A while ago, we took in a chinchilla who had excessively chewed his fur. When he came to us, in fact, he had chewed off every bit of fur that he could reach-- in some places, down to his very skin. We constantly commented on how he looked-- like half a chin, like a kangaroo, and so on. We dubbed him Buffalo Bill.

Now, three months later to the day, Buffalo Bill is beginning to show his improvement. He enjoys hanging out near the boy chin in the next cage over. He has stopped chewing his fur and you can see it's growing back in tufts. This pattern of fur growth is completely normal. In just a few more months, he will look like a regular, fluffy chinchilla again. Check out how he's coming along!

Last week Whimsy found out that a fellow chinthusiast had to get out of the chinchilla business. Adult onset of allergies is to blame for this one. It's sad, but worked out well in the end. He just happened to have two chins that Whimsy had had her eye on. One is a white sapphire carrier and the other is her daughter, a sapphire. It looks like we're getting into that mutation after all. :)

(The sapphire girl, enjoying one of our hand-made bridges.)

Two others that came along for the ride are sister to the sapphire, a little standard grey girl, and an ebony boy named Spencer. They are both teeny tiny, but the ebony especially. I've not seen a full grown chin this small before. Whimsy tried pairing Spencer with Chip, a rescue who came in with Doby. Doby had turned aggressive, and poor Chip has been without a good buddy for a while now. It looks like Spencer has become his new best friend. They get along great! Both are total sweeties and super passive. What a perfect boy pair. 

(Chip to the left, Spencer on the right.)

We're working with the sister chin (standard) to get her acclimated and accepted into the community cage with the other girls. Since this community is growing so nicely, it may be time to either split the herd, or get a larger cage.

Oh! Speaking of larger cages, I forgot to mention how much the chin room continues to change. It has gotten to the point where the chins have kicked Whimsy's office out of the room. Now she works from the laundry room right outside the chin room door! My how we've grown!

So today was cage cleaning day for the Aunties in the "community cage." After vacuuming out the used bedding and wiping everything down, we usually sprinkle some dust in the bottom of the cage and let the girls roll around in it. This time, we let all of the kits join in the dust party fun! Everyone had a blast, popcorning everywhere and running around. Take a look at these fun clips we took:

As a side note: no, the kits do not live in the same cage as in the video. They all have separate, baby-safe homes with their mommies.

When Whimsy went to the York PA chinchilla show two weekends ago, we had the great honor of bringing back two new additions. We wanted to add the sapphire mutation to our herd since Diva passed on with a prolapse earlier this year. What a pleasant surprise to find one of our favorite fellow MCBA members (Silkrheins) had this gorgeous guy available! Whimsy had her eye on him from the very beginning of the day and laid claim to him prior to the start of the show. Wouldn't you know it, the little guy won color class champion!

Another amazing addition happened with our very first Shoots extra dark standard. The standard gray (natural) chinchilla is the backbone of any good breeding program. Our second little guy has absolutely the most amazing depth of color and clarity and a nice sharp belly line. As a matter of fact, he is so dark that several people have mistaken him for a black velvet! For this reason we acquired him to put with our Bowen's black velvet female. We're expecting amazing results for this pair by the time next year's show season starts back up.

As usual, it's been another exciting week here. First I would like to welcome x4 and Wombat back. Earlier this year one of our rescue babies went off to a new home as a same gender cagemate for another chin who had lost his buddy. Now the two of them are here for a four month visit while their chinmom completes her internship. It's been neat to see how little x4 has grown in size and personality!

We also have another new addition. Our beige and violet pair had their first litter. Z4 was born on Thursday and was followed by a sibling that didn't make it. The second in the litter turned out to be our first experience with a mummified kit. This is where the fetus dies in the womb and is reabsorbed.

Click here for pictures and commentary on the Chins-n-Hedgies forum. (Warning: not for the squeamish!)

On Saturday, Whimsy went to a chin show in Pennsylvania. We didn't show any chins this time around, but did get in touch with another long time chin owner who loves a challenge. She adopted Frida, Wallace, and Ross! I had concerns for those three. Since they are known to bite, I did not want to offer them for adoption to someone new to chins. Thankfully there is someone for everyone and this is no exception! Thank you, Ange, for offering a home for these three.

I thought that rehoming four chins this weekend would free up a lot of cage space. I was wrong. When Whimsy returned from the show we found an email from another local family who needed to rehome their fuzzfamily of 5. Mommy, Daddy, 6 month brother and sister and tiny baby sister are all settling in nicely here where they are under quarantine and evaluation. We have father and son sharing a cage and mom and her two daughters in another. The same gender split is working out nicely.