Limping Chinchilla

[Cuddlebug]

Cute. I am glad that nothing was broken.

 

[Laurie]

I'm glad nothing was broken! Yes, you should be worried about her appetite. Usually when a chin is stressed, in pain, or ill they stop eating, which obviously is not good and leads to their demise. When a chin stops eating they need to be force fed Critical Care, which you can usually get from your vet or via menagerie here on the forum. Critical Care is mixed with water to make a slurry type gruel for the chins. You'll have to feed it using a syringe. You can do a search of the forum for critical care or force/hand feeding.

If she is eating that's good, but you need to monitor her very closely to make sure she continues to eat and does not stop eating.

 

[ncc2015]

Thanks yea. I have critical care but it already expired. I tried blending the hay and pellets but the hay wont get small enough and it doesn't go in the syringe. I really think I need some critical care because she's barely pooping now and it's very tiny and I'm assuming it's because she's barely eaten anything. I think I'll go to a closer vet thats listed on the oxbow site and get some from there. Thanks again for all the help.

 

[CJR]

When I got Tia, she had a broken pelvis, so I consider myself fairly knowledgeable in this area.

If she is still limping, you need to confine her. She needs to be in a small cage where she can't jump - a cat carrier works well for this purpose. No ledges, no wheels, nothing.

If she isn't eating, grind up her pellets and mix them with water and force feed her. She needs to keep eating, that is a top priority. Also keep her liquid intake up. I do that by mixing some simethicone (anti-gas for infants, you can find it in any grocery store) into the water. They like the taste of the simethicone and it won't hurt them. Get her to drink as much as possible, you want to keep her insides moist especially if she isn't eating.

Don't worry about grinding the hay up, just grind up the pellets and do whatever it takes to get her to eat them. I know this is hard, but it's necessary.

 

[Laurie]

If you can't get critical care today you can crush up pellets and add water to make the slurry until you can get critical care in. You do not want her to stop eating, that puts her into statis which again leads to a chinchilla demise. I recommend feeding her smaller amounts of crushed pellets or critical care throughout the day. You want to get at least 80mls of food into her.

 

[ncc2015]

Thanks for all the advice. Yes i actually used fleece to seperate her cage into a smaller area and then another fleece for the top because she liked to climb the sides of the cage esp since its 1/2in by 1in so it was easy for her to do so. I don't have an all wire carrier so I didn't want to put her in the plastic carrier we have which she loves to chew the holes of. Yes I did actually crush up the hay and pellets. I actually used the dropper to the mylicon (infant anti-gas medicine which was prescribed by the vet) and was able to suck it up with that even though the hay wasn't completely shredded. I was having trouble earlier sucking it up in the syringe so I'm glad I found another tool to use. I don't think i gave her 80ml but prob around 40ml before she wouldnt eat it anymore. I put her back in her cage and she started eating the hay. So I guess feeding her the crushed food also increases her appetite a little. I already saw an improvement as when I was trying to wrap her I saw some more poos and when I put her back in the cage still more poos, which is great because for the past few days I haven't actually seen her poo. Since the crushed food is working great I think Ill just give that instead of getting critical care every day until she starts eating as much as she did before her injury. Is 80ml how much i should try to give at each feeding or will 40ml 3x a day be okay for her?

 

[Laurie]

80mls is the amount each day--so you can split up the feedings. If she is eating hay that's great. You want to keep her eating and make sure she is eating, drink, and pooping. If you feel she is eating enough hay and pellets on her own then there's no need to handfeed. You only want to handfeed when they are not eating on their own. I would try to feed her again in a few hours and then monitor tomorrow to see if she is eating hay and pellets.

 

[CJR]

I am in agreement with Laurie. You're doing great with her, Ncc.

 

[ncc2015]

oh 80ml in a day ok. She's been eating hay, but she barely touches her pellets even though I've dusted them with chinchilla lifeline which she always gobbles up. In her pellets bowl is just enough to cover the bottom of it and since Wed is still the same amount so I think I will continue to handfeed her until she starts eating a good amount of pellets along with her hay. She really hates being confined though i put another fleece blanket on the floor and put it up a little on the sides to keep the hay from falling out of the cage and she likes to sit on top of the little fleece mound since she can't go anywhere else. She's been doing a lot better since handfeeding her. Thanks again for all the advice and support.