Blue Cloud Dust and Eye Infections

[detroitchinchillas]

About three weeks ago we went down to Ohio to buy some dust. We talked about eventually showing our chins, hopefully during next year's season. We had previously been using Blue Sparkle, but we were told that the judges preferred to see Blue Cloud dust on the chins. We ended up spending the extra money and purchasing the Blue Cloud.

Our dusting procedure is pretty straight forward. We place one and a half cups of dust in the dust bins. The dust bins go in with our chins every three days, leaving them in for ten to fifteen minutes. We then empty the dust, wipe out whatever is left behind with paper towel, and put fresh dust in before moving the bin to another chin.

Since we switched the Blue Cloud we have had five chins develop eye infections. We were able to clear three of them out ourselves with Vetericyn gel, but the other two we had to get some triple antibiotic gel from the vet.

We never had any problems like this with the Blue Sparkle dust. And it really stinks, since the Blue Cloud dust is almost twice as expensive. Our vet recommended we go back to Blue Sparkle.

So, my question is two-fold. Has anyone else experienced anything like this? And if not, does anyone have any suggestions for what we could change?

 

[becky12883]

A cup and a half for one chin and you only use it once? That is gonna cost you a lot. I only have 3 chins, but there is one bath that they all share and I put a heaping half cup in and use it about 3 times for each chin. So I use a little over a half cup for 9 baths. I dump it when there are too many poos in it or it doesn't get dusty anymore.
As for the eye infections, a lot of people use Blue Cloud dust and their chins don't get eye infections. Is there some other source the eye infections could have come from? Pink eye and other bacteria can pass back and forth from different species, so if you or someone or some other animal that has been around the chins has been sick recently they might have contracted the infections that way.
I'm not a breeder so I don't know really anything other than what I can relate about my pets. I'm sure there are more experienced people that will have some thoughts for you.

 

[AZChins]

I don't know what happened to your chins. I've been using Blue Cloud for the entire time I have had my chinchillas, so I don't know what to say. There's an eye infection that pops up once every couple of months, but that's pretty normal with a herd my size...it's always an easy to clear up case of conjunctivitis.

Maybe the chins just aren't used to it yet? The particles are larger and maybe irritating their eyes more?

 

[detroitchinchillas]

Thanks for the advice. I have no idea what could have caused it. Neither of us have had pink eye or been in contact with anyone who has had it or any other eye illness. The only thing that we've changed in the routine with our chins since last October has been the dust. I think in the past year, when we were using the Blue Sparkle dust, we had maybe two eye infections total.

I'm not sure about the physical size of the dust, but I was given that the Blue Cloud dust was much more fine in grain than the Blue Sparkle dust. So maybe it's that it's smaller and easier to get under the eyes?

We've cleared all of them up now, but I don't want to give dust baths right now for fear of giving more chins eye infections. We won't be able to pick up more Blue Sparkle until the Ohio Claim Show in a couple weeks. So I'm at a loss and it's pretty frustrating.