conflicted whether or not that was the right thing to do. My instinct tells me she had a valid illness and she is on the verge of recovering. I do have the address, number and directions to the nearest e-vet in my emergency kit though if she doesn't get better. I noticed she has lost weight today (before I fed her though). I am hoping that is because she's been pooing and her GI tract is regaining function. Still smaller poos but still slowly improving.

I think I'm going to post something when this is over (hopefully soon). I have learned a few valuable things and want to be completely prepared if it happens again. I don't know if I'll find out why it happened (she's been eating the same food and hay for months. She got new alfalfa but it looks ok to me. New kitten could have stressed her etc) but I do not want to be as naive as I was before and think I can wait to get supplies for my emergency kit because I don't think she'll get sick soon and find out what she'll eat and what works for her.

 

[ticklechin]

Chins can get a bit of gas that will make them go off feed, its not to the degree they bloat, they just feel gassy like you would. The couple of times my healthy chins went off feed I would start the simethicone, hand feed small meals-by small I mean 5ml several times a day to add up to a full ration, get them moving and massage, the issue went away in a day and they went back to normal. The key is catching the gas early-when it is still up high in the stomach and/or cecum the simethicone can work to break it up-if the condition goes on for a couple of days without any treatment the gas makes its way to the intestines-simethicone does not work well down low, only mechanical breaking up of the bubbles and moving them down with massage will work-the intestinal tract of the chinchilla is LOONNGG, so it takes awhile to get it out when it gets to this point and the risk of stasis rears its ugly head.

 

[caiti]

Dawn--I think that what happened was I caught it sorta early (hopefully). It has been going on for potentially 4 days. Although her poos now are pretty much normal but I'm still syringe feeding her. I started putting a sock of rice warmed up in her cage and everytime she sits on it she pretty much immediately poos. It's kinda funny. I'll stealthily try to slide it under her and she's like "What..what is that?!?! Wait..oh that's kind of nice, ok. Maybe I'll sit here for a minute" and then I hear "plink, plink...plink".

I've been trying to massage her belly but she does not enjoy it at all, to say the least. She used to like when I rubbed her tummy when I first got her but I stopped doing it so often and she stopped liking it a while ago.

I feed her at most 10mLs at a time so she gets smallish meals. I feed her all she'll eat before she gets distracted by the open door and tries to escape. I was feeding her 5mLs every hour yesterday for a little while but if I don't need to I'd rather not feed her every hour for at least 12 hours in a row.

 

[Sandi]

I don't know but shouldn't she be eating on her own by now? Have you weighed her recently?

 

[caiti]

Sandi--I've been weighing her pellets and it goes down a couple/few grams every time. She is eating her alfalfa hay mixed with some timothy. Honestly, I'm too scared to not hand feed her every so often to wait and see if she'll eat on her own. I've fed her 45mLs today so I think I may try and see if she'll eat on her own tonight. I put new food in her bowl last night and it weighed 82.1g. It now weighs 76g. I'm almost positive she at least ate early this morning (between 5am and 9am) because there were poos next to her bowl and it was tilted towards where she stands when she eats.

She has lost weight. She's now 550 and she is usually around 560. I've been having trouble with her weight in general recently. She lost a little bit then I switched her off Mazuri and she lost even more, which I thought might have been from the protein and fat decrease in her food. I'm thinking about switching her food again but I'm afraid it's too soon and don't want to keep switching her food on her.

 

[ticklechin]

I would cut her off, maybe give her 10ml in the morning and see what happens, if she can eat she will and you need to know. 10 grams is not much of a loss at all, weaning a chin off hand feeding you can have a loss or gain and I know its hard to wean, you feel the chin will starve but they won't if they can eat and the 10ml will be enough food to keep things moving but not enough to make her not hungry. If she is acting like a normal chin, will take a treat and eat it with no issues then she is messing with you, chins who love to be hand fed can do that to you.

 

[caiti]

Dawn--yes she will take a shreddie, those acidolphilus tablets from QMC, an oat or any of her treats no problem. I just fed her 10mLs and gave her some simethicone and let her out for about 15 min and tried to massage her belly.

I am getting really worried. I don't see a lot of poos but I do see her eating most of them during the day which obviously is normal but I wish I could count them before she eats them!! I just weighed her and she weighed 536. That was about what she was when she came to me. She ate a good 5g of pellets last night. She has weighed pretty much 560 +/- 5g for the past month consistently (I weigh her every couple days).
So she went from around 560 to
8/04- 556
8/06- 568
8/07- 548.8
8/08- 536

Still no lethargy or decrease in activity. She did sleep a lot last night (as long as I could tell when I was awake) but I had her awake pretty much the entire day.

I think what I'm going to do is not feed her anymore or a just a little. Weigh her bowl and her tonight. Weigh them again early tomorrow and if she hasn't eaten a good amount of has lost much more weight I'm going to the vet. It opens at 8 and it's never busy. If worse comes to worse and I can't get an appointment I'll go to the e-vet at 8. Do you guys think that's a good idea?

I would love it if she were just messing with me. I am usually relatively intuitive with animals being sick or hurt (even my mice I could read better) but chinchillas have completely stumped me. I have never been so unsure of a situation like this ever. I literally am torn between "it's nothing" and "she's dying". It's incredibly confusing.

 

[ticklechin]

If the vet can see you, it would not be a bad idea for another opinion rather than us on the net, I would not spend the money on a emergency visit since you can feed her if needed and she is not showing any signs of distress other than not eating. Have the vet look at the teeth, feel up the belly and listen to it, check the poo quality, and if nothing is found then if it was my chin I would try switching feeds again and see what happens.

 

[Laurie]

Cait just remember too that not all chins are big chins. I have a slight girlie here who barely reaches 530--she has always been that way and she is a healthy gal.