I feel like I must be forgetting something...

[pants567]

Hello All!
I've been silently stalking in the shadows for a couple weeks now reading through thread after thread and doing more research than anything else... my boyfriend will see me on the computer and ask "Reading about Chinchillas" and I'm so engrossed that I just nod. Anyway, all is in preparation for my new little buddy who will be coming home next Saturday!

As the title says, I feel like I must be forgetting something because it would be very easy to after all I've read. Some background info: this is will be my first chin. He is a medium standard, he'll be 5 months old on October 18th (he was born on my birthday, so much in common already lol). I'm super excited and I feel like I've learned SOOO much over the past couple weeks. Anywho, here's what I have so far:
this is the cage I got:
http://www.amazon.com/Prevue-Produc...MDKO/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1317407553&sr=8-2

I like it because it is all metal and the ramps and shelves are solid metal instead of mesh. It was a wire bottom on top of a plastic pullout tray. I'm planning on putting this ( http://www.petsmart.com/product/index.jsp?productId=2753297 ) on the bottom level as well as a chinchiller and maybe a piece of KD pine to put his food bowl on so he has somewhere to rest his little feetsies on while he eats. I read somewhere on here about someone using a suet feeder to hold the hay so I was planning on doing that to keep him from peeing on it. As far as food, the breeder I'm getting him from sells Shoots, so I'll be buying that when I pick him up to keep him on the food he has been eating and maybe transition to Oxbow since that is easier for me to get since the breeder is 2 hours away. I'll be using Oxbow hay assuming it is available, if not I may have to resort to kaytee if it doesn't look too awful. As far as treats (obviously he'll have to wait a month or so since he won't be 6 months old yet) I have ordered dried rosehips, a box of apple wood (he can have that right away right?) and some compressed alfalfa from Ronda. For perches I was planning on getting some lava ledges and I also ordered a tube and cuddle ledge from Brittany (classychillas) as well as a hanging toy with lots of different chewables. For now I'll be using blue sparkle dust for his baths and probably using a cobbler tin or something until I feel it is safe to take him out of his cage.

I ordered this play pen (http://www.amazon.com/Midwest-Zinc-...T2IE/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&qid=1317408251&sr=8-5 ) and afterward read that zinc is toxic :wacko: so my question is will it be safe if I soak it in 50/50 vinegar/water mixture? Or should I just return it and get something NOT made with zinc? I got the 30" tall one and planned on setting it up in my kitchen for when he needs out of cage play time. His water bottle is glass. I haven't bought him a wheel because he isn't 6 months old (and the good ones are wicked expensive). There is an exotics vet a little less than an hour away.

For the ride home I'm planning on getting a little cat carrier and putting some fleece on the bottom and throwing some hay in there as well. I'm also getting a bunch of pumice stones from the breeder. After I run out of the blue sparkle I want to switch to blue cloud since I've found that it is actually pretty cheap online in large quantities.

In my head, he is named, but I want to wait until I have him to actually decide on his name. Sorry for the scatter-brained post, but I'm so excited! If you see anything wrong with the things I've bought or if I've forgotten anything, please let me know! I want to have everything ready for my baby when he comes home! OH! And I've attached a picture that the breeder sent me. It is blurry, but I'm already in love!

 

[LoveBug]

the only thing i see wrong with that cage is that the floor is wire and not solid.. it's not recommend for a chin to be on. since they can get their little feetsies caught in it.
the ramps don't need to be in there since a chin won't use them, they are jumpers.
he can have wood sticks right away when you get him, its recommended really.
have you tried looking at our vendors on here to see how much they cost for timothy hay? they're actually priced very well.
i can't help you with the playpen since i don't know much about them. i'll just be using carboard to wrap around in my kitchen in the spots where i wouldn't want my chin to get to.

 

[pants567]

Yeah, I was worried about the mesh flooring. I think there may be an option to not use it, but I worry about that because the tray is plastic and I don't want him chewing on it. Would it be better to have a plastic tray or mesh floor?

 

[pants567]

Another question, if I just use the plastic pan is there anything I can cover it with to keep it from getting chewed? Is it ok to put bedding on top of fleece?

 

[LoveBug]

you can use the plastic pan, and get a fleece liner. thats what 95% of us on here use. (well not me yet cause i dont have my chin but i will be). and yes its okay to put bedding on top of fleece although it sticks like crazy. most use a pyrex baking dish and put the bedding in that. and that way you don't have to put bedding all over your fleece. just in a dish. it'd be better to have the plastic pan, wiring flooring just isn't good.

 

[bchins]

I have a few wire-bottomed cages, but they are all 1/2" x 1/2" to 1/2" x 1". I just make sure to always have enough solid surfaces for the chinnies. That cage may have a bit more than a 1/2" x 1" bottom, so that may be a danger to him...but the fleece with the plastic pan and a bowl or such of KD Pine Bedding is a great idea too.

 

[pants567]

Yeah I'm not sure what the spacing is for the bottom part so I'll have to check when it comes. If the spacing is too big I'll just leave the wire part out and make a couple fleece liners. If the spacing is small enough I'll just make sure to put a couple pieces of KD pine in for him to walk around on the bottom level. The shelves are solid metal so that'll give him some non-mesh surfaces to walk around on as well as the wood and lava ledges I'll be putting in for him to jump around on.
I'm guess pine is the better choice for bedding vs aspen? Should I think about just leaving the factory supplied shelves out and build all wood shelves for him to hop around on? A friend of mine has ramps in his chinchilla cage and the chinchilla uses them a lot. I guess it is just one of those chin preferences? I know they like to jump around a lot and I have a feeling if I make my own shelves I'll have more room for a wheel in the future.

 

[LoveBug]

i personally would build shelves and take out the factory ones. that way when it's old enough a wheel can be placed in there. cause the wheels are exactly the smallest things.. hah. but i have heard of those bars snapping.. :/
but me personally i prefer aspen due to it is more absorbant. but it's up to you on which you choose. either the kd pine or aspen.

 

[3CsMommy]

You know, you could just tile the bottom. I have one chin that I've called a "Plastic Brush-hog, so I couldn't keep the plastic pans, and since my apartment gets hot, I wasn't in love with a metal pan either. So, I have no pan at all. Instead, I put a piece of fleece down on the mesh and lay in floor tiles cut to fit the inside of the cage. The tiles I got were about $1 each at Home Depot. If I find a pee spot outside the litter box, a wet paper towel takes care of it, and the tiles lift out so I can swap the fleece out every week.

That might be a long-term goal, though, since you'd have to litter box train your little guy first, so to start with, a fleece sleeve over the plastic pan would work. Or, you could wrap the metal grate in fleece and use clips underneath to hold it on until he gets consistent with the litter box.

 

[danilinn]

Have you looked at the lists and stickies? Here's a few:

http://www.chins-n-hedgies.com/forums/showthread.php?t=863&highlight=suppliers
http://www.chins-n-hedgies.com/forums/showthread.php?p=7917#post7917
http://www.chins-n-hedgies.com/forums/showthread.php?t=20384

Going through vendors within the chinchilla community, so to speak, is your safest bet for safety, quality, and good prices, in spite of shipping costs. Jonesy has a few Petco/smart items, but they all came off of NWI Chins' chin-safe store items page. She loves that tacky Super Pet kabob I bought before she moved in--what can ya do? It's not like she gets FOOD from them (shudder).

Prevue cages are reputed to have flimsy metal that won't last. Most people on here use Ferret Nations. I fell for the Quality Cage mansion--it's expensive with shipping, but chins can live 20 years. (I'm blessed enough to be daddy's girl to a retired carpenter, so mine was custom-built for $120 and 60 hours of labors of love, but that was the original model we started from before my dad went into the crazy artist zone.)

Fleece (anti-pill) is the mainstay of our household these days. If you use kn pine on the whole bottom, even covered in fleece, it's going to smell like pee and need replacing. Jones has a steel pan with fleece covers--that's working great. Switch them out and wipe the pan with vinegar a couple of times a week, vacuum the poop, and your weekly cage cleaning is lots faster and easier. (Not to mention your chin will be happier to not be wallowing in dried pee, til she finds her toilet-spot.)
I am totally with LoveBug--do-it-yourself and online chin vendors are the way to go.

I think you're better off with Blue Cloud than Blue Sparkle, anyway--I have heard that there is something like silica in Blue Sparkle, whereas Blue Cloud is pretty much edible.

As far as playpens go, I can't speak from experience, either, but I've ruled it out as an option for us. Jonesy turns four months on the 10th, and she already has the nerve to jump 2-3 feet when she's out of her cage. (Briefly--I give her 10 minute MAX playtimes til she's older.) The playpen you ordered is 2' high, and that's an easy leap. It seems to m if you cover it, it's not much different than being in another cage. Pick the safest room and block off any unsafe areas. I was a total slob with my yarn til Jonesy got home--now it's all in covered baskets. Outlet covers, block off cords or any other dangers or places you can't get her out of with cardboard or even a good baby gate--watch the plastic on that last, but it's not like you won't be there to supervise.

 

[danilinn]

Afterthought: OF COURSE you feel like you're forgetting something. Honestly, I had trouble sleeping for two weeks before my little girl came home--even had a nightmare that I took her to the university where I work and she got away. Absurd in retrospect, but it was cold-sweat stuff at the time.
Her first night home I fell asleep on the couch gazing at her, and woke up calmer with the biggest smile on my face.
Jonesy's breeder says I'm "in tune with her," but after the first week, I had no trouble telling what she liked, hated, wanted, when she was being lovey v. sneaky, etc.
It sounds like you'll be the same way, since you've been researching fanatically.
And if your boyfriend thinks you're getting a pet rock with fur and a tail, just wait--you'll be vindicated soon enough. I'm still gloating over how hard my husband has fallen for my girl.
It's gonna be great!

 

[pants567]

Thanks for those lists! I think eventually I'll upgrade to a FN, but for now I'm going to modify this one... assuming the bars don't break. Hopefully they won't because I don't want the little guy to get hurt. I think I'm going to leave the ramps out as some people have suggested and buy some more ledges. I bought 2 lava ledges and I'm going to invest in some KD pine ledges as well.
I'm hoping my boyfriend will love him as much as I already do! We spent last night discussing names and he expressed his worry that I'll love my new baby more than I love him! It was so funny! Anyway, off to look at more toys for my baby! Can't wait until next week to bring him home! I'll make sure to post some pictures.

 

[pants567]

After some long and hard thinking, I decided I'm going to buy a cage from the breeder. They sell cages very similar to the quality cages in that they have the 1/2x1 inch wiring all around and KD pine ledges included. It also has a solid floor so I don't have to worry about his feet getting hurt and it'll just be safer all around. Thinking about the wires breaking when he bounces around on added ledges was the straw that broke the camel's back. The little guy isn't even in my house yet and I'm already a worried mom.

 

[xBrianx619]

My chinchillas cage is all wire, but I replaced the shelves with kiln dried pine ones and I put a bunch of granite/marble tiles on the floor. So now he doesn't have to step on the wires! The cage was custom made and is very strudy. I have his food bowl and lots of hay on the bottom floor, since I can't find anything to hold the hay in yet. Maybe ill try using a tin can since that's what was suggested on these forums. The people here seem to know what they're talking about

 

[pants567]

Yeah the new cage I'm getting has a J-feeder attached to it, so I may just put the hay in that and put his food in the bowl I bought. That way the hay will be off the floor.

 

[danilinn]

Brian, the granite tiles are a great idea--it's like a whole floor of chin chillers!

 

[danilinn]

if you think it's a good cage, it's probably well worth the investment. remember, your little guy is going to be around for 15+ years.
Jonesy has 1/2" wire, and it's never occurred to her to chew on it, so that's a plus, too. i thought about going the cheap cage route, and just when i was ready (and sick over the $) to buy the QC, my mom suggested that i tell my dad (retired carpenter) what it was going to cost. he deemed the QC mansion boring, and Jonesy ended up with a 4' tall, 2' deep, 3' wide oval, complete with a "racetrack" around the 2' mark. she loves the small wire spacing--when she gets crazy excited at sunset or after her supplement, she runs up it, springs onto a shelf, and down again at some crazy angle like she's Tony Hawk.
pants, the worried mom thing will settle down, i promise. i worry like most people breathe, but i calmed down a lot as soon as her carrier was in my lap on the way home, and i'm relaxing even more as she loses her baby-clumsiness and gets wilier (and harder to catch when she pulls a great cage escape).
she'll have been home a month on the tenth, and in the last two weeks, i've only woken her up once to make sure she was still breathing. the worry settles as you see how smart they are.
as far as hay holders go, i've had no luck on that front, either. i'm planning to show up in Dad's garage one day this week with a pic of the SuperPet hay manger and explain all that's wrong with it (too hard to pull hay out of, too easy to chew through), and see if we can't design something better. right now, she has an Oxbow bungalow i stuff hay into because i gave her a bowl for hay and she peed in it all the time. the bungalow is a temporary solution, though. what about the Ware metal hay balls? the only reason i ruled that out is that Jonesy hates hanging toys, for some odd reason.

 

[LoveBug]

i don't know if those hay balls are okay.. to me they don't seem safe.
have you tried a terra cotta pot? or even a fleece hay bag?

 

[pants567]

I saw a picture of Jonesy's cage, it is so awesome! My little one (still unnamed cause I don't want to pick one until I actually meet him... 2 days!!!) is going to be in a 24X24X36 inch cage. It comes with three full length KD pine shelves and I'm planning on building some more and some perches for him as well. I'll post pictures and what not when he gets home if he'll let me. The spacing on the wires is 1/2 inch by 1 inch which is what I've seen most people recommend and the bottom is solid.
Thanks everyone so much for the tips! It really has made me feel a lot better. I'm also glad to know that I'm not the only one who worries like it's my job. You got me thinking about how cool it would be to have a little racetrack along the inside haha! Time to go draw some more sketches of how I could set up shelves!

 

[LoveBug]

aw yay on your soon to be chinnie homecoming!
can't wait to see him, and to see what your cage looks like