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1

Health / Re: Swollen genitalia

« on: September 04, 2016, 01:29:04 AM »

Definitely, I've had a chin that died from malocclusion and since then I always worry a lot when I see something "strange".It's just that his parts are so different from everything I've seen before.I'll move his cage to another location in the same room away from the lights to see if there is cooler.He 's a sweetie.Thank you a lot for your help

Did someone give you info for checking for hair rings??  I did a YouTube search for "chinchilla hair ring check" and there were plenty of videos showing you how to do it.  These look to be the top 4:

https://youtu.be/klldt0TmLpI

https://youtu.be/QFF1Xg_6pHw

https://youtu.be/BafuUFuO-oA

https://youtu.be/s-lfH0CU0iM

Hope that helps!!

Tina

2

General Chat / Re: Good cheap excercise wheel for a polish chinchilla

« on: September 04, 2016, 01:05:32 AM »

.DO you have any recommendations?

This is the one I got from Etsy and I have ZERO complaints.  She's very easy to work with and stands by her work!

https://www.etsy.com/listing/244698998/pet-revolution-16-ultra-silent-deluxe

Hope that helps!

Tina

3

Health / Re: Salt block?

« on: August 23, 2016, 11:08:25 PM »

Experiment at your own risk. In my opinion this is a risk not worth taking.

Aloha!

In my case, what I meant was, they are too precious to experiment on and I tossed the salt block in the trash! @MariaSelena came to the same conclusion, I believe! 

Anyway, mahalo again for your feedback!!
~ Tina

4

Health / Re: Salt block?

« on: August 23, 2016, 04:35:51 PM »

It's a very conflicting topic. Some of breeders use it and every chin has its private block in the cage. Some of breeders afraid of it and tell, that salt block is a "white death" for chinchillas.

In the beginning, I bought some of them, but none of my herd ate it. Of course, I put it away. Than, I started to discuss the question with different breeders and owners, and their opinion was 50/50.
I'm afraid of making experiments on my animals. So, I refused to use salt blocks on my farm.

That's why I can't give you an exact answer. 

Mahalo MariaSelena!!!

I kind of agree with you about experimenting, so I tossed the salt blocks/licks - in my experience, if an animal is salt deficient, they will chew on metal to try and get salt.  Course, no idea how well that works for chins since they chew on everything anyway!!

~ Tina

5

General Chat / Re: Joey and Kira

« on: August 08, 2016, 05:58:50 AM »

Hmm... At least with the attachment , you can view it full size, heh 

6

General Chat / Joey and Kira

« on: August 08, 2016, 05:57:00 AM »

Some new pictures, taken yesterday!!

Another month to go before they get to come home!!

Tina

P.S.  Not sure what's the best way to share images so with this one, I did both inline and attachment!

7

Q & A / Re: What mutation is this?

« on: August 08, 2016, 05:31:44 AM »

Aloha!

The more I read about the mutations, the more I can see I have a LONG way to go in understanding them!!

Do you know of any print type book available?  I'd love to find a website that has a page for each mutation with tons of pictures on each one. I found 1 site that started that but only had 1 photos as example - course I forgot to bookmark it so haven't been able to return to read it again.

Mahalo again for your reply and help in trying to get it figured out!!

A hui hou,
Tina

8

Q & A / Re: What mutation is this?

« on: August 07, 2016, 04:59:43 PM »

Mahalo!!!!   I sure wish I could see his tail.  Venture to guess what it looks like?

You guys are awesome!!

9

Cages / Re: Making My Own Chews and Accessories

« on: August 07, 2016, 04:57:01 PM »

Aloha!

So cherry and apricot woods are out, yes?  Because they are a pit-based fruits?

Mahalo!!

10

Q & A / Re: What mutation is this?

« on: August 04, 2016, 04:34:28 PM »

Honestly I don't know. I wish I could go to chinchilla shows that have a lot of different colors and see them in person. I'm in kind of a secluded situation myself living where it's a bit warm for large scale operations.

My first thought on this one is the fur is extremely short. The fur closest to the skin is dark and then the tips are light on the belly. So I'm guessing it's just the tips are very shallow because of the shortness of the fur so its legs are pulled forward exposing those deeper colors. I would expect in a normal stance it would not be near as noticeable. Although the forelimb colors on my own standard vary quite a bit.

So if you can go to chinchilla shows that would be ideal. If I remember right sapphire and RPA are recessive so both sire and dam must be Sc and RPAc.

GRRR, my 4-month old kitten just walked across my keyboard and "reloaded" this page - I had JUST finished the last line of my reply.  He erased it all!  It's a good thing he's CUTE!

ok, so ya, I believe you are correct, both are recessive.  If I decide to breed, its the RPA I'm interested in though.  At this point in my understanding, I think I'd want a nice blocky Std RPAc (or RPA if I'm feeling rich) male.  He would work with both my girls... Joey is the Sc RPAc Std, and Kira is a dark ebony.  But if I get to that point, I will definitely be contacting multiple breeders for their suggestions in what type of male would be best - that would work with both girls (though, by that time, I could probably split them and each get their own boyfriend), but thats so far down the road, I'm just trying to NOT think too much about it!

If you hang around here for any length of time you'll be mentoring people and learning about all kind of crazy things that can go wrong with pet owners and chinchillas. The forums are active and it comes and goes in waves. I strongly recommend Empress Chinchilla and MBCA for more information. They are good communities and resources for breeders.

http://www.mutationchinchillas.com/index.html
http://empresschinchilla.org/

I've already been in contact with Maxine - the general manager of ECBC.  She sent me their latest newsletter and it was very informative!  If I decide to breed, I absolutely will join both.  When I raised and showed English bulldogs, I was a member of their chapter of the National English Bulldog non-profit; when my parents raised emus, we were very involved with the American Emu Association and our local state and county chapters. My opinion is you can't be on-top of everything you need to know by yourself, and these resources are just too good to pass up!  Since moving to Hawaii, my parents are planting Cacao mostly on their farm and they've already joined and are involved with the local Cacao Association.  Their goal is to have Hawaiian Chocolate being as well known as "Kona Coffee".  Since its such a new industry, everyone involved really works together and learns together about every aspect of growing and processing cacao.

‘A‘ole pilikia (Your'e welcome (If I googled that right!))

Hey, you taught me a new one!  According to one of my resources, it translates to "no problem" which is basically a "you're welcome"!  I've only been here 6 years, so I'm still learning the phrases and stuff that are used so much here.  Things like "Aloha" and "Mahalo" just come to me now - I get weird looks when I'm on the mainland and say them.  The biggest roadblock is pronunciation.  Basically there are no silent letters in Hawaiian - if you just read/say it like it looks like, you are probably going to be really close.  If you try to pronounce it  using English silent letter/syllable rules, you'll be way off!  Nothing amuses a local more, than a haole mispronouncing something wrong.  Most are goodnatured about it, and appreciate that you are trying to use their local language.

11

Q & A / Re: What mutation is this?e,

« on: August 04, 2016, 04:32:02 AM »

Although you can never know for sure without seeing the pedigree I'm going to guess this is a sapphire. It's about the right color but its fur quality is also terrible which is a known trait of the sapphire mutation that is not well developed.

Mahalo for pointing out you never really know without a pedigree, but I'm just attempting to train my eye for things like color, quality and such.  You have been awesome in answering my plethora of questions!  Mahalo again!

So back to this photo... Is it fairly normal for a sapphire to have the dark arms and legs with the lighter gray tummy??  I think that's what stood out for me - the darker shade on hands and feet and even, around his neck looks darker as well.  It's not often I've seen the "tummy" side of a chinchilla.  Joey is a Sc so I guess it's possible (if I decide to breed her), I could see a sapphire kit, depending on what the male is - he'd have to be at least a Sc or Sapphire himself as well, correct?  I believe the sapphire gene is recessive so the kit would have to get 1 from each parent to actually show that color?  I picked her more for the RPAc genes.     Boy, don't I sound like an expert scientist, talking about genes, recessive and everything!  I'll have to do some more searches on Google for sapphire chinchilla images since it is in my starting bloodline.

I hate being so "secluded" here - I'm hoping to plan a trip to the mainland next year to coincide with a show I can attend!  I'm sure it's easier to learn the mutations and stuff in person rather than through photos.  There is a DOWNSIDE to living here for sure!

Again, mahalo for your continued help and patience as I stumble through this learning time!  I hope someday I can help mentor a new owner myself - there is so much to learn if you really want to understand these furry, fluffy balls of attitude, that's for sure!  I think I've gone through every single post in the forums now - other than the last breeder one, that I'm still stumbling through as I have time!  The forums look to have been really active in years past!  Mahalo for keeping the resource open and monitoring the few posts from me and a couple other new chin parents!

A hui hou (until we "meet/speak" again - hope you don't mind a spattering of Hawaiian!),
Tina

12

Cages / Re: It came, it came!!

« on: August 04, 2016, 04:01:30 AM »

Sounds like fun. I recommend getting some help to build it though and the CN cage will be heavier.
With my FN cage I had an issue with some plastic doodads on the ends of the bars that turned out to be packing material. Beware of that and save yourself a serious headache if CN does that too.

Mahalo!!  My breeder actually has a video on YouTube with her putting together a CN by herself so I know it can be done (course I'm thinking she has quite a few she's put together before... But I'm sure my daughter will help me - we're pretty crafty women!!

I was shocked, however, with how heavy that box is... Fort Knox, chinchilla-style!!  Thank the Lord for tile and wood floors, I was able to slide it across the back hallway and into my room!

13

Cages / It came, it came!!

« on: August 03, 2016, 09:35:07 PM »

Aloha!!

Guess what??  I'm so excited!  My CritterNation came today!!!!!!

The 2 add-ons are coming separately.  I was going to set up the bottom level first, but then it dawned on me, they like higher so I'm gonna set up the TOP level for them to start with. 

I may not sleep tonight, but just lay here and drool over my latest pictures of Joey & Kira and my CN box leaning against my dresser.  I'll have to really work to keep my OCD from ripping the box open and putting it together!!  Which the biggest problem with that is I haven't snitched a rubber mallet from my dads workshop yet, heh!

6 more weeks!  I can do this!!

Mahalo for letting me share my excitement with you!
Tina

14

Cages / Re: How far does your chin run?

« on: August 03, 2016, 09:14:52 PM »

LOL - most of that went over my head.  My programming expertise is database driven websites... Give me HTML, SQL and ASP and I can pretty much do anything.  Technical computer stuff I can get to a point, engineering stuff though?  Yikes!!

I found a bicycle computer that's $14, it auto-wakes, you can adjust the "tire size" down to 16" and its wireless so no wires.  I THINK I can get that working.  I didn't think about hot glue for the magnet, that's a great idea!  My girls will be too young for the wheel for quite awhile, but I have ordered it so I can play with it and set it up in an unused level of the cage.  I'm getting 3 stories, but the girls only get 1 level, the top one, to start out with.  Joey will be 4 months old, but Kira will be more like 6 or 8 weeks old when they come over!!

Mahalo!
Tina

15

Q & A / What mutation is this?

« on: August 03, 2016, 08:53:55 PM »

Aloha!

I was drooling over chinchilla images on google and ran across this one... It literally jumped out of the page at me!!  So very unique!  Can I get your opinion?  What mutation would this be?

Mahalo!
Tina