Tortured by children chinchilla

[Cuddlebug]

This is so wrong! I can't believe that anyone would feel that this is OK. Stuffing a chinchilla in a bag and leaving her in it has got to be pure torture for her. I don't care if she bites or poops on you, she is still a living thing and should not be treated this way. I had a rescue here that was tortured by kids. She sprayed, bit like crazy and pooped all over. Poor thing would go into a blind panic if anyone reached into her cage. I spent months getting bit several times a day and getting sprayed if I just looked at her. She eventually realized that I was not going to hurt her and calmed down. She was such a sweet thing and her new family loves her dearly. There is never a reason to bag a chinchilla. Time and patience is what they need, not bags.

 

[tunes]

They hate harnesses because you aren't supposed to ever USE a harness on a chinchilla. Their rib cage and spine are not made for them. Chins who use harnesses end up with broken bones. So substituting a mesh bag for a harness is like substituting apples for oranges.

 

[ticklechin]

Last time I noticed people don't speak chinchilla and chinchilla don't speak human, so I have no idea how this person knows the chin likes. The chin is trying to be as small and still as possible so the predator does not know its in the bag.

 

[Danderson]

Exactly what I was thinking, Dawn! If I am very still maybe I won't be seen..
Seriously, your chinchilla can not be comfortable with this!

 

[DoGooder]

Can somebody explain to me why she only purrs when she's in the mesh bag?

DoGooder

 

[becky12883]

I'm pretty sure only cats can purr. It's probably not a happy noise she is making.
I seriously think that putting any animal in a mesh bag and stringing them up on a clothes line is torture. If you don't see anything wrong with what you're doing, you probably shouldn't own an animal of any kind.

 

[tunes]

In over 12 years of owning chinchillas, I've never heard one purr. I think I've heard someone else mention that, but I have never heard it myself. I have a few chins that absolutely love to be held, many that will spend hours on my shoulder, and I have one that will stand at the front of her cage for three days if you will scritch her chin for that long. Not one of them has ever purred.

As mentioned above, chins are not cats. I doubt what you are hearing is a true purr.

 

[RDZCRanch]

Chinchillas do not have similar or the same bone structures as cats to resonate sounds into a purr. So chinchillas do not purr. If her body is vibrating, she is probably shaking violently. She could also be grinding her teeth which is a sound made during discomfort. Other noises they may for contentment do not sound anything like purring. It is light, baby-like chirping. Typical low sounds are warning calls or sounds of discomfort or displeasure.

 

[EMSChins]

I agree that the sound you hear is not a "purr" as I have never heard a chin purr in my life. I have however heard them grind their teeth to indicate that they want you to back off - which is exactly what I would expect them to do if you trapped them in a bag and suspended them from the rafters.

In one of your posts you said that if you were an exotics vet and suggested this it would lend more credibility to your corner and capture technique but in reality any of us would run to the hills screaming if a vet suggested such an asinine way to pick up a chin! Because we know better.

You are either a troll or one incredibly stupid chin owner! Sorry but there is just no other word for it. I guess they'll let anyone buy a chin!

 

[DoGooder]

Folks, I’ve read a lot of articles saying chinchillas purr such as this one:

http://www.chinchillaplace.com/blog/?Tag=Taming Your Chinchilla

When my chin is scared she shakes and the shaking is concentrated in her shoulders. She also breathes heavily when she’s scared.

When I first noticed her purring she was on my chest, one of her favorite places. I checked her breathing but I couldn’t feel any breathing. She was completely still except the bottom half of her body was vibrating-not shaking but vibrating.

There is a distinct noticeable difference when she’s upset and when she’s content. Chins have emotions very similar to humans and it’s obvious when she’s purring she’s very happy and often nuzzles my neck and sends positive energy to me and acts very loving like a human being would. She tends to purr when I am feeling especially loving towards her. For example, when I’m holding her I will look at her and think loving thoughts and then she starts to purr.

If I’m watching a movie and suddenly there’s an action scene with loud violence she stops purring and starts biting and wanting to leave. It’s crystal clear to me that she purrs when she’s happy and she only purrs when she’s comforted by the soft mesh. The woman who owned her before said she loved hanging from the faux fur hammock at the top level of her cage, so even at her other home my chin loved to hang high inside a soft surface and look down at the room.

In the wild chins spend most of the day hiding in burrows and under rocks and looking out, so they like to feel protected and keep watch. They’re also used to associating with other softy, furry companions. I guess the reason my chin likes the mesh so much is that it’s soft and yielding and provides a cover where she can feel safe and look outside at the world.

Just because other chinchillas don’t purr doesn’t mean my chinchilla doesn’t purr. All chinchillas have different personalities and act differently. At the end of the day the most important thing is to carefully observe your chinchilla. I know when my chinchilla is happy and when she’s upset and I quickly stop something that’s upsetting her, for example, she could only stand being in her carry cage for 2 minutes outside today so after only 2 minutes I took her out to avoid traumatizing her.

DoGooder

 

[RDZCRanch]

Unfortunately...after having owned a couple of hundred chinchillas, I can say for certain that they do not, in fact, purr. I have seen chinchillas when people think they are purring and there is always another explanation for the behavior or sound. Inexperienced people with a few chinchillas are not what I would call "experts" on chinchilla sounds and behavior since they have limited experience with it. Half of the sites I come across that try to explain chinchilla sounds have them completely wrong.

The vibrating is not contentment. She sounds like she may be a bit of a nervous chinchilla which is not something impossible to work with or horrible and probably wasn't created by mesh bags. The nipping after she "purrs" is to further explain her discomfort when things go to a slightly more uncomfortable level.

Chinchillas can express some emotions, but they do not have human emotions or close to the same. It's called anthropomorphism when you think your animal is feeling what you feel. The things they do notice are when your stress levels are high, you release certain pheromones that they can detect and it will stress them out.

 

[EMSChins]

It never ceases to amaze me when someone who has owned a chin for just a month comes along and teaches those of us that have owned them for years a thing or two (rolls eyes)!

 

[tunes]

DoGooder, chins do not purr. In 12 years I've had more than 500 babies born in addition to owning at least 500 chins (the exact count escapes me at the moment). Out of over 1000 chins, NONE of them have purred, but your one purrs with contentment when it's dangling from a clothesline stuffed in a sack? I have sold chins to pet homes where they are ridiculously spoiled with every comfort money can buy, attention lavished on them, supplements, huge cages, accessories to match their sexes/colors (and you know who you are ) and not ONE of them has purred. But you want us to believe that your chin, performing a miracle of which they are not capable (as explained to you by RDZC), does purr because you read about it on some unsubstantiated website?

Here's an example of a few more tidbits you can pick up from those same websites.

1) Chinchillas only have two nipples.
2) Sisters and brothers won't mate because they know they are sisters and brothers and that would be icky.
3) It's wonderful to give a chin as many raisins as they want a day, and to give them pineapple juice in their water for flavoring.
4) Chinchillas who run around their cages are insane, as in nuts, not just displaying chinchilla-like behavior.
5) Ebonies cannot be bred to ebonies because they will die.
6) Chinchillas love peanuts and popcorn.

Do I need to go on? We are all telling you it is not possible for a chin to purr. They are not anatomically built to do it. They also cannot throw up, another thing they are not anatomically able to do. Why is it that you will believe one inaccurate website over an entire forum of experienced breeders and pet owners?

And no, chins do not have emotions similar to humans. As stated by a wonderful person who passed away not too long ago "Chinchillas are not cute little humans in furry coats." They are animals. They are incapable of expressing emotion the same way that a human would. You can breed brother to sister, mother to son, father to daughter, and they really don't think it's icky. They don't CARE because they are animals.

 

[DoGooder]

tunes, maybe my chin doesn't purr like a cat but whatever she's doing it's similar to purring. And while you may not think chins have emotions like humans I believe they do, not exactly the same but they have typical feelings that humans have such as happiness, sadness, fear, embarrassment, etc. It's something I've observed.

As for animal incest, it occurs among all animals including humans but that doesn't make it healthy or common. Nature punishes incest by increasing genetic diseases of incestuous offspring. For example, purebred dogs have a lot more diseases than muts.

Chinchillas in the wild live in big herds of 100 or so and the females have plenty of males to choose from that aren't near relatives, so just because they might inbreed at a farm doesn't mean their first choice would be to breed with a near-relative. Among other species like wolves, animals travel long distances to find a suitable mate not related to their nuclear family. Among wild birds, incest is extremely rare because birds can travel such huge distances by flying so they have a lot of non-relatives to choose from and they prefer non-relatives which is why their incest rate is near zero.

DoGooder

 

[tunes]

As for animal incest, it occurs among all animals including humans but that doesn't make it healthy or common. Nature punishes incest by increasing genetic diseases of incestuous offspring. For example, purebred dogs have a lot more diseases than muts.

You seem to have completely missed the point. Whether it's healthy or not isn't the point. The point is that some people really believe that chins won't mate, due to giving them human emotions, because they will know they are related if they are brother and sister and would be repulsed by it. Chins will hump anything. A two month old kit will hump it's mother. They don't care if they are relatives. Relatives mean nothing to them.

BTW, line breeding is done with all animals, with careful studying of their lines and to cement in certain traits in the offspring. In line breeding, you will breed father to daughter, mother to son, etc. It's not something to be taken lightly, and I would never attempt it, but there are those that do. Chinchillas that are line bred correctly don't have any more health issues than any other chin.

 

[Claire D]

I know full well I am wasting my time posting this but I'm going to do it anyway; in the hopes that it might be useful to other people who may read Dogooder's posts and think it's ok to treat a chinchilla in the same way.


Whilst I am sure you think you're doing a good thing for your chinchilla, you're not. You're causing her distress, whether you choose to accept that or not. Forcing her to stay in a confined, mesh trap is cruel.


Let me address some points:

I understand your concern because you've never heard of people picking up chins in a mesh bag, but I ask that you believe me that this creates virtually no stress for my chin. I think the combination of something completely new being done by a novice is what is causing the alarm. If it was something new recommended by an exotic animal vet than I would be considered more authoritative and more people would see this is a helpful technique.

Wong on all counts. No-one on this forum is going to believe you are not causing your chinchilla distress - for the simple reason you are inflicting a totally unnatural, trap situation on a prey animal and her behaviour reflects that.
Those of us with many years of experience keeping chins in a variety of settings are telling you that you are wrong - based on observation, not anthropomorphic, emotional projection (which is what you are doing).
It's got nothing to do with you being a newby, it's got to do with you being completely incorrect about chinchilla behaviour.
If it was recommended by an exotic vet, I'd be looking for a proper, chinchilla competent vet!

And I'm working on a mesh sling to carry my chin like a human baby in front of me because she doesn't like carry cages. I make these things because the material is soft, flexible, breathable, and therefore gentle on her rather than the hard, harsh alternatives of the tough harness ropy fiber and metal cage.

Why??? If you want to bond with your chin, let her out in a chinchilla safe room and let her interact with you naturally! Let her express and exhibit her normal behaviours rather than forcing her to do what you want - which is to sit with you like some small, fluffy toy.

Chins have emotions very similar to humans

As others have already said, no they don't. You like to project your emotions onto your chinchilla but that doesn't mean it is so.

If I’m watching a movie and suddenly there’s an action scene with loud violence she stops purring and starts biting and wanting to leave.

Do you think this is normal behaviour for a prey animal? Seriously, you think it is acceptable and not stressful to keep a prey animal trapped in a mesh bag, while they nip to get out and run away from danger?

The natural behaviour for a prey animal is to (sometimes freeze for a second) then run and hide from danger - anyone who actually lets their chinchilla exhibit normal behaviour will tell you that when they are out running about, being curious, if they are startled by an unfamiliar or loud noise they will bolt to their safe place.
Not allowing them to bolt is stressful.
Your chin keeps still and tucks down in the bag because she is scared not because she is enjoying the experience and is keeping still 'because she is happy' - behavior, not anthropomorphism.

It’s crystal clear to me that she purrs when she’s happy and she only purrs when she’s comforted by the soft mesh. The woman who owned her before said she loved hanging from the faux fur hammock at the top level of her cage, so even at her other home my chin loved to hang high inside a soft surface and look down at the room.


In the wild chins spend most of the day hiding in burrows and under rocks and looking out, so they like to feel protected and keep watch. They’re also used to associating with other softy, furry companions. I guess the reason my chin likes the mesh so much is that it’s soft and yielding and provides a cover where she can feel safe and look outside at the world.

The purring issue has been addressed but, again, seriously?? How can you possibly think it is not stressful for a chin to be hung from the ceiling in a bag she can't get out of?
There's a world of difference between a chin snoozing on a hammock in a suitable chinchilla cage where they can choose to get off and on at will than being suspended several feet in the air, unable to get out of a trap.
Chinchillas are rock hoppers, not arboreal climbing animals. The clue is in there - they spend their days in hollows and under rocks; ie. on/in the ground!

Just because other chinchillas don’t purr doesn’t mean my chinchilla doesn’t purr. All chinchillas have different personalities and act differently. At the end of the day the most important thing is to carefully observe your chinchilla. I know when my chinchilla is happy and when she’s upset and I quickly stop something that’s upsetting her, for example, she could only stand being in her carry cage for 2 minutes outside today so after only 2 minutes I took her out to avoid traumatizing her.

Yes, I agree careful, objective observation is the key - not what you are doing which is anthropomorphism. There are people on this forum who have been carefully and objectively observing chinchillas for 15+ years who are telling you that you are wrong ....... why is it that you think we are all wrong and you're right?

Why did you think it necessary to take your chinchilla outside in a carry cage anyway? What made you decide she was distressed?

And while you may not think chins have emotions like humans I believe they do, not exactly the same but they have typical feelings that humans have such as happiness, sadness, fear, embarrassment, etc. It's something I've observed.

Explain how a chin behaves when it is embarrassed?

Embarrassment is an emotional state of intense discomfort with oneself, experienced upon having a socially unacceptable act or condition witnessed by or revealed to others.

Now you are suggesting that chinchillas know what is socially acceptable behaviour and also know when they have broken said acceptable social norms?

What comes through very clearly in your posts is that you want to inflict your beliefs and desire for companionship (on your terms) onto your chinchilla. You want a chin that just sits quietly in a bag slung around your neck so that you can feel comforted.
I'm going to be blunt and say that you should get a furry toy instead and stop treating your chinchilla like one - if you really want to experience true chinchilla behaviour, let her do what she wants. If she wants to interact with you she will and if she doesn't she wont. Let her out in a chinchilla safe room, lie on the floor with her watching TV and see if she comes to you.

 

[ticklechin]

Guido would only purr after he got a beer out of the fridge, plopped in front of the T.V, clicked on Toddlers and Tiaras and tucked in to a bag of chips.....I know I know not contributing but so it this topic.

 

[DoGooder]

tunes, if you take my last post in context, especially the parts providing evidence that incest isn't the norm, I am implying that in general animas prefer to mate with non-relatives. I could be wrong but it seems that the gist of what some folks are saying on this thread is that chinches don't have a preference for healthy mating relationships with non-relatives.

bondiferous, I feel badly that your thread has been transformed by this mesh bag argument. I just wanted to suggest a way to reduce your male chinchillas stress if you have to move him, and I never expected this negative response from others. I hope he recovers completely and can eventually be held without being stressed.

Claire D., I love logic and am very good at it which is why I got an easy A in my Logic college course. I use logic to find out what makes my chinchilla happy and healthy. I assume your chinchillas live in a cage which is a confined space, so where’s the logic that says it’s okay for you to keep your chinchillas in a confined, presumably metal-barred cage, but if I confine my chinchilla in a soft net you say I’m: “Forcing her to stay in a confined, mesh trap is cruel.” Explain why a soft cage is a cruel “trap” but a metal cage isn’t a trap.

You said I’m “inflicting” a trap on my chinchilla and “her behavior reflects that.” But I told you in the mesh her behavior is that her breathing becomes calm and imperceptible, she sits quietly, when I hug her she nuzzles against me, etc.-all typical contentment behavior in animals. When I hold her without the mesh she often tries to crawl off of me after a few minutes, but in the net she often sits still for over 15 minutes. It’s not because the mesh confines her because she can easily hop across a room in the mesh, so she has the ability to crawl off of me but she’s much less motivated to do so if she’ in the mesh.

You say I’m “forcing her” to do what I want, but it’s incredibly easy for my chinchilla to chew through the thin mesh yet though she’s used it dozens of times she hasn’t chewed even a small hole in it. When she arrived at my home with her equipment she had chewed about 4 square inches off her plastic wheel and chewed the edges off her plastic trays-big holes. So I know she can rip apart the mesh easy as pie, but she refuses to do so. How do you explain the fact that she gnaws her metal carry cage so savagely that she rocks it back and forth, but she refuses to gnaw even a tiny hole in her mesh bag?

After I mentioned my chin doesn’t like loud, violent movie scenes and remains quiet until the violent scene makes her want to run you said: “you think it is acceptable and not stressful to keep a prey animal trapped in a mesh bag, while they nip to get out and run away from danger?” That statement misses my point which is that she sits quiet and calm until the violent scene. The implication is that it’s the movie violence that’s making her want to leave, not the mesh bag.

However, you do make a point that there’s a difference between a chinchilla hanging from a hammock that she can jump off at will and hanging from a mesh bag that she can’t leave. Obviously you have contempt for the latter, but to be fair do you also have contempt for people who hang their chins from their arms when they put them in a carry cage to go to the vet or people who hang their chins off their shoulders in animal backpacks?

You also said, “Chinchillas are rock hoppers, not arboreal climbing animals. The clue is in there - they spend their days in hollows and under rocks; ie. on/in the ground!” But they’re indigenous to mountains, so their ancestors evolved looking down from their high mountain peaks. Wild chinchillas are used to sitting on a rock and looking down miles and miles to the lands beneath them which might be why chinchillas love sitting on perches and looking down.

You asked, “Why did you think it necessary to take your chinchilla outside in a carry cage anyway? What made you decide she was distressed?”

I didn’t put her in a cage outside because I though she was distressed if that’s your implication. I plan to take her to a vet for a checkup and I want to be able to carry her in her little metal cage. Also if she gets sick and has to spend the night in a small cage at the vets I want her to already be used to being in a small cage so the overnight stay at the vet’s doesn’t traumatize her. Therefore, I’m slowly training her to get used to being in her cage by giving her a treat when I put her inside the cage.

You said, “Explain how a chin behaves when it is embarrassed?” My chinchilla exhibits standard human embarrassment behavior in some situations. For example, when I first got her her cage smelled really bad and before I had time to thoroughly clean it I looked at her sitting staring at me, and when I involuntarily scrunched up my nose in disgust at the gross smell, her face changed and she looked down and away like a human would who would be embarrassed to be found in that situation.

You said, “Now you are suggesting that chinchillas know what is socially acceptable behaviour and also know when they have broken said acceptable social norms?” To some degree, yes. Chinchilla’s are social animals who evolved complex social behaviors suited to living in groups of 100. Animals of all species have grooming and mating rituals, obey social norms for fear of being punished, take on roles such as babysitter (i.e. among wolves), and communicate socially with voice and body signals, so of course a herd animal like a chinchilla will seek approval from others because chinchillas evolved to carefully observe social norms in order to be accepted by the herd.

You said, “Let her out in a chinchilla safe room, lie on the floor with her watching TV and see if she comes to you.” We don’t have any chinchilla safe rooms because all our rooms have a lot of wood furniture and/or wood cabinets that she can destroy in a few minutes. However, I have let her hop around several rooms as I watch her. Also, most times I open her cage she approaches me and tries to climb on my arm or chest so she’s comfortable around me.

 

[InkedupTara]

Are you really implying your chinchilla knew you were disgusted by her cage smelling???

 

[DoGooder]

Are you really implying your chinchilla knew you were disgusted by her cage smelling???

Yup. We stared at each other for a few seconds and the moment I scrunched up and made a disgusted face, she immediately lowered her head and turned her profile to the side in apparent shame. I'm not saying it's a fact she was ashamed but it's typically how animals, including humans, behave when they're ashamed.

DoGooder