Small Chin?

[andyv2k14]

Hey,

My chinchilla is really small (like can hunch up and sit on one hand small). I want to say she's only about five or six inches long when she stretches out. The place I bought her from is apparently very bad at taking care of pets.

So far, she is doing ok, though my impression is that she wasn't fed much if any hay at all when she was in the store. Can this be the reason she is so small? If the lady at the store is right (which is in doubt), she is about 4 months old. Outside of that, she seems active and happy enough, though she does scratch her haunches and grind her teeth a lot. Can anyone provide me with some info?

I never should have used that store. Apparently a lot of their animals are sickly or small. Hopefully, with good care, my baby can live a long a happy life....

 

[Isabella Whateva]

What kind of food are you feeding? Good feed, lots of hay, and filtered water are key to healthy chins. If she's really four months, she might just be tiny cause she's still a baby. The only accurate way to gauge if she's a healthy size is to weigh her. You can get a cheap little kitchen scale at Walmart or the dollar store.

One of my chins grinds her teeth a lot too, but she's fine. Make sure you're checking her teeth to make sure they aren't overgrown and give her lots of toys to gnaw on

 

[andyv2k14]

I feed her Oxbrow pellets (had to switch from Mazuri because the stores around here stopped carrying them). I will get a scale, what is a healthy weight for that age? She has a good appetite, but she is very picky. She'll pick through an entire bale of hay just to get to one piece that she wants. Is this pickiness normal? I don't think its the hay because I've tried to feed her hay from three different stores and she's always the same. She really likes the stalks with the little buds on the top (I call it corn on the cob for chins).

I'm just paranoid about her health because apparently the pet store that sold her to me has a bad history with mistreating animals and not taking good care of them.

 

[greychins]

I agree that if she really is four months old, she may not be very large. Likewise... some chins are just small. We have a 9 months old here who is still like 450 grams (though his parents are larger, he just never grew). And he's had a healthy diet and hay while he's here and all that... anyway, the point is... some chins are just small.

Poor diet can contribute - we get in rescues all the time that gain weight when put on a better food... but I believe that ranch chins don't often get hay, and they're healthy....

A scale is a good investment though.