Floof and Poof: Dust Baths, Sticks, Lava Ledges, Papaya and Huts = What they love!
Chomping on wheat and other treats.
That was a massive photo and video dump, I know. But look at those faces! Can you really blame me? Floof and Poof are just too cute not to share.
The Backstory
We brought these two boys home from a reputable breeder back in 2024. They were just tiny babies then, and they still “pop” for us every now and then. If you’ve never seen a chinchilla pop, it’s exactly what it sounds like. They jump suddenly like a popcorn kernel hitting hot oil. It is usually something they only do when they are very young, and it is easily the best thing you’ll see all day.
They live in a total chinchilla mansion. It is an eight-foot-tall cage filled with ledges, huts, tubes, and ramps. They even have a specialized running wheel and “Chinchillers,” which are specialized stones they lay on to stay cool.
The “Roommate” Situation
From the time I first spoke to the breeder to the day I picked them up, there just wasn’t enough time to properly bond them. By November of 2025, we noticed things were getting a bit tense. There was a lot of dominant chasing happening around the cage, so we made the tough call to separate them.
Luckily, we had an identical cage in our lower level. I hauled that massive thing up in pieces and spent the afternoon putting it back together. Now they live in side-by-side cages. We are working on getting them back together slowly, but it is a process that might take a few more months.
The “Catch Me If You Can” Workout
To help them get used to one another again, I block off a large space on the main floor for supervised “playtime” in short spurts. I know we need to do this more often, but it is absolutely exhausting.
Do you have any idea how fast these guys are? I might be lucky enough to catch one, but the other will have me running in circles for ten minutes straight. By the end, I’m sweaty, frustrated, and terrified of being too rough since they are incredibly fragile. Despite how soft they look, they are definitely not pets for children.
Of course, my husband finds the whole thing hilarious. He watches my struggle on the security camera we set up and treats it like his favorite comedy show.