Chinchilla Community Forums
Chinchillas => Q & A => Topic started by: Jenova on February 15, 2007, 01:24:42 PM
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We just took on a dog who was in a pretty bad way. We've had him cleaned up, de-flead and all the rest.
Cheech is in our room and we generally have the door closed because we like to keep our room cooler than the rest of the house for him. He's fine with the rabbits that we sometimes bring into our room. They hop around while he runs around his cage trying to follow them and gives them a good sniff every time they come over. The hamster he's fine with too, he just watches it as it rolls around in it's ball... but the dog... every time he sticks his head through the door, Cheech goes mad and starts running around crazily. I haven't got a clue why, the dog is very gentle, I mean we have to protect him from the rabbits who attack him and he wouldn't hurt a fly, but Cheech seems to think otherwise. We're not going to bother trying to introduce them, keeping them separate is probably safest but I would appreciate any comments on why you think he hates the dog so much. Or is he showing affection? I have no idea. I've never encountered this before so I just wanted to see what you guys think. :)
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Chinchillas are prey animals. He likely is fearful of your dog. He doesn't know whether or not the dog would hurt him and he certainly doesn't want to find out.
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::silly::Is Cheech giving warning calls when the new dog starts in the room?
Maybe he has had a bad experience with dogs before. You never want to continue to expose him to something he feels uncomfortable with ... it could cause him to start chewing fur.
I have an article, on Luv 'N Chins II about a family of my chins that was scared by my brother's dog. It took less than a minute to start a nervous fur chewing problem with the two kits that has yet to straighten out ... this was over 2 years ago that it happened. Two, what would have been, beautiful homo ebonies are still nervous chewers. The parents made it past the chewing after about 6 months, but the two kits still do.
http://www.geocities.com/jobernstein1949/
And click on: Other Family Pets Can Affect Your Chin Detrimentally
::wave::
Jo Ann
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Thank you for the replies. There is no need for them to come into contact with each other so we will keep them apart. He didn't make any warning sounds and the only thing he's done differently is that a day or two ago it looked like he had hiccups. I was a little worried at first but he stopped and although I've been keeping a close ye on him it hasn't happened again. I still don't know what it was, I couldn't hear any sound, his body just shook slightly every couple of seconds for about a minute. But he hadn't been in contact with the dog for ages when this happened so i didn't think it was connected.
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I feel very lucky that My little guy and my dog seem to be the best of friends. Smokey will lift up and put his front paws on the table and get nose to nose with chico . when chico is making noises in the room Smokey goes to make sure everything it ok ... I dont get it . SMokey will sit on the edge of the bed and just watch chico for hours and chico goes right to that side of the cage and watches smokey occasionally nosing each other.
When i put chico in his ball he chases smokey around in it and smokey play right along . I figured they would be mortal enemies but they arent i do feel very very lucky.
i tend to agree with everyone else . Maybe your chin had a bad experience or is unsure about they dog. maybe over time the little guy will calm down about it.