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[Emmalou]

Hello,

We are new on here from the uk and we recently bought a pair of chinchillas for the first time, we have done a lot of research and understand the commitment of having them and are trying to do everything right and look after them exactly as we should.

When we got them we were told they were Two females so we were quite happy knowing they were already living together and are generally better in pairs but one managed to injure their leg so we took her to the vets ( soft tissue injury and is on medicine and doing much better now!) but there we were told that both our chinchillas are actually male, so would really like some advice on anything else we should be looking out for with two males and if they are  definitely  okay together, obviously we just want to look after them the best we possibly can do any advice would be massively appreciated! Thank you so much! X

[GrayRodent]

Males make good pairs too. I've actually heard females tend to be more problematic. They do get more hormonal than males. I will say it's important to not house them in the same room with another female because they tend to fight and it can be dangerous.

Also with any pair of chinchillas I advise to have a separate cage setup available in case you must separate them. Chinchillas can turn on each other for no apparent reason. In my Internet experience it appears that you'll usually have a couple of days where you might notice things will escalate before injury occurs.

I have a double level Ferret Nation cage. Originally my two were combined but it didn't work out so I installed the divider and both chins have plenty of space.

Also do you know what the leg injury was caused by? You may need to do something different with the cage if it was a cage related issue.

[Emmalou]

Thank you for the help!
Yes we have a seperate cage as they are currently in a smaller one together whilst rhubarb is healing, as far as we can gather she fell off a shelf or she hit her leg on a housing unit thing for them so we have bought a new cage which has levels instead of shelves so it's safer and we have removed the house too! X

[GrayRodent]

Wow, that's horrible. Chinchilla cages should be fitted with wooden shelving. A safe cage height for pet chinchillas is about 2 feet. In that space you can put 2 to 3 tiers of shelves. The shelves give them a solid surface to live and sleep on to keep them off the floor (or bedding) and it gives them a good surface to gnaw upon. It effectively multiplies the floor area inside of the cage as well.

[Emmalou]

Yes the previous cage was safe, it had previously been home to another chinchillas, it was just an unfortunate accident so we have done what we can to eliminate that happening again