How to make a showcase for a chinchilla with your own hands?

Chinchillas are touching and cute rodents that need the attention of their master. How long the chinchilla will please us with its presence depends on the care that we surround it and on the conditions that we will create for the animal to exist in a city apartment.

Experienced experts have come to the conclusion that a special showcase cage will be the optimal habitat for this rodent. Such display cases can be found in specialized stores, but if a person who wants to have a chinchilla in the house has certain metalwork and carpentry skills, he will be able to save some money by making this place of residence of the future pet with his own hands. We will try to figure out what a showcase is, and how does it differ from an ordinary cell?

Imagine a grandmother's sideboard, or rather, its upper part. This is a cabinet with doors below and with glass shelves in the upper part, again behind glass doors that make it sliding or opening. This top is the showcase. Shelves can be made plywood for chinchillas, and glass doors can be replaced with fiberglass material or something similar - as long as the light penetrates.

I must say that the chinchilla will feel much more comfortable in the window than in the cage, and there are many reasons for this.

• The showcase is more spacious than the cell.
• The cage is made of twigs, there is nowhere to hide in it, and the chinchilla needs its own closed mink. Showcases for this purpose are optimally adapted - the owner can improvise with closed areas quite freely.
• There is more space in the window than in the cage, because its depth can be made any.
• Various natural materials that the owner can use to build a display case will suit a rodent more than metal rods. Chinchillas prefer nooks where they can hide in case of something, and if they are made of wood - just fine.
• The rodent, located behind the glass of the window, creates less noise, does not interfere with the owners.
• It is easy to get it from the window if several doors are provided in the front wall.
• If garbage is constantly pouring from the cage through the rods, then a solid wall will prevent this unpleasant feature, besides providing access to each "floor" of the display case, cleaning will not take much time.
• The showcase can be “disguised” if it is made from materials suitable in color to the furniture set.
• If you provide the showcase with wheels, it can move from room to room in order to create an acceptable temperature regime for the rodent and not overheat it. It should not be forgotten that temperatures above 25 degrees Celsius can cause heat shock to the chinchilla, because these animals come from the highlands of the Andes of the South American continent.

Having come to the conclusion that the showcase will be the most convenient habitat for the chinchilla, it should be noted that it is possible to make a showcase on your own from wood, aluminum profile, plastic structures. There is a specific set of requirements for the manufacture of display cases:

• the smallest space for a chinchilla should not be less than 800x800x500 mm;
• when containing more individuals, the sizes increase by a factor;
• the materials from which the showcase is made should be quite durable and safe, since any rodents have a habit of trying them “by the tooth”;
• the showcase must be dry, warm, well-lit (but not overly), well-ventilated;
• during manufacture, sharp edges should be removed, protruding corners of the panels, which could cause an accidental injury to the pet.

This is one of the most important requirements for showcases of this type so that the animal is not crowded. Chinchillas require at least 0.4 m2 per individual. Moreover, this area does not depend on either the length or the width of the window - both can be changed either at will or based on the dimensions of the apartment.

Why is it often advised to use the skeletons of old cabinets as a basis? The point is the convenience and simplicity of its conversion - you will need to spend a minimum of effort to turn it into a showcase. Although a certain danger to the pet may lie precisely in the material from which the cabinet was made. Particleboard, which is the most common material of cabinet walls and consists of epoxy resins, can poison a rodent with its components if it manages to bite off some part of it.

Here's an approximate step-by-step process guide that describes how to build a display case from a cabinet.

1. Remove the door.
2. If there are shelves in them, cut openings. Chinchillas will need them for transitions between levels.
3. In the case when there are no shelves, there is room for imagination - shelves can be placed in random order.
4. Natural wood must be the material for the shelves, since chinchillas prefer to “try on the tooth” precisely horizontal surfaces - the vertical wall is less convenient for gnawing.
5. Ventilation openings will need to be cut in the upper part of the cabinet to allow air masses to circulate freely inside the display case.
6. Be sure to tighten these holes with a metal mesh - such a chinchilla will definitely not even try to gnaw.
7. The removed cabinet doors are replaced with a metal mesh stretched over the frame, or they are made of transparent material. Most experts recommend a mesh.
8. To do the work of manufacturing such a frame, it is recommended to take the same removed “native” doors and replace the panels with a mesh, leaving the outer frame of the door about 100 mm wide to secure the mesh.
9. It is very good if lower drawers were originally provided for in the cabinet design. This will make re-equipment even less energy-consuming - just the next step is to remove the floor of the main part of the cabinet and change it to a frequent grid, under which it is easy to place a container where the litter and garbage will fall. This will greatly facilitate the process of cleaning the display case.

If there is no suitable cabinet for conversion, the showcase can be made by yourself. To ensure the most comfortable manufacturing conditions, you will have to use:

• with a screwdriver;
• self-tapping screws of different sizes;
• jigsaw;
• new hinges of doors;
• drill;
• drill / rotor;
• sealing tape.

Since it is difficult to guess with the sizes, there are no ready-made drawings “for all occasions” - they will have to be made independently by measuring the allotted area of ​​the room. Accordingly, the required amount of material is also selected. This may be an approximate sketch-drawing for a medium-sized room.

Usually, racks are used as legs, in the case when the floor of the showcase is made of mesh, and a certain gap is required between the mesh and the floor, so that under the mesh there is a container for collecting waste of chinchilla's vital activity.

In addition to simple shelves with holes, a showcase for chinchillas is also equipped with some accessories. For example, as a hole, that is, shelter from daylight, a small house can be used, which is easy to manufacture in accordance with the dimensions of the showcase itself.

The feeder can be arranged in the form of a manger made of wood or the same metal mesh where you will need to put hay or other food.

If chinchilla is limited in its physical activity, it will quickly gain weight. Therefore, the so-called town will be very appropriate. It should at least consist of:

• running wheel;
• multilevel shelves connected by transitions in the form of a suspension bridge, tunnel or staircase;
• swing / hammock.

For information on how to make a showcase for chinchillas with your own hands, see the next video.