Chinchillas are a breed of pets that have recently started to rise in popularity. These cute creatures are very unique in their nutritional needs and the foods that they can eat.
What do Chinchillas eat? Chinchillas eat a mixture of hay and pellets. A chinchilla’s diet consists of a steady supply of hay combined with a couple of tablespoons of pellets each day. The hay and pellets work to properly move along the chinchilla’s digestive system.
What do Chinchillas eat? Diet guide + Best Practices!
Chinchilla’s essential core diet
To begin to learn about a chinchilla’s diet, you have to understand what type of diet they need. In both the wild and captivity, chinchillas are completely herbivorous. They don’t partake in eating bugs or any type of small prey. Instead, you can usually find them scouring around for seeds.
Chinchillas are also a type of mammal that prefers to be active at night. You will primarily notice your chinchilla moving around at dawn or dusk. In the wild, these are the times a chin would be trying to find food. Try to have food available during the times your chinchilla is awake.
Hay
To start things off, we are going to be taking a look at one of the most important parts of a chinchilla’s diet, hay. Unlike most foods, hay should always be available in the cage. In the wild, chins chew on grass to help grind down their teeth and balance out their digestive tract.
Without the proper amount of hay, you can easily find yourself with a chinchilla facing dental issues. Like many other mammals in the rodent family, a chin’s teeth never stop growing and must be maintained. Chewing on tough grasses such as hay helps wear down the teeth.
Hay also provides the proper amount of nutrients to help the digestive tract move along. Without hay, a chinchilla can easily succumb to many types of digestive issues including constipation. There are several types of hay sold for chinchillas with the most popular being Alfalfa Hay.
Most importantly though, remember to refresh the hay daily and to only buy hay made specifically for chinchillas. Hay sold for chinchillas filters out all the harmful weeds that can get mixed up when the plant is harvested. Good quality hay is generally cheap and sold at most pet stores.
In addition to hay, there are some types of grasses that can be fed to your chinchilla. A common type of grass given to chins is orchard grass. This can be found for sale by many leading pet stores.
Pellets
To balance out the hay that your chinchilla intakes, you will want to feed them a balanced diet of pellets. Like most things involving chinchillas, picking out the right type of pellets can be tough at first as many types are unhealthy. Even worse, it can be easy to overfeed your chins.
What do chinchillas eat when it comes to pellets? Well, the most important thing you need to remember is that many brands are more of a treat than a nutritional meal. Many pellet mixes use more than the recommended dose of fruits or veggies in the mix or not enough hay.
To avoid this, make sure the main ingredient of the pellet is hay. If the brand contains a mixture of fruits or vegetables, then you will want to avoid it. You will also want to stick to a pellet brand once you start with it, changing brands can quickly upset your chins digestive system.
Unlike with pure hay, you should limit the number of pellets you feed to your pets a day. The general rule is to feed your chins 1 to 2 tablespoons of pellets each day. This is only adjusted for adolescent or chinchillas who have become pregnant and need special dietary changes.
Fruits
Fruits are a little bit more of a complicated subject when you’re trying to figure out what chinchillas eat. In their natural habitat, there isn’t a ton of fruit variety available for consumption. In fact, many of the things we know about captive chinchillas’ diet has taken years of study.
To start off, fruits are not always a healthy option to feed to your chins. Fruits contain a lot of sugar which can be bad for a chinchilla’s body in the long run. In fact, there is only a small list of fruits that a chinchilla can safely consume thanks to there sensitive extremely stomachs.
Fruits should never be given to your chinchilla if they have been experiencing health problems. If a chinchilla is sick then having to process a sudden intake of sugar can make them worse. Even when healthy, you should never exceed 10% of a chinchilla’s diet with fruits in a day.
If you are looking at giving a chinchilla a treat then stay away from fruits like oranges that contain a lot of citrus or acid. Luckily, most store-bought treats contain strawberries or apples. When giving a chinchilla fruit, make sure to cut it into small easy to chew pieces and never leave it in the cage.
Vegetables
Like with fruits, vegetables can be a tricky subject when it comes to feeding your chinchilla. Vegetables also fall into the treat category and should never be the main part of a chin’s diet. Excess feeding of vegetables can lead to many health problems or rapid weight gain.
Some of the most popular vegetables given to chinchillas are carrots and sweet potatoes. You can give these to chins in small cut-up portions as treats. Like with fruit, make sure that vegetables don’t exceed 10% of your chinchilla’s diet.
If given in small doses, vegetables can be a healthy addition to a chinchilla’s diet. Be sure to not exceed giving your chins fruit or veggies more than 3 to 4 times a week. Make sure to remove vegetables if your chinchilla doesn’t eat them quickly to keep them from rotting in the cage.
Water
The most important part of a chinchilla’s diet is water. Chinchillas need constant access to clean purified water. It’s best to attach a water bottle to the side of the cage and change it regularly. If it’s been sitting out for a few days then you need to change it out with purified water.
If you are in a place where you only have tap or chlorinated water then take some time to boil the water to remove any harmful contaminants. You can also give your chinchillas purified bottled water to ensure they are being properly hydrated.
How much do chinchillas eat per day?
Chinchillas are small creatures with a tiny stomachs. Realistically, a normal grown chinchilla should only be eating a couple of tablespoons of pellets a day. This amount should go up or down between 1 to 2 tablespoons depending on your chinchilla’s weight gain or loss.
As for hay, it should be available for your chinchillas to chew on 24/7. Your chins will quickly develop multiple health issues if they do not have a fresh supply of hay available to them regularly. To easily supply them, add a dispenser onto the cage side and fill it daily.
If you notice that your chinchilla isn’t finishing their food then you may want to cut back from two tablespoons. While there is no perfect way to tell how much any given chin should eat, as long as they are active and keep a proper amount of weight on their body then things are going fine.
In cases where a chinchilla becomes pregnant or sick, you may need to contact your vet about their diet. These situations will change the amount of food your chinchilla will need to take in. Never increase or decrease the standard amount of pellets without your vet’s approval.
Should I give treats to a Chinchilla? If so, what type and how much?
Treats can be given to your pet but only if they are given in moderation. There are many treats on the market that claim to be healthy for chins, but in reality are only healthy on occasion. With that being said, giving your chinchilla treats 3 to 4 times a week can be good for there diet.
Some of the most common store-bought treats are said to be for multiple types of animals. With these treats, you should always check the nutrients on the label to figure out just how much of the product is good for your chin. If possible, try to only buy chinchilla-specific treats.
Fruits and vegetables are also considered treats for this breed of mammal. Chinchillas in the wild do scavenge for fruits and vegetables but due to the area they inhabit, there isn’t a large variety. Because of this, you have to avoid many citrus-based fruits many small animals love.
Treats should never exceed more than 10% of a chinchilla daily diet and should never be given if the chinchilla is unhealthy. When giving fruits and vegetables, be sure to wash them off before providing them to your pet. If you notice anything not quite right about the product, throw it away.
Foods to avoid feeding to a Chinchilla and Why?
Like mentioned previously, chinchillas didn’t evolve in an area with diverse food options. Thanks to this there are many types of food that a chinchilla’s sensitive digestive system just can’t properly process. For starters, tropical fruits aren’t suitable for chinchillas as a treat.
Fruits that contain acid or a ton of sugar can quickly make your healthy chinchilla develop several different health problems. A chinchilla should also only be fed hay-based pellets. Pellets that mix in vegetables or fruit can cause weight gain or offset the digestive system.
You should never feed your chinchilla hay you obtained from a farm. Chinchillas can be killed if certain weeds get mixed into their food. Many types of farm-harvested hay can be hazardous for your chin. If you don’t own and maintain your own farm, it’s best to provide store-bought hay.
Chinchillas should never be fed bugs or any type of meat product. The digestive system of a chinchilla isn’t made to process meat and your chinchilla will become ill. If you’re not sure about a food item, you want to research it to verify it’s health effects on chinchillas.
Diet-related issues of Chinchillas and health effects
For starters, the number one issue many new owners can run into is rapid weight gain or weight loss. This stems from not knowing the proper amount of food to feed a chinchilla. Weight gain can make a chinchilla become lazy or even make it harder for them to breathe when playing.
Weight loss, much like weight gain, can have a chinchilla laying around more. Without proper nutrition, an energetic chinchilla can become lethargic and will forgo exercising. In other cases, many owners won’t provide a constant supply of fresh hay for the chinchilla to snack on.
In cases where a chinchilla is deprived hay, their teeth will continue growing, causing painful dental issues that can require surgery to correct. The chinchilla will also have trouble properly digesting food and may find themselves constipated or with frequent diarrhea.
When asking what do chinchillas eat, take into account that the quality of food you provide can have a huge effect on their health. Low-quality pellets that aren’t made primarily of hay can upset your chin’s stomach. While this isn’t life threatening at first, it can lead to malnutrition.
The worst part of feeding chinchillas an improper diet can be fatty liver disease which develops when a chin consumes too much sugary food or fat. This disease will cause your chinchilla to lose weight until they are too weak to move. It can be cured, but only if caught in early stages.
Lastly, if fed the wrong foods, your chinchilla’s digestive tract can become inflamed. This is a painful experience for your chinchilla and in some cases can be fatal. This is called gastroenteritis and can be caused by both food changes or bad quality food.