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[Matt0925]

We just brought our chinchilla on a cross country move over about two days. I know it was very stressful for her, but I think she handled it well. The thing is now though that she is not eating or urinating. She has a full water bottle and food bowl, plus she has timothy hay. At this point she doesn't even want raisens (I cant spell lol) which is very odd for her.

Any thoughts would be great. Thanks!

[dianah]

is she pooing? it's very important that she eats - if she doesn't eat for more than 24 hours, her gut may go into stasis and this is no good at all (i.e. seriously life threatening).

i would get her to a vet asap. have her seen, they may need to stimulate her gut. you may be able to get oxbow critical care from them.

if you have any syringes, you could crush her pellets and mix them with water and force feed her (i know it sounds horrible) but feed from the side of the mouth, don't squirt down the throat as she may breathe it in.

they do not wee a lot - and they don't really drink a lot either - so you may not notice any wee. poo is important however. she should be constantly pooing.

[dianah]

just thought i'd give you some more info.

i would not give her raisins at the moment, if she is going into stasis (or is in stasis already), sugary things like raisins increase the gas in the gut and in a gut that's not moving this causes serious problems (they can't fart or burp so the only way of getting gas out is by normal gut movement)

you could try giving her rolled oats (like porridge ones but not instant) - mae, my rescue who goes into stasis on a fairly regular basis eats these even if she doesn't touch anything else - no more than a teaspoon a day though. ideally you want to get some fibre into her (hay's best)

the food you're giving her, is it the same as what she's been on before you got her?

i would also suggest probiotics. you can get some from your vet, there's also a product called lifeline that's a mixture of all sorts of good things including probiotics and stimulates appetite. you can get it from here http://chocolatechinchillas.com/id6.html and if you email dawnna that it's an emergency, she'll ship quicker.

oxbow critical care - they do two different version, original and fine grind. original has bigger bits and i couldn't syringe it - many animals will eat it off a spoon or of a finger. fine grind is a fine powder and fits through syringe easily - i have to use that one for mae because she prefers it for some reason, even though she now eats it off my finger.

the important thing is: she *needs* to eat and she *needs* to poo. keep the diet basic (ie no sugary treats) and see the vet asap. g.i. stasis is very painful and dangerous condition, the quicker treatment starts the better prognosis. if the gut stops, is not treated or treatment is not effective, organs start shutting down.
mae's had this on four different occasions, the first time she very nearly died (all vets thought she wasn't gonna make it), the consecutive times were easier as i picked it up early.

remember they are prey animals and will often not show any sign of illness. quite often when symptoms are obvious, it's too late. so, anytime they stop eating or change behaviour in any way, you need to suspect something's wrong (even though it quite often isn't - better safe than sorry)

[jmdebb]

oh yes, pls go to a vet asap, and let us know how you make out, sending get well wishes

[Matt0925]

Thank you for the replys.

She is still pooping, however they are smaller than usual. If I pick up a piece of her food and hand it to her she will eat, however she wont go up to her bowl and eat it. We also give her timothy hay cubes, the past couple days I have seen her chew on it a bit, however nothing noticable. She is chewing on her wood sticks that we give her though, pretty often as well. We give a mix between regular and apple wood. Should we stop with the apple wood sticks?

The water in her bottle looks a little lower, but not a ton. She is trained to pee in a pan of litter, I have not noticed any wet spots, however it is possible that I am just missing them.

We ran out and got some 100% Whole grain rolled oats. Is there a specific way to feed them? Just offer her a bit and see if she eats? Thank you again for the help. There was one other time in the past that she stopped eating for us, we had been out of town with a pet sitter watching her. Need less to say, he did not do a good job and she was not eating when we returned. We gave her some hay and that got her restarted eating. I am hoping the oats will help. Thanks again.

[dianah]

ah. that's good if she's eaten when given food. and that she's pooping even if they are smaller.

if she's eating when you hand her stuff, i would just do that a few times a day. i have to do that with mae every so often, she usually starts eating by herself a few days laters. give her hay as well as pellets. and keep at the apple sticks, i think anything that stimulates her chewing etc is good. given she's eating stuff when given it, i would only give her 1 teaspoon of oats twice a week (divide that amount for each day of the week) - i just hand them over, one by one. takes time, but they love it!

you may want to get lactulose from your vet. it's basically a 'gut lubricant' and it makes dry poos a bit more moist and helps to keep things going. it tastes lovely as well (it's sugar water pretty much) and my lot take it off a syringe without me having to take them out of the cage.

sorry i seem to have got the circumstances wrong, i thought you had just brought her home but as i understand it now she's been with you for a while, you've just moved? is that right? in that case you know how much she drinks and how much she pees and all. she will drink a little less if she's not eating pellets though.

[Matt0925]

Thanks for the reply Dianah. No need to be sorry 

We have had her for a couple of years now. What stressed her out was a move across the country, took a little over two days. I dont think she enjoyed it much.

I gave her a new block of hay last night, she chewed on it for a minute then quit, looks like she has not had any since. I will give her some more wood, that seems to be the only thing she is chewing on often. I will start hand feeding her. She seems to eat a bit when I do it, that is better than nothing.

I fed her about half a teaspoon of the oats last night, she took them if I handed them to her but once again would not eat it off of the ground. I will feed her some pellets a couple times today, see if I can make some progres. I believe I did hear her drink just a bit last night, however I was half asleep at the time and could have imagined it.

Any tips on finding a good vet? Most around here only seems to see cats and dogs. Thanks again!

[dianah]

mae's like that as well. you have to hand the oats over, somehow that makes them better  it takes about 12-15 hours to digest food so if she's pooping, it's going in somehow!

i think it's just a stress reaction and maybe she's not quite sure what's going on. i'd spend as much time with her as you can and keep handing her food. mae goes into stasis when i'm not at home. the first time (this was only a month after we rescued her and she was not eating and she was on all sorts of medication so that was a factor, i think) i went away for a couple of days and she got sick. second time round, i left in the morning and didn't come back until about 10pm and she got sick. i mentioned it to my vet and she said that stress affects gut and she may just be so attached to me (i'm her first real human mum, the people who had her before us should be sent to prison for how they treated her) that she just reacts to it this badly. now we know this, i refrain from going anywhere (i hardly ever do anyway) and if i have to go, we'll give her gut moving medicine the day before.

as for the vets. i live on the isle of man so we don't have a specialist exotics hospital/surgery. and there's not that many chinchillas on the island. but, the surgery our dogs go to has a vet who's very good with exotics and another joined the practice at the end of last year and she's extremely good with exotics too - she saved mae's life on numerous occasions. so, i would suggest, if there's no specialist place, call your local surgeries and enquire what their experience is with chinchillas.
i do find that some people are a bit awkward around them - ie don't know how to hold them or what to do with them really. but generally everybody in my practice now knows a lot more about chinchillas than they did a year ago, simply because i have six and mae is never quite right so we're there all the time!
so, a small animal vet with interest in exotics and some experience with exotics would be good.

[Matt0925]

Just wanted to give an update. She still takes the oats fine, she loves them. The pellets she will only eat one or two from me now, then stops. I havent seen much chewing on wood or hay either. She is also no longer pooping. I cleaned her cage this morning, there are no new leavings since then. We talked to our cat and dog vet, she refered us to a couple of other vets who do exotics. I am going to call them now and see if we can get her in tomorrow. I dont want her to wait until Monday at this point.

I will see if they can perscribe her lactulose and see if that will help. Thanks for the tips, I will let you know how everything goes. Hopefully it will be some good news soon.

[dianah]

i'm glad you're taking her. you're doing the right thing by not waiting til monday. could you get critical care from your usual vet before you get to talk to the exotics one? there's an injection they can give her - it's called maxolon and i found it works quite well but she'll need it daily. you can also get them in tablets but it's somewhat fiddly (i.e. dissolve 1/4 of a tablet which is very small in water and give half of that - 3 times a day) so injection is preferable. you could massage her tummy - this works well, as well as doing warm compresses - you could stick some rice into a sock, tie it, stick it in the microwave for a minute, then hold it to her tummy for five minutes or so, then massage her tummy in a slow gentle clockwise motion - you may actually squeeze poo out of her that way. food and hydration is important - you'll find that if you feed critical care, she won't drink much but that's because there's a lot of water mixed in.

good luck and keep us updated!

[Matt0925]

I got the apt made for tomorrow morning, so she doesnt have to wait long.

I am willing to try all of those methods to help her, however I think I will wait until after tomorrow. To be honest she is not big on being held. She loves to be petted and scratched, however holding is not high on her list. I dont think we hold her enough to be honest. Once she is out she is fine however.

I will suggest the lactulose tomorrow to the vet and see what they say. I would really prefer not to give her injections, but will if I need to. Thanks again dianah, you have been a huge help.

[dianah]

good luck! hope they get her better quickly!

mine don't like to be held either but you know, need's must. mae still loves me even though i've had to feed her horrid stuff!

i would imagine lactulose will not work on its own at this point. it's great for lubricating the inside and helps greatly when the poos are dry or smaller but it doesn't stimulate the gut movement once the gut has stopped. it helps stop the gut content from drying out though so it's good in combination with motility drugs.

if she is it gi stasis - i don't want to scare you but it's important that you're aware of how serious this condition is - generally the prognosis is very guarded. it took about three weeks for mae to get over the first one, she had 15 injections in the first week alone (it's a very painful condition so they give them painkillers as well), i was handfeeding around the clock, massaging tummy and everything else. she did pull through but when she got better, the vet told me they didn't expect her to. it was horrid because she had all the treatment she could have and there was nothing else i could do and she's just lie there not doing anything and obviously in pain.

the fact that she's had it a few times (though never as bad as the first time) and is still here is largely due to the fact that i treat it at the first sign of trouble (ie she doesn't poo for a few hours, in she goes), i have medication at home to give her and my vet will see me at any time, day and night.

injection may well be necessary. your vet will know

[Matt0925]

Well, we had a break through last night. She used to dig through her food bowl and dump a bunch on the ground. Last night as I was going to be she did that and ate a bit. She is pooping again. Plus I heard her drink and chew on her hay. So perhaps she was just being stubborn.

I am still going to take her to the very. I wish I didnt have to, however I would rather be safe than sorry. I just hope it doesnt end up costing me too much. Being a college student stinks lol

[dianah]

wooohoo! fab that's good!

definitely take her just to make sure. if it's nothing, all you'll end up paying for is the consultation. my vets thankfully don't charge me for consultation most of the time (go there way too often) so i usually just pay for the treatment. but even so, when i take her straight away if she's not pooing, it tends to get sorted within 3 visits. the first time we probably went 25 times in three weeks. thankfully the injections and medication cost next to nothing but it tends to be cheaper if i catch the problem earlier. 

[dianah]

any news? what did the vet say? is she ok?