Our first little one we hand fed is our pet Peewee. She has her own page located at http://www.megalink.net/~zep/details.html. This page has the details to why Peewee was hand fed and the experience we went through with her mom. Peewee was recently featured on the cover of the MCBA (Mutation Chinchilla Breeders Assoc) news letter.

When I first started feeding Peewee, I really had no idea what was going to be involved. I had never fed a baby before. I never really expected her to live. Peewee was only about 10 grams at birth and looked like she was early. The first thing I did for her was to get her in a box with a wire cover, with wire spaced no more than 1" x .5 ". Then I dugout my heating pad and placed it under the box on the lowest setting, with a towel between the heating pad and the box. For a box I used an old end table drawer and fashioned a cover to fit it. An aquarium would also be appropriate, but remember the thinner the bottom surface the more insulation you may need between the box and heating pad. I also filled the box with shavings and added a rabbit pelt for the little one to feel secure. Chinchillas can get really lonely by themselves at this age and need attention. If memory serves me correctly, I was told by someone once that a baby chin like this can die from being lonely.

Anyway I started Peewee out on kitten formula we purchased at a local vets office. I Started mixing the formula with about a 2 to 1 ratio at first, to get her system used to it. I found a good way to heat formula was to take a film container and fill it half full of water and heat it in the microwave for 15 secs and then add the formula to it and shake it well. It will be cool enough to feed when it feels luke warm, about like a human babies bottle. The film container is water proof and makes a good container for formula storage. Store leftover formula in the fridge and reheat in the microwave for no more than 5 to 10 secs, depending on the amount left in the container. DO NOT OVERHEAT IT. I usually make a fresh batch every 8 to 12 hours, but as the little ones get bigger, it doesn't last that long. Old formula should be thrown out after 8 to 12 hours and should always be kept in the fridge when not in use. Another consideration is the size of the can you purchase. At first the baby won't eat much, but as time goes by, I found I was using a lot of formula and it was a lot less expensive to purchase it in a big can and store the can in the fridge instead of purchasing little cans and that Wal-Mart was a lot less expensive than the vets office to purchase formula. The first few days of trying to get Peewee to eat were hard. She didn't like the formula and her size hindered the efforts greatly. The schedule to feed chinchillas is about every 2 to 3 hours. I was very very tired after about ten weeks of this. At first I would put a drop on her lips and let her taste it, sometimes rubbing her chin to stimulate her to eat. After a couple of days, Peewee would let me put the tip of the dropper in her mouth and squeeze gently and she would drink in little sips. When the baby chin is first born, it shouldn't eat more than a dropper at a feeding and this will increase with time. Do not overfeed. Also, it is good to rub the chins belly until the chinchilla urinates and/or has a bowel movement. This rubbing stimulates the digestive system. I have watched our mom chins with babies. A lot of times when they are "cleaning butts", what seems to be happening is this action is making the chinchilla baby urinate. Another method to check for proper urination is to blow on the chins genitals and it should urinate.

After about 2 weeks of this I changed the formula to a 1 to 1 ratio, Peewee was not getting enough nutrition with the 2 to 1 ratio anymore. Around this time I also added a water bottle to the box and some food and hay so she could become familiar with what her future diet would be if she made it. Peewee is now letting me put the tip of the dropper, at an angle, in her mouth. Sometimes she would hold it with her paws. I also started giving her a pee sized amount of Nutrical, which can be obtained at a vets office, twice a day to give her some extra nutrition. Not all hand fed babies need Nutrical. Peewee was so small I decided it wouldn't hurt. Another useful item to people hand feeding, is a digital gram scale. A chinchilla should gain about 4 grams a day. Peewee was so underweight even at 2 weeks that she was about the size of a film container and half the weight she should of been for her age, as you can see in the pic on her page. I also started giving water by dropper at 2 weeks, in little amounts.

As Peewee got older, she began to suck the milk from the dropper on her own, like it was a bottle. I would give a very little squeeze and she would take it from there. As time went by, she would grab for the dropper on her own and attack it as though it was her last meal! The sound of the microwave beeping was her signal to wake up. She would spring out from under her rabbit pelt and screech until I would get her from her tank. I started using an aquarium after a couple weeks to giv her more room and for her to see what was going on, on the outside.

When peewee got a little older, I introduced another little one that needed to be fed and she took her right in. This little one is Peeps. Peeps mom jumped on her when she was a couple of weeks old and caused eye and optical nerve damage to her. I immediately dealt with the trauma of her injury and added her to the tank for feeding and observation, cause mom was not going to take her back. Peeps was easy and hard. easy because she was normal sized, but hard because all she had ever had was moms milk. It took a little time for her to get used to the formula I used for Peewee. But basically it was all about the same feed her every 2 hours and weigh her once a day.

Today I have 2 of the best pet chinchillas a breeder could ever ask for. As soon as I open the door to Peewee and Peeps cage, yes they are still together, Peewee is out and up my arm before I can even see what's going on. These 2 are great!!!

When Peewee and Peeps were old enough to dust. They had no idea how to dust. I would take them by the belly and roll their backs in the dust. They caught on after a couple of times of doing this. Even to this day Peewee and Peeps will lay on their backs in the dust for hours at a time, and/or the bottom of the cage. They sleep as a dog might by ones feet.

I have included a pic of Peeps on the bottom of this page to show what a fool she is!! also a pic of the type of dropper I use to feed all our little ones. This type of dropper can be purchased very inexpensively at any drugstore and probably else where. I get them for about $.50 as piece.

Well that's all for now. I plan to format this page a little better, with more details, as time allows, but this is the basics. I have so many people coming to me for details on how to hand feed that this page was becoming necessary. I also plan to add more about Peeps and maybe she will get her own page too. Peeps is another story in herself. Also, I will be adding my experiences with Rascal, the latest chinchilla I am feeding, and his story.

Oh, one last item of use. I was going to save this for a later time, but it is very relevent here. Rascal, our newest baby born on Christmas, along with another brother and a sister, was abandoned by the mom when he was born. The mom, Taffy, had the first 2 babies around 11 am and Rascal was the last and he was born a lot later, around 5 or 6 pm. By the time Rascal emerged into the world, Taffy was drained. Taffy had a hard pregnancy towards the end of term. She would stop drinking for days and would have to be rehydrated. The first day I planned on having to feed all 3 babies, but she came around and started drinking more and developed her milk. While she was still pregnant and not drinking, I was observing that she would reabsorb fluid from her milk sacs and I believe this is the only thing that kept her going in the state she was in. Anyway, Rascal emerged and was abandoned right off. It was probably at least a half hour after his birth that I noticed he was here. He was cold and lifeless. Immediately I brought him downstairs and started rubbing him to dry him and stimulate him. After a couple of hours of this he started showing signs of a normal little one who was hungry. Another way to help, what looks like a dead chinchilla baby, is to put him in warm water and rub him and this can sometimes bring one around. I would suggest doing this in a warm place to keep the baby from getting a chill. Dry the baby with a soft cloth by gently rubbing him all over. I have used a hair dryer on low in the past on bigger chins, but I don't recommend this unless you are very very careful about the amount of heat you use. One other thing to mention here is the fact that an abandoned baby may have fluid in it's lungs and/or nose. a bulb syringe, like the one pictured below, is very useful to remove fluid from the nose. When it seems like the baby may have fluid in the lungs, you can hear it and sometimes feel it in the little ones chest, the best method I have found is to rub the little one in a place that makes it squeak. The squeaking seems to help the baby get the fluid up.

I will be adding more on these subjects as time allows and I will also be discussing the differences between a mom raised baby and a hand fed baby and why it is sometimes important to leave the baby with mom, if it's ok with her, and taking the baby out only to feed it.

Shawn.

If you have any questions, please e-mail me. zep@megalink.net