My chinchilla has made a terribly loud noise!!

I have a 4 1/2 month old chinchilla kit. She is very healthy and well-cared for, but about fifteen minutes ago something strange happened. She made the terrible loud squeal that some other chinchilla sites have mentioned...although it is apparently a rare noise to hear. She was playing in her cage while I was about to go to sleep, and all of a sudden she made the noise out of nowhere!! It seriously sounded as though she was being squeezed and could not breathe. She was alone in her cage, as she is my only chin. I am absolutely terrified, and don't know what to do, being that it is nearly 3:00 AM, and no vets that I know of are available at this time. The noise that she made usually happens when chins are in pain or are suddenly frightened, and she seems to be fine now. I checked her all over and she has no cuts or visible ailments, so I don't think she is physically hurt. Chacha had suggested that she was having a stroke (as in, heat stroke), but she is kept very cool at all times. She has her own, personal fan, a chin-chiller, many frozen rocks, and our home is kept very cool in order to accommodate her (yeah, she's spoiled), so I am trying to think of other reasons why she may have freaked out like this. The room was absolutely quiet when it happened, so I don't know what could have possibly frightened her. Also, I have not given her a wheel or anything because she is still quite young, so it couldn't have been that which had hurt her in any way. I am really freaked out, so any help is greatly appreciated. Thanks so much!!

p.s. it is nothing that I have heard before, it was one loud squeal that lasted for about a second and a half

ahhhhh

I believe I know the sound. She is fine...she was calling out to you
Eta, it sounds like when you squeeze a rubber dog toy or rubber chicken I bet

Oh I remember when Ralphy first did that it scared the crap out of me! He did it at 2 am and woke me up and I rushed over to his cage and he seemed okay, but I gave him a cheerio and went back to bed. Unfortunately, he learned that if he squawks like that at 2 am on the dot, I will give him attention and he began doing it every night haha. It sounds awful but I agree with the last post, she just wants attention! Furby hardly does it at all but Ralphy does it a lot!

I have a couple of chins that do that. It almost always has me running to find out if there is something wrong. Then the chin looks at me as if to say 'what took you so long'

Heck, that scream is a nightly occurence here, started out with one chin doing it while running on the wheel, then more learned it and they scream when they feel like it. I have had one belt it out on my lap watching T.V. Dante screams just about every morning around 4:30am, I guess it is a human attention call since no chins respond to it.

It sure is scary when they do that! My Leonard does it quite often and lately Mick St. John has been doing it as well. Because they're boys I always say it's their "trying to get a girlfriend" call!

Kiwi does this too, but very rarely. Boy it makes you jump out of your skin.

Ohhhhhh thank god...I heard the noise and rushed over to her cage and checked all over for any blood or anything, haha! Whew, well that fixed alot of my nerves for sure. Thanks so much guys, and sorry about posing this in the "emergencies" section, I was just so afraid that she was having some type of problem, ahh!

Kishi also does this alot, usually arounnd 3 am, i usually just petand talk to her, give her scritchies, and she is fine, do you have any streetlights or bushes outside your window?i think that's what scares kishi sometimes, the shadows of the bush outside(it reaches the second floor almost) casts shadows which scare her.

Once or twice, Sonya (who sleeps all the time, even when everyone else is awake lol) will make that noise as if she's having a nightmare. I don't know if you've read that they will make noises in their sleep, sometimes they just makes calling noises, but sometimes they make frightened noises. Obviously she was awake, so it wasn't that, but I just wanted to give you the heads up that sometimes they make weird noises in their sleep, so you don't worry if you overhear her sleep talking. :thumbsup:

This thread saved my sanity. My chins seem to scream nightly and when I turn on the light, they are just going about their business completely undisturbed. I was convinced one of them had a splinter or ulcer or something.

Since it's an attention thing, will they eventually stop if I ignore it? And if it's like "crying wolf", should I NOT ignore it since they may actually be injured?