New owner to a 6 year old Chin, advice?

[Nerk]

I recently acquired a 6 year old chinchilla. She is my first chinchilla.
Well first off, I recently took him(or what I thought) into the vet a discovered he is actually a she. The previous owners told me it was a male. Other then that she's ideal weight, digestions good and, teeth are perfect.
I really do like her, she's got such personality and is fun to just watch scurry around her cage. I just want her to be a happy/healthy girl so I'm wondering if some more experienced owner can help me.
~Where can I find a good cage? I saw ferret.com has their ferret nation cages on sale but I want to know if the site is reliable.
~What is good bedding? The previous owners used carefresh which I read is not very healthy but I'm debating between fleece or woodchips. She seems to pee only in one specific corner so I think I might be able to get her to go in a pan, but again I'm not sure I can teach an older chinny new tricks.
~What is a good wood to build new shelving out of?
~I wanted to get her a fleece hammock, but should I build my own or purchase one? I know to avoid ones with strings.
I'm willing to make her a happy chin, right now cost is not an issue.
I know I took on a lot and I went in a little more blind then I thought, but I do want to redeem myself and give her a happy home.
Again, if you can give me any information I would love that. I have some articles the vet gave me on feeding and housing but I just wanted to get some advice from experienced owners.

 

[becky12883]

Ferret.com 1800petsupplies.com or petsmart.com are your best bets on finding a great deal on a FN182. They all have sales at random, find the best price and shipping.

For bedding, if you use the plastic pans that come with the FN you'll want cover them to prevent chewing. If you get metal pans from bassequipment.com you can go with either fleece or pine/aspen wood shavings. You definitely can teach an old chin new tricks, go ahead and see if she'll use a litter pan. You could even do it now in the old cage, just stick some bedding in a pan and put it in the corner she pees in the most. If she takes to it right away then I personally recommend going with fleece. It's very easy if they're litter trained.

For shelves you want kiln dried pine (cheaper option) or poplar (harder to work with option). If you go to Home Depot they will cut the board to approximate lengths for you even.

If you're good at sewing you can make a fleece hammock, there's lots of youtube videos with instructions. If you'd rather not sew, you can check out the classifieds and vendor lists and find someone to make you one (same for the shelves). For fleece some good people are AnnieO- ChinChic on etsy or Shooper-Fleece for Furries on facebook. There are more, those are just the first two off the top of my head.

Lastly, don't trust all the advice your vet gave you, read up here (sounds like you already are). Most info a vet gives out on diet is usually not what is recommended here.

Welcome to the world of chinchillas, I'm sure she will have a great happy home with you!

 

[Nerk]

Thank you! I'm going to look around a lot for Chinnie hammocks.
Right now she's not too happy with me, probably from taking her to the vet. She'll come up to cage for a scratch, I'll start scratching her chin and then she'll push me away with her paw.

 

[e.murphy518]

I got my FN 182 from Petsmart, but I have heard ferret.com is reliable. The Ferret Nation is an awesome cage and very easy to clean with tons of space.

I personally use fleece liners on the FN cage pans and I use one glass Pyrex pan on each level full of Aspen Wood bedding and they pretty much only pee in those (but poop everywhere) If you put a litter pan in the corner where she pees most, it could work pretty easily

I built my own shelves out of poplar for my first cage and bought kiln dried pine shelves for my second cage. They are pretty easy to make if you know the basics of a saw and drill

I sewed two fleece hammocks with fleece loops and they turned out really well and didn't take much time at all. The fleece was also pretty inexpensive off of Joann Fabric's website

Have fun with her!

 

[Nerk]

Thanks for the advice! I just ordered her FN182 cage last night. I'm looking around for a good place to buy accessories for it now. In the end I think I will end up making her fleece items.

 

[Godofgods]

I'm looking around for a good place to buy accessories for it now.

Few of my chin sites in my favorites list seem to be closed

Heres two that still worked:

RondasChins They have a lot of twigs and such.

And

QualityMutationChinchillas They do a lot of work with fleece like items.

Theres plenty of other online stores around that you can check to. I beleive they have a section for stores here somewhere...

 

[Nerk]

I wish I had known about Quality one. I ended up purchasing some fleece items from Annie Chinchic on Etsy. But I see she does liners which is awesome. I'll keep an eye out. Thank you!

 

[sassyandclassy]

If you want to make your own fleece hammock its super easy- I just did it the other day for the first time!

I bought blizzard fleece at joanns, cut two triangles, sewed it inside out and left a little opening, flipped it, and finished sewing. I made three holes and put grommets in it and voila! its perfect and my chin loves it =]