Fourteen-year status report of fatal illnesses in captive chinchilla (Chinchilla lanigera)

• Autores: Martino, Pablo Eduardo; Bautista, Emilia Lucila; Gimeno, Eduardo Jorge; Stanchi, Néstor Oscar; Radman, Nilda Esther
• Año de publicación: 2016
• Idioma: inglés
• Tipo de recurso: artículo
• Materia: Ciencias Veterinarias; Chinchilla; Causas de Muerte; Mortalidad; furbearing animals
• Institución: Comisión de Investigaciones Científicas de la Provincia de Buenos Aires

Fur ranching has been a prosperous industry for decades. Despite its worldwide distribution, little published information is available regarding the importance of the various causes of death in chinchilla (Chinchilla lanigera). In the period 1999–2013, 698 captive chinchillas from different commercial ranches were presented for necropsy at the Pathology Department (UNLP). Two-hundred and fortyfour animals (35.0%) had classical enteritis, 198 (28.4%) had pneumonia, 63 (9.0%) had other infections, 40 (5.7%) had traumatic injuries, 109 (15.6%) had miscellaneous conditions, meanwhile 44 (6.3%) had no significant lesions. Although some disease processes may be underrepresented (i.e. heat stroke and the shock syndrome), the data were collected from a field wide enough and over a sufficient period to give a reliable overview of the fatal problems of this rodent in captivity.