Chinchilla Behavior

Chinchillas are social creatures, and display many interesting behaviors. Some relate to play, others relate to self-defense; some relate to feeling happy, others to feeling stressed or in pain.

Identifying what these behaviors mean is crucial to learning to care for your pet. Take pain-related behaviors, for example: like holding the ears back, arching the back and holding the paws close to the chest. When you spot these behaviors, you can tell your chinchilla is in pain and give it the help it needs. The problem is that many behaviors have double meanings, like holding the ears back, which can indicate either pain or sleepiness!

So, to help you figure out what your chinchilla is thinking, feeling and doing, use our guides below. Click on the tab to read about the behavior that interests you most, or click through the numbers at the bottom to view even more pages on the topic of chinchilla behavior.