caiti
Well-known member
I adopted a chinchila, Chloe, a little over 2 weeks ago. She was in a pathetically small cage when I picked her up from her previous owner. I bought her a 2x2x4 cage. Anyways--I wanted to build her a better cage and have been researching how to do that. I have a few questions if anyone can help me out that would be amazing, because all I'm finding is contradictary info and advice.
1) Is galvanized wire really bad? This is by far the most confusing thing I've encountered...EVER. I know galvanization is a process of coating metal with hot zinc to protect the metal from erosion. And I know zinc is poisonous to chinchillas. But I've never heard of a chinchilla dying from gnawing on galvanized wire and it's in a ton of cages. Do they react to elemental zinc only or something? Is it because zinc carbonate is on top of the rest of the zinc? And, is there a coating that isn't harmful for chins to chew on, or a process that makes a plastic coating unchewable?
2) I'm aware when building a cage you have to cover up the sides of wood boards that the melamine coating ends on, but can a chinchilla chew the melamine off the the board face?
Thank you for reading this long post and for any help you may offer. Here's some pics because everyone loves pics...they were taken from a phone so expect horrible quality but they're cute either way.
1) Is galvanized wire really bad? This is by far the most confusing thing I've encountered...EVER. I know galvanization is a process of coating metal with hot zinc to protect the metal from erosion. And I know zinc is poisonous to chinchillas. But I've never heard of a chinchilla dying from gnawing on galvanized wire and it's in a ton of cages. Do they react to elemental zinc only or something? Is it because zinc carbonate is on top of the rest of the zinc? And, is there a coating that isn't harmful for chins to chew on, or a process that makes a plastic coating unchewable?
2) I'm aware when building a cage you have to cover up the sides of wood boards that the melamine coating ends on, but can a chinchilla chew the melamine off the the board face?
Thank you for reading this long post and for any help you may offer. Here's some pics because everyone loves pics...they were taken from a phone so expect horrible quality but they're cute either way.
