home made cages

Chinchilla & Hedgehog Pet Forum

Help Support Chinchilla & Hedgehog Pet Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.
chinchillalover0927

chinchillalover0927

to many chin chips??
Joined
Sep 15, 2009
Messages
1,079
Location
picayune, Ms
ok,
so thanks to some member i have gotten an idea to make home made cages. I am only interested in cages that are enclosed except for the front because im trying to cut down on mess. I also have 11 chins so im looking for cages that are designed in uniform. If anyone has any custom built cages if you could show me pics for ideas that would be great!!! I looked online but didnt find much at all. I love ticklechins idea but i feel that later on the shelves would be ruined and need to be re placed which will sound like a pain in the behind!!

THANKS :)
 
Here's mine:
26097_389481909472_680434472_3786565_3828147_n.jpg


My tip, put wheels on them, especially is you use melamine (that stuff is heavy). Casters are fairly cheap, easy to screw on, and make it so much easy to clean behind things or rearrange the room.

Here are some I made for other people, back when I had more time:
26097_389478794472_680434472_3786389_932552_n.jpg

26097_389480889472_680434472_3786556_1535195_n.jpg
 
that last and first pic would be purfect for me!! lol

if you remember, the first cage, all 3 rows included do you remember a round about cost??
 
At the time I made them (years ago)I think it was about $200-250 per tower (4 cages), includes melamine, screws, pine shelves, shelf brackets, melamine tape for the outside edges, wheels, locks, hinges, hardware cloth for doors, and pine for the door frames and front flap. Prices have changed since then so I have no idea what they would cost to make now.

The front flap on the cages is very nifty...keeps all the cage mess in the cage when you open the door.
Another tip...pull out dividers are nice too (make one large cage into two smaller ones and vise versa).
 
My cages

room6.jpg


Inside, the shelves will never need to be replaced since they are all tiled-my original homemade cages where 10 years old with tile shelves and they were still original were in good shape. 8 cages, 28x28x72 on wheels with tiles shelves cost 1500.00. I use no fleece liners, just fleece mattresses inside their hidey houses, they have pee boxes down below filled with pine shavings.

room4.jpg


room1.jpg



Tile

pee1.jpg


Pee box

pee.jpg
 
Last edited:
I wish someone lives in my area and make me a couple of cages for me.... You guys' cages are wonderful! I always wanted to have home-made cages. The problem is...I am not a handyman (handywoman?) by far.....agggg
 
yea im not to handy either my pawpaw would be making these cages for me...im just worried about cost, i was going to do runs but alot of people dont like them but i think they would have been alot cheaper..financially i cant go spending hundreds of dollars on making cages.
 
my mom also brought up a good point..my room isnt the best circulated in the house...my chins are fine in the cages they are in now but im worried that they might get to warm in those cages because there only way of air circulation is through the front of the cage
 
our house temp is set about 78 degrees...my room only has one vent and i have a ceiling fan that is on 24/7 for my chinnies... my room has always been the warmest in the house because i keep my door shut because of my animals.. (we have 7 boxers).. so im worried that it might not be a good idea for them that they wont get the air they need.
 
I'm pretty sure 78 is too warm even if the cages are well circulated. You might want to bring the temp down, especially since you only have one vent in your room.
 
they have been in my room for a year now and are fine with that temperature..i cant knock it down anymore because thats what the temp has always been in the house and the parents would kill me... its not always 78, just around 78 at the highest.. but never under 75 degrees.
 
So if the thermostat is set to 78 (which is too warm) and your room is hotter than the rest of the house.......? A fan will circulate your air but it will not cool down your chins.

Having only the front of your cages open will not keep heat in the cage. It will be the same temperature in the cage as it is in the room.

The MAX recommended temperature is 75.
 
so i could build these cages and they would be the same as if they were in my room currently? thats all im concerned about..they are never hot because they never use there cooling tiles so they must be fine with the temp...like i said its not always on 78 momma just gave me a rough estimate of what the temps usually around..its NEVER over 78 but never under 75.. They must be fine with it because its never caused a problem so its obviously not hurting them if they arent even using the cooling tiles..my room is warmer than the rest of the house but ive cut that down drastically by foiling my windows..no sun light gets into my room anymore and that helped ALOT!!!

ill just start leaving my door open, the rest of the house is fine because there are tons of vents! and the ac unit running our part of the house is only the one story piece of the house..my dad has a seperate ac unit for his room..
 
Last edited:
Wow. I'm going to be honest and say I am really surprised you haven't had a chinchilla die from those temps. My guys start with the warm red ears at 74. Their room stays 68-70 and even then with a good run they get worn out. 78 is way too high and no matter if they are doing ok, or not, it can't be comfortable for them. Put on a fur coat and run around your house at 78 and see how you feel. You also said that your room is the warmest, so that means it is even higher than 78 in there if the room that the thermostat is in is cooler. You need to get them out of your bedroom or make your bedroom cooler, period. The other cages will still have decent air circulation due to the large doors, but at that temp, I don't think it matters one way or the other. It's just too hot in general. Also, you need a thermometer in your room if you don't already have one. Temp/humidity is too hard to judge without one. It's mandatory with chins. I got mine at walmart for $7 and it measures humidity and temp.

Considering you knew the temp of your home before you brought the chins in, and you knew their temperature requirements, I don't even remotely know what you were thinking. A ceiling fan does nothing to keep chins cool. The only reason you feel cool under a ceiling fan is because you sweat. Chins don't sweat.

......I honestly don't even know what to say.
 
Last edited:
78 depends on what the humidity is like and how much radiant heat is coming through the wall. Sometimes 78 would work here and it wouldn't be too bad, but sometimes 74 or 75 wouldn't work either because it can get really humid for a few days at a time.

If you've ever been in a room where the sun is directly striking the outside walls, you may notice that it feels hotter than what the air temperature happens to be. The type of construction materials that a wall is made out of can really impact how hot it feels. We put up porches around the house and it made a difference in how much of the radiant heat pours through. Basically...the heat radiates from the wall to the objects in the room and other walls...and makes them feel really hot. The foil in the windows helps tremendously with that. Block or brick construction can work as a barrier.

Seriously, if it feels hot to you, it's hot for the chins. Here I notice that I feel hot at about 76°, at that point the air conditioner goes on high. :)
 
I would not even think of keeping a chin full time at 78, no matter what the humidity was. I know there is a member here that has kept chins in 80+ deg temps and said they acclimated fine since they blew fur but they are not built for those temps and its not fair to the chin to have to acclimate to make the humans who took them into their homes "happy".
 
She's in the south. Her humidity is probably somewhere around 65% in the house, if not higher. My chin room is at 68 degrees and 55% humidity. This is with the AC running all day long, and definitely not set at 78 degrees. Mississippi's humidity is even worse than ours.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Latest posts

Back
Top