Sick Chinnie, advice needed.

Upon taking the chins out for playtime this evening I noticed Buttons had not eaten much and there wasn't as much poo in the cage as their normally is. This is very strange for him as he usually has a huge appetite. I took him out of the cage and his nose and eyes are weapy. I called a very knowledgeable chin vet (Hidden Hills Animal Hospital) and Buttons has an appointment for tomorrow.

I am scared to death this could be a teeth issue, though because his nose is also runny I am thinking a cold? He's not around a draft and the vent is covered near his cage. He has also had no contact with any of the rescues (who showed no sign of being sick). Can chins just randomly get a cold/sickness even if no one in the house has shown any signs of being sick (counting the chins)?

Can anyone think of anything I can do for him tonight to make him more comfortable? Also, should I take him out of his regular cage and put him in a smaller quarantine cage away from Chula (Chula is above him in a FN)? I did feed him some CC (mixed with Lifeline) 3 times today and he ate some on his own. I haven't seen him touch his hay or pellets today though which is what made me check on him in the first place. My chins are truly day sleepers, so I didn't think anything of checking on him because I thought he was sleeping. I didn't know he wasn't feeling good.

I wish him well. Since you have already been hand-feeding, other than offering some Simethicone I can't think of anything to do but see the vet. Until you know what you are dealing with and since the cage-mate has already been exposed I personally would not quarantine, keeping him with his cage-mate may offer some comfort.

I just got off the phone with the chin knowledgeable vet who happens to be off tomorrow but he is calling the other vet to tell him what to give me. He said Baytril is not his first choice since the taste is crap and it tends to make them not want to eat. He said he is going to prescribe (septra) tmz and reglan to keep the gut moving. He is also going to have me come in for a follow up appointment on Monday (complimentary in terms of payment since he will not be there tomorrow).

Does this sound like a good plan?

Parkerspetchins said:

I wish him well. Since you have already been hand-feeding, other than offering some Simethicone I can't think of anything to do but see the vet. Until you know what you are dealing with and since the cage-mate has already been exposed I personally would not quarantine, keeping him with his cage-mate may offer some comfort.

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They are not cage mates. Chula is on the top of the FN and Buttons is on the bottom. The vet did tell me that if it is a URI, which he said he has no doubt it is from the way I described his symptoms, that Chula has already been exposed and he wouldn't move Buttons to the smaller cage which would stress him out further. He said any other situation he would say yes to the quarantine, but since he already isn't big on food he doesn't want to make it worse.

Is it still recommended that I move him? The farthest I can move him is the bathroom connected to my bedroom (where Chula is). It does have a door though. I can't move him to the living room since then he will be with the rescues.

Obviously, I'm not a vet, but runny nose and eyes doesn't sound like a teeth issue. If it was just runny eyes, maybe, but with his nose running I would think it would be more a upper respiratory tract infection type issue.

Here's the thing, often times TMZ is not strong enough for a respiratory problem. It might be, and it won't hurt to get him started on it, but if it's a true pneumonia, I would guess that the Baytril would be more the way to go as it's a stronger antibiotic.

Also think about giving him some nebulization via warm steam if he's having trouble breathing. You didn't mention his breathing at all - is it labored or normal?

Ack, poor Buttons

I'll keep the wee guy in my thoughts, here's to a speedy recovery!

Sounds like upper respiratory. to listen for a clicking sound when breathing, that is an indicate that they may be struggling a bit. if anyone has a nebulizer in the house it can do wonders

I agree with Peggy - TMZ won't hurt him, and it tastes better, but Baytril is a very good antibiotic and if it's really a URI or pneumonia he'll need Bayril to get it out of his system.

On a side note, I know that it gets thrown around a lot that Baytril makes them go off feed, but for what it's worth I've never had any problems with chinnies going off food on Baytril if the dosage is correct.

He ate some CC earlier and now he won't anymore. I added some pumpkin to it from a recommendation of someone else and still nothing. I then added some oats, herbs, and crushed rosehips to the top and still nothing. I have to go to work in 35 minutes and I don't want to leave him. My job is far from understanding about animal emergencies which is why I am actually glad that I don't work tomorrow during the day so he can see the vet.

Thank you to everyone who helped me in chat. I am about to move on to force feeding just to make sure he has something in his system. I pray this goes ok with him. I will ask for Baytril tomorrow as that's what everyone so far has told me to do. I don't know if they will give it to me since it's not the exotic vet that's there and I will be seeing him on Monday. On another forum someone told me that her chin was having these same problems, was put on what my vet wants to put him on, and passed away two days later. I am sooooooooooooooo worried now. She thinks Baytril would have saved him. I am definitely going to beg the vet for Baytril tomorrow, not Monday. I understand why he is anti Baytril but the last thing I want is for Buttons to pass away from this. This has proved to me that rehoming him would have absolutely killed me and I have no idea why I had even thought about it. I haven't had enough time with him yet.

I think Chula knows something isn't right. Even though he can't see Buttons he knows that when I go to the lower level I am paying attention to him. usually his jealousy flares up and he's been totally calm and collected even though I haven't really paid attention to him.

You're going to need to put the CC in a syringe and force him to eat it. It's weird at first, but once he gets used to it he will just sit there for it, and once he feels better he may even eat the CC on his own. Mixing pumpkin with it can work sometimes, but not always. You can try mixing in a little strawberry Glucerna - it's a dietary supplement for diabetics, so contains no sugar.

I wasn't sure what else to call them since they are sharing the same cage structure but I did read what you posted, guess I didn't make it clear. I would not move him out of his cage but maybe the vet will give you extra meds in case the other chin develops the same symptoms. I hope he makes a quick recovery!

Ok, got 10 cc's of CC into him and about 10 cc's onto him. Poor baby. He looks horrible.

I stopped because he got really violent to the syringe towards the end. He ended up biting a piece of the tip off because he was biting it so hard. I think he was at his limit at that point.

Will 10 cc's be ok for tonight while I am at work? I will go at it again in the am before I take him to his vet appointment.

My girl was given Baytril and she seems to have missed the it tastes yucky memo cuz she won't let the syringe go. So I have 1 of 2 chins who think its a treat.

Good luck with Buttons.

moon said:

You're going to need to put the CC in a syringe and force him to eat it. It's weird at first, but once he gets used to it he will just sit there for it, and once he feels better he may even eat the CC on his own. Mixing pumpkin with it can work sometimes, but not always. You can try mixing in a little strawberry Glucerna - it's a dietary supplement for diabetics, so contains no sugar.

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He was actually eating the CC on his own during the day. Only about 2 teaspoons though. Everyone in chat told me to try what I could to eat it on his own since he already doesn't feel good. I ended up syringing it to him. Just got done. I feel bad for him because his face was basically covered in it since he wouldn't stop wiggling (he was burritoed, but that didn't stop his head from moving). The vet is going to wonder what on earth I did to him. Is 10cc's enough for now, plus what he ate earlier? I don't want to put him through anymore unless I absolutely have to. He got crazy angry towards the end, but we both got through it.

Aww poor wee one. Just let me know if there's anything I can do to help.

Poor baby. I wiped him off with a baby wipe to get as much as I could off and this is the aftermath.

EnslavedByNinjas said:

Aww poor wee one. Just let me know if there's anything I can do to help.

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Thank you for that. The ledges that you told me you would make me for the rescue is crazy helpful since now I don't have time to make them. Again, you're amazing and I am so thankful for your help.

It's the least I can do with how helpful you've been to me!

On a side note - the chinnie vet you go to at Hidden Hills, is that Dr. Stephen Hart? That's who I took Nibbler to, and when he decided he was afraid he was going to hop down to play, crouched down on the floor with Brie and I and had a 20 minute conversation on chins while he ran all over around us.

I believe he said his name was Hartz. We thought it was Holtz but he corrected me. Maybe I heard him wrong?