Chinchilla refusing a bath!

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Alex.clark

New member
Joined
Nov 19, 2016
Messages
2
Location
South Yorkshire United Kingdom
Hello,

I am new to the forum and hoping someone could help. I have three chinchillas, 1 male and 2 females. Milly and chilly were rescued and introduced together and they had Lilly before chilly was neutered. All have been really healthy and have never caused me a problem until a couple of weeks ago. Chilly refuses to take a sand bath which is not like him at all. He will often sit in the bath then hop right out. There is nothing else obviously wrong with him... He is eating fine, drinking and using his wheel like mad!

I took him to an expert exotics vet who couldn't find anything obviously wrong. She thought she saw a couple of Spurs in his mouth but she wasn't 100% sure this was the cause as they didn't appear to be large enough to cause a problem. The only thing she could recommend was to anaesthetise him and check him over further. Obviously this comes with a risk for chinchillas and I don't want to do it unless needed. I'm just not convinced it's pain in his teeth as he's eating and playing fine otherwise. Has anybody else experienced this or can anyone offer some help?

Thank you in advance. Alex
 
does he willingly hop into the container, or do you have to put him in there? is it a new batch of dust, or different brand than you've normally used?

i would suggest the next time you try to get him to dust, get him in the container and pick up some dust with your hand, pour it on his back. see if that gets him to roll around . if not, use your hand to brush it around on him. i've had to do this a couple times with baby chinchillas, as they didn't seem to know how to dust, but learned. you don't want him to go unbathed, so maybe just by dusting him manually yourself, he'll stay clean until he does it himself again.
 
one if my girls that i had for years stopped taking sand baths for a good 2 months or so. If i put her in there she would freak out. Even tho it was the same dust house, same sand. Eventually after that long time, she calmed down and went right back to it.
 
Hello,

Sorry about the lateness in reply. I have been away.

He jumps willingly on to the container and even in the sand.My father is currently looking after them till I get moved into my new home and bless him... He has tried numerous dusts... Including the old bag and numerous containers including the old bath and he thought it might be something to do with the sand or container.

I have tried pouring it over him and he was not amused at all 😂. He just sat there with it all over his back! I did try to brush some in. Luckily he isn't too scruffy or oily even without the sand baths.

Since my post he has had one roll on two nights when the baths been in so hoping we are getting there. It's just very strange as he normally loves a bath.
 
A bit late on my part. Hopefully nothing is wrong. I did have a female chinchilla that refused to bathe while I was looking. She'd hop in and stare at me until I turned away. (You can't' make these things up!) Most protective thing ever.

When I'm doing a deeper inspection, I blow on the fur to get to the skin level. If he's still not bathing, you might try doing this to see if there are any skin abrasions, etc.
 
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