Bio-Air. Wonderful stuff, Bio-Air. It’s a very powerful and effective essential oil based air freshener. It contains eucalyptus, peppermint, camphor, and menthol. Used very sparingly after cleaning out the chin room it fills the room with a minty aroma for hours. It’s also good for putting under the cage of any chins with respiratory infections or colds (just a tiny drop on the newspaper but only if the chins cannot reach it) to aid with breathing and clear the nasal passages etc.

Sounds like a sales pitch doesn’t it? I don’t mean it to but this stuff is great - Debbie recommended it some time last year and now I use it at least once a week to make the chin room smell clean and fresh. It’s powerful and it lasts for ages - and the chins seem to like it.

So …….. on to the story. I keep the trigger spray down by the sink in the kitchen (it’s also good for eliminating cooking smells like bacon) but somehow the bottle was balanced on a bottle of fabric softener. When I came home on Monday I could smell the tell-tale peppermint aroma but could not initially work out where it was coming from. Talie and I were blaming each other for using it but neither of us did. Odd. Definitely odd - because we could both smell it. Panic! Had I left it in the chins’ room and it had been knocked over? Use too much of the stuff and it makes your eyes water for a while - I know this because I used it in the car once a little over-enthusiastically - and needed to drive around for 3 days with the windows down!

The smell seemed to be coming from the kitchen (we deduced this by sniffing loudly - very scientific) and I suddenly saw the bottom of the bottle - it was upside down. Now this stuff is not cheap and I was about to start bemoaning my financial loss (it’s expensive to buy but lasts for ages - unless you spill it!) when I realised that the contents of the bottle were now soaked into an old piece of towel which I used for the chins. Oh well, it must be useful as an air freshener in it’s own right now - a bit like the fabric wicks you find in those liquid air fresheners. I deposited the cloth in the chin room by the air purifier and immediately the room was filled with the scent of menthol, camphor, peppermint, and eucalyptus. It took me ages to wash the minty smell from my hands too.

Its now 2 days later and the chins still have a “hint of minty freshness”. It’s wonderful. I wonder how long it will last?

The kits are beginning to popcorn hop like little furry fleas. I love it when they do that. They are all gaining weight, even the smallest female, and Leila’s big kits are begining to mimic their mother by tasting pellets and hay. One of them was looking particulalry smug earlier with a tiny piece of shredded wheat in his/her mouth.

Apart from waking up and seeing the little kits in with Bella bickering, all is quiet. When I left for work this morning there were kits on each side of both mothers, contentedly suckling.

Fingers crossed it remains that way and they all start gaining weight.

Ah yes, Leila has certainly produced 3 mini Grenville and Griseldas. Precocious, mischievous, bickering, monsters!

Poor little runt female has been having a hard time trying to feed. The two larger kits scuffle with her, especially the other female and so she has not been getting much in the way of feeds. Leila is still trying to separate them when they fight but she is having difficulty. I have been keeping a close eye on when all and, whilst no damage is being done, the little one is getting tired. She has not re-gained her birth weight yet. I separated the bigger female out for a while earlier today and the male and the runt got on either side of Leila and settled down immediately. It was only when I tried to re-introduce the bigger female that things deteriorated again.

Bella’s little kit is continuing to gain weight. Bella continues to be very protective and I have always doubted she would take on another kit (I have tried it before and failed) - but she has surprised me today. I took the runt away from Leila because she is going to get hurt or fail to feed and starve - the other two get along fine, one on either side of Leila and no bickering (famous last words, eh?).

Cautiously I handed the runt to Bella and she sniffed her all over, gave her bottom a quick wash, and then tucked her underneath her belly. The kit was a little bewildered at first and was wandering about but Bella simply followed, groomed her gently and then tucked her up again. Both “Shorty” and the runt have met, sniffed noses, and ignored each other. On the baby monitor I can currently see Bella in the “feeding kit” position, with both kits plugged in to each sde of her - so far so good!

All is quiet in the chin room.

Oh and, as predicted yesterday, Leila’s groomed all the marking off the kits’ ears!!

Well, Bella’s little fella (must not keep referring to him as “shorty” or it is going to stick!) seems to be doing great considering how wobbly he was when first born. Bella is now in full mothering mode and is very protective of him; open the cage door to take him out to weigh him and she’s there like a short, all grumpy and defensive.

He’s putting on weight slowly but surely and the tell-tale curly tail has appeared. He spends most of his time tucked happily under his mother, back legs waving in the air as he’s upside down.

He’s looking more chin-like too.

Bella's Kit at 2 days old

Leila’s kits, on the other hand, are being complete monsters. They have been climbing the bars and pinging off backwards and are currently still jostling for teat position. Leila is being brilliant, bless her, and is separating the offenders when scuffles break out.

What is not so helpful is that Leila also seems to be grooming off the pen marks we put in the kits’ ears so we could distinguish them. We ut fresh marks on today - what’s the betting they are nowhere to be seen again tomorrow?

Anyway ……….. kit photos as promised. These were all taken by Talie yesterday.

Leila with the male kit

1st standard female, just born

2nd Female Kit Born

Looking for milk

Bella’s kit is a male (checked earlier today) and he seems to be doing pretty well. He is getting to grips with the whole suckling thing and Bella appears to be finally settling down to motherhood. He’s a cutey - very quiet and shy. He’s also very small, weighing 44g yesterday but surprisingly (kits usually lose weight in the first 24 hours or so before the mother’s milk comes in) he had gained 1g today.

Here is the little chap:

"Shorty"

I popped into the chin room this morning to check on “Shorty” (I do hope that name does not stick - like “Thug“) and from the corner of my eye I noticed that Leila had gone into labour. She’s not due until Monday and I was on my way out to Roman & Jane’s Chinchilla Rescue to help out - I made a quick phonecall to Jane to tell her that Leila had changed my plans for me and I would be late. I then started hopping from foot to foot and banged on Talie’s door so she could watch the kits being born.

Leila is another Manor character. She is feisty and can be a real stroppy madam when she wants to be but I love her dearly and she has the ability to always make me smile. One of her favourite hobbies is taking off my glasses. I got her about 4 years ago from a breeder who literally gave her to me because she had a couple of tiny (5 pence piece sized) fur chew marks on her hip and so was of no use to the breeder at all.

I brought her home to The Manor and settled her into a cage which was just about at eye level and spent weeks slowly and carefully interacting with her. This is when I discovered she liked my glasses. It took all of a couple of days for Leila to settle into The Manor and she stopped fur chewing instantly; it was clearly stress/boredom related. With some toys and gentle attention Leila turned into a beautiful chinchilla - both in character and in body.The only time she has ever shown any sign of fur chewing again was when I moved her to a cage she did not like - it was too high for her and she could not “chat” to me quite so readily. She took one small nibble of her fur in exactly the same place as when she originally arrived. Moving her back to an eye level cage stopped the habit again - so now she stays in the same cage level and is perfectly happy.

Leila’s last litter produced two cracking standards (Griselda and Genville) who both won group awards - Griselda won a 3rd (dark standard female group) at the National in April 2006 which I was very chuffed with since these were the first standard chinchillas I had bred. Grenville now lives the life O’Reilly with a friend of mine, shares a cage with a chin that Debbie bred called Moley (big, squishy, cuddly lump of a chin!), and still managed to win 1st, Reserve Best Adult Standard Male and Reserve Best Standard at a show last September (Southern Region) - that’s not bad going for a 3 year old.

Both Grenville and Griselda have inherited Leila’s character - George, their father (and the father of the latest litter) is quiet, a bit aloof but absolutely amazing as a breeding male - he is suave and very gentle with his girlies and never misses a trick. Currently he’s looking a bit porky because he’s got 3 females and he pops up in each cage when you go round with the treats - if you’re not paying attention he’s snaffled 3 treats before you’ve noticed!

Currently it is difficult to tell which of the two chins is pregnant - as this photo demonstrates

George (on the shelf) and Leila a few days ago

Thankfully Leila’s labour was pretty uneventful - she had triplets this time: 2 females and a male. She was pretty tired by the end of it and when she finally expelled the placentas I did not let her eat them. I removed them, gave her a raisin instead, and left her to settle with the kits.

Talie took some excellent photos - will upload them tomorrow. Right now I’m off to watch the kits settle with their mother.