I recently took one of our chins to a new veterinarian, who I had heard a lot of wonderful things about. This veterinarian handles all of the exotic patients for the entire university veterinary hospital, and has had patients flown in from other states even. She gave us tons of information (much more than other vets), and we really took her advice & knowledge to heart, and want to share it too!
A lot of you already adhere to this, but, for those out there who are still doing it, I wanted to share the doctor's very adamant directions to not feed treats such as dried fruits, seeds, or things like cheerios or grains. Chins digestive systems are amazingly complex and designed specifically to digest fibrous, shrubby, and woody plants found in their native mountain habitat (and thrive on them!). A chin's digestive system is not designed to handle dried fruits or cheerios/grains or seeds or anything like that (my chins were quite sad to hear that even plain cheerios are a definite no-no - I'd thought they were ok - oops!)...
Another thing we recently learned was just how important hay is for a chin. Hay is crucial for keeping the back teeth ground down. The chewing motion when a chin eats hay grinds down their back molar teeth (which grow continuously, same as those large front incisors). The chewing motion of hay by the molars is very specific, and differs from how a chin will chomp down pellets, wood, or pumice stones (which is more of a chomping/slicing motion working their wonderful large front incisors). The veterinarian has seen many chinchillas over the years, and dental problems with these back teeth (abscesses, eye problems as roots overgrow, ect) as chins hit 4-6 years is a frequent enough problem for her to get out her model chin skull and demonstrate the motions that grind various teeth down.
Our exotics vet at the university hospital stresses 90% hay diets (for all of the premolars and molars, as well as for good nutrition and GI health), 10% pellets (for their extra bit of added nutrition), along with plenty of chewing items for those front teeth.
We've always offered plenty of timothy hay, but also unlimited Oxbow chinchilla deluxe pellets, so that some of our chins mostly eat pellets as that is what they like best. Now we will be making a point of always having lots of fresh unlimited hay, but with a limited amount of pellets per day to ensure most of what they are consuming is in fact hay.
I am thinking of trying willow twigs as "treats" (since I'm stopping those plain cheerios). Has anyone tried these? I saw them at petsmart - they are very, very thin little twigs sold in a small bundle.
A lot of you already adhere to this, but, for those out there who are still doing it, I wanted to share the doctor's very adamant directions to not feed treats such as dried fruits, seeds, or things like cheerios or grains. Chins digestive systems are amazingly complex and designed specifically to digest fibrous, shrubby, and woody plants found in their native mountain habitat (and thrive on them!). A chin's digestive system is not designed to handle dried fruits or cheerios/grains or seeds or anything like that (my chins were quite sad to hear that even plain cheerios are a definite no-no - I'd thought they were ok - oops!)...
Another thing we recently learned was just how important hay is for a chin. Hay is crucial for keeping the back teeth ground down. The chewing motion when a chin eats hay grinds down their back molar teeth (which grow continuously, same as those large front incisors). The chewing motion of hay by the molars is very specific, and differs from how a chin will chomp down pellets, wood, or pumice stones (which is more of a chomping/slicing motion working their wonderful large front incisors). The veterinarian has seen many chinchillas over the years, and dental problems with these back teeth (abscesses, eye problems as roots overgrow, ect) as chins hit 4-6 years is a frequent enough problem for her to get out her model chin skull and demonstrate the motions that grind various teeth down.
Our exotics vet at the university hospital stresses 90% hay diets (for all of the premolars and molars, as well as for good nutrition and GI health), 10% pellets (for their extra bit of added nutrition), along with plenty of chewing items for those front teeth.
We've always offered plenty of timothy hay, but also unlimited Oxbow chinchilla deluxe pellets, so that some of our chins mostly eat pellets as that is what they like best. Now we will be making a point of always having lots of fresh unlimited hay, but with a limited amount of pellets per day to ensure most of what they are consuming is in fact hay.
I am thinking of trying willow twigs as "treats" (since I'm stopping those plain cheerios). Has anyone tried these? I saw them at petsmart - they are very, very thin little twigs sold in a small bundle.
