I know my last post talked about people from way-too-far-away wanting to adopt...and I know we touch on that all the time... but it's because... so many people don't even bother to check!
Now, in all fairness, I do realize that if you search for chinchillas and some state, your first posts will be chinchillas from that state (if there are chinchillas in that state). But once you run out of chinchilla listings from that state, google will show you results from wherever in the world. So, like for example, I had someone email me about this one chinchilla, asking if we still had her available. Sure do. They wanted pics, so I sent pics. Then they ask, where are we located. Hammond, IN. Oh, well they're in California.
Someone asked me the other day how busy the phones are. Well.. it's my own cell phone, so it is busy at times, and it isn't. Mostly, perhaps sadly, it's people calling for the rescue. Not too many people call just to talk to me (haha?). But let me give you some examples.
Last night (too late for me to call them back by the time I noticed... because I was at dog class), I got a call from someone who adopted and their niece (who came with) had been playing with Summer and wanted to know if she was for adoption. Called them back, said, sorry, no, but gave them the number for Eco Exotics (630-395-0588 for those that want it), and they usually have prairie dogs in the spring.
Also had a call last night from a guy, Chad, who was wanting his chins to come into the rescue. Said he was in Ohio and wanted to know if I knew of other rescues if we couldn't take them in. I told him, he'd have to bring cages because our cages are full at the moment, but if he was looking for a rescue closer to him he might try Heartland, and gave him their number.
Got a call today from someone who saw the website and wanted to come adopt a chin. We set up an appointment, they came by and took home our blue diamond along with a cage and all supplies. Yay.
Then had a call today from someone else with two outside rabbits that they wanted to rehome. They're way up north so they weren't so sure about making the drive up here and were waiting to hear back from some other people, so she's going to see what happens with that before she officially gets back to me as far as whether she wants to come by with them or not.
Then got an email and a phone call from someone who is being transferred out of country for their job and needs their chin to come into the rescue. Called them back, didn't get them, so I left a message. Ended up emailing them back when I got home because I still hadn't heard back and they had mentioned they could come tomorrow (Saturday). So I got in touch with them and now they're coming by tomorrow.
And lastly, before I go to bed... for the local people who read this, you probably know around Christmas we have our rescue Christmas tree at Hearts in Motion with ornaments for sale.... this year we sold $36 worth of ornaments! For everyone who purchased one, thank you for your generosity! And thank you to my mom for checking on the tree and adding ornaments when needed. The tree will be back up next year for anyone who wants to support the rescue and get some ornaments to add to their own tree.
Friday, January 15, 2016
Some Updates
So, I'm working on listing all the chins. So far, so good. What I've been running into a lot lately is this -- someone calls / texts / emails and tells me they want a specific chin and asks if I can get it. So I check, and I can get one in, and then they ask, oh do I have another chin, different color available too? So I send them pics of that one. So then they ask, oh well what about this one too? And this one? So they effectively are asking about four chins. They have pics of all four chins, but I don't know if they're planning on getting one chin, or two, or three, or four... or none (which is actually, usually, how it goes). Here's the thing. When I say I will hold a chin for a week without a deposit -- that is meant to be ONE chin. That you are intending to adopt when you get here. I will not hold four, for an unknown amount of time, so you can hem and haw and take 3 weeks to decide, well do you really want to get that many now, or should you wait, or...???? If you specifically ask me to get in a chin for you and I actually do this, that one will stay unlisted until you actually tell me you don't want it (well, within reason). But the other chins, if you haven't specifically said you're for sure getting them... they're gonna get listed when they're ready. It's nothing against anyone specifically. I'd personally love if you all went home with four chins (and so would the rescue account). But here's the thing -- the average person that tells me they want to get multiple chins and asks for the rare colors and then can't decide... they usually don't adopt... wait for it... anything! The current person I'm thinking of is asking about four chins... for a total of... after multi-chin discounts... $800. Pardon me for thinking they're not going to come through, but... if the past is any indication... they will never adopt.
Now, if you really want to adopt four chins and all and plan to come by, you can put down a deposit. That will hold the chins, and you will not hear me say a word about you not showing up. But here's the thing. The average person that contacts me about a ton of chins that are rare colors like this refuses to put down a deposit and can never find time to make the trip. But if you are serious and show me you're serious with a deposit, by all means. So far, I'm still waiting to see it happen though.
Moving along. Petfinder is an animal listing website. That's it. I had someone in Canada message me today about wanting chins shipped to them. Chins they found listed on petfinder from my rescue. I emailed back, sorry, we don't ship, we like to meet the adopters in person. So they emailed back asking if Petfinder could ship them. Petfinder doesn't ship. I suppose maybe people don't understand what Petfinder is, but really, it's just a website where rescues can list animals so the rest of the world sees that they're available. They have tools that may be useful for some rescues (dog and cat ones) as well, but for the general public... that's it.
Still want to ship the chinchilla? I've told countless people to look into u-ship. It's where you list, ok you want a chinchilla shipped from Indiana to some other state and people will bid and say ok they'll do it for this much. You pay them, and they come pick it up and take it to you. We've had it done once, one of our chins is in California. It worked just fine. But here's the thing -- I tell people to look into that... oh that's too much work. Well, that's why we don't ship -- on this end, it's too much work to get the vet certificate, get a carrier that the airlines approve of, get to the airport, and so on. I'd imagine the cost is probably about the same. I think people think, though, that it's going to be like $30 to ship the chin to them, or something like that. Not the $200+ (not including carrier, vet bill, and so on) just for the airline fee. And it's not going to come to their door either -- they have to go to the airport to pick it up. It's a tad bit more complicated than buying something from amazon and having it show up on your door.
Moving along again -- we are full! Yes, again. Just about every cage that can have a chinchilla in it, does. And I have like four voicemails asking if I can take in people's chins. If we're absolutely full and for some reason you cannot wait to bring in your chin, I will ask that you bring the cage with. If that's not a possibility, then you simply will need to wait for us to adopt out some, so we have room for yours. Simple as that. I know no one has patience nowadays, but I don't have 4000 spare cages, and even if I did... I still have to clean them. It's hard enough to keep up with as many cages as are currently here, much less if I start adding temporary cages everywhere, so that's why I have to limit it when I do. Now, I'm going to go add the paragraph on the rescue page noting that we're full and such and then call back those voicemails....
Now, if you really want to adopt four chins and all and plan to come by, you can put down a deposit. That will hold the chins, and you will not hear me say a word about you not showing up. But here's the thing. The average person that contacts me about a ton of chins that are rare colors like this refuses to put down a deposit and can never find time to make the trip. But if you are serious and show me you're serious with a deposit, by all means. So far, I'm still waiting to see it happen though.
Moving along. Petfinder is an animal listing website. That's it. I had someone in Canada message me today about wanting chins shipped to them. Chins they found listed on petfinder from my rescue. I emailed back, sorry, we don't ship, we like to meet the adopters in person. So they emailed back asking if Petfinder could ship them. Petfinder doesn't ship. I suppose maybe people don't understand what Petfinder is, but really, it's just a website where rescues can list animals so the rest of the world sees that they're available. They have tools that may be useful for some rescues (dog and cat ones) as well, but for the general public... that's it.
Still want to ship the chinchilla? I've told countless people to look into u-ship. It's where you list, ok you want a chinchilla shipped from Indiana to some other state and people will bid and say ok they'll do it for this much. You pay them, and they come pick it up and take it to you. We've had it done once, one of our chins is in California. It worked just fine. But here's the thing -- I tell people to look into that... oh that's too much work. Well, that's why we don't ship -- on this end, it's too much work to get the vet certificate, get a carrier that the airlines approve of, get to the airport, and so on. I'd imagine the cost is probably about the same. I think people think, though, that it's going to be like $30 to ship the chin to them, or something like that. Not the $200+ (not including carrier, vet bill, and so on) just for the airline fee. And it's not going to come to their door either -- they have to go to the airport to pick it up. It's a tad bit more complicated than buying something from amazon and having it show up on your door.
Moving along again -- we are full! Yes, again. Just about every cage that can have a chinchilla in it, does. And I have like four voicemails asking if I can take in people's chins. If we're absolutely full and for some reason you cannot wait to bring in your chin, I will ask that you bring the cage with. If that's not a possibility, then you simply will need to wait for us to adopt out some, so we have room for yours. Simple as that. I know no one has patience nowadays, but I don't have 4000 spare cages, and even if I did... I still have to clean them. It's hard enough to keep up with as many cages as are currently here, much less if I start adding temporary cages everywhere, so that's why I have to limit it when I do. Now, I'm going to go add the paragraph on the rescue page noting that we're full and such and then call back those voicemails....
Monday, January 4, 2016
Grooming & Chin Care
I've lately heard several potential adopters ask if chins really need a dust bath. The short answer is yes, they do.
Partially because it keeps their fur pretty and not greasy, but also because when not dusted, their fur tends to get matted easier.
Case in point. Chilly was surrendered yesterday. Just picking him up you could feel all the hard matts. They said that they hadn't given him a dust bath in a few months. So, out came the show combs... and I think he looks much better.
Chilly before:
Chilly after:
He had so many matts that had to be pulled out -- that's why he still looks rough and uneven. Grooming a chin like this to get them and their fur back to a healthy state is much different than grooming a show chin, for the purpose of making them pretty-er. It'll grow back though, with lots of dust baths and handling to try and make to keep those matts at bay.
I could make a second chin out of this amount of fur and matts! For size reference, that's the bottom of a package of mason jars.
I bet he feels much better!
The people who dropped him off were very nice people, but said they just didn't have time for him anymore. The owner was going to college (I believe) and the parents ... can't remember if they didn't have time or didn't want to care for him... but I wish people would call (whether here or somewhere else) before it gets this bad.
I left the cage in the garage because it could probably used powerwashed or at least soaked in a tub of water to loosen all the gunk. They said, too cold outside to wash it (uh-huh... it was 60 almost every day up until last week) and they didn't have a tub to soak it in. Not sure I'd soak a cage in my bathtub, but in the winter, when I get in used cages, I find a way to get them clean and looking great. If I can do it without a utility sink, spray bottles, and scrubbies..
Anyway. I didn't take a picture of the cage, but I'll attach this next picture... use this to think about what the cage much look like.... because you don't need some fancy equipment or outside hose to clean a food dish!
Oh and here's one of Chilly in one of my rescue cages.
Alrighty well that's it for now, I gotta go accomplish some stuff.
Partially because it keeps their fur pretty and not greasy, but also because when not dusted, their fur tends to get matted easier.
Case in point. Chilly was surrendered yesterday. Just picking him up you could feel all the hard matts. They said that they hadn't given him a dust bath in a few months. So, out came the show combs... and I think he looks much better.
Chilly before:
Chilly after:
He had so many matts that had to be pulled out -- that's why he still looks rough and uneven. Grooming a chin like this to get them and their fur back to a healthy state is much different than grooming a show chin, for the purpose of making them pretty-er. It'll grow back though, with lots of dust baths and handling to try and make to keep those matts at bay.
I could make a second chin out of this amount of fur and matts! For size reference, that's the bottom of a package of mason jars.
I bet he feels much better!
The people who dropped him off were very nice people, but said they just didn't have time for him anymore. The owner was going to college (I believe) and the parents ... can't remember if they didn't have time or didn't want to care for him... but I wish people would call (whether here or somewhere else) before it gets this bad.
I left the cage in the garage because it could probably used powerwashed or at least soaked in a tub of water to loosen all the gunk. They said, too cold outside to wash it (uh-huh... it was 60 almost every day up until last week) and they didn't have a tub to soak it in. Not sure I'd soak a cage in my bathtub, but in the winter, when I get in used cages, I find a way to get them clean and looking great. If I can do it without a utility sink, spray bottles, and scrubbies..
Anyway. I didn't take a picture of the cage, but I'll attach this next picture... use this to think about what the cage much look like.... because you don't need some fancy equipment or outside hose to clean a food dish!
Oh and here's one of Chilly in one of my rescue cages.
Alrighty well that's it for now, I gotta go accomplish some stuff.
Friday, January 1, 2016
Happy New Year! ... some updates
I know, I know, and I do mean, I know... believe me, some of you are super good at reminding me that there have been no blog posts lately. That's going to get better!
Partially because, as you may have noticed, the webstore has been closed and will likely be closed for much of January. There's a note on the Supplies for Sale page, and the webstore link on the navbar has gone bye-bye. Naturally, some people will still figure out the link to the webstore and will still order... and the link is elsewhere on the website. Some people have a direct link saved in their favorites, not their fault... others have told me over the years they've figured it out so they can "get around" the closed webstore. Here's the thing. I love you all and appreciate your orders... but it's still only me doing 98% of everything here. Maybe you met Joel, who helps me clean. Or maybe you've run into Mitchell and Liz, who have been helping out lately. I appreciate them more than anyone could possibly know, but the other 98%... still me. And that's fine, don't get me wrong, I'm not complaining. I just have had some people patiently waiting for their orders, and I would like to get those out... but every time I see another one come in, especially lately when I have so many around the holidays, I've been having an "ugh" moment. Add that to the 4" stack of paperwork on my desk that needs to be dealt with, and the books that need to be finalized for the year, and the orders that need to be finished so I can refund whatever excess shipping there is... and you can see why the store needed to be closed for at least a little bit. I'm pretty sure I had it open all of 2015, which I feel was awesome, as it was closed much of 2014. I do need a bit of time as things have gotten busier, but it will be back open soon... and if you just can't wait, and find yourself a link to the webstore and order something... I will personally add it to the back of the order list, and will get to it sometime...
Anyway. Moving along onto new stuff. We had some new rescues come in. Chappie, Chippie, Little Chappie, Little Chippie, and Legume. The non "little" versions are the parents, a black velvet and standard grey, and the little ones are the daughters... a black velvet and a standard grey. They came in because the owners said that once the female had the babies, she turned bitchy and started spraying. Then, apparently, the male started biting. The babies they said are fine. I was told that the male couldn't be separated from the female or else he'd bite... but as these are rescue chins and, according to the previous owners, sound like they could take some effort to get adopted, I told them they would be separated. And I did, with no bites, no sprays, no nothing. Yay for that. We shall see how things continue to go.
Legume (pronounced Lay-goom... is that really how you pronounce it? That's not how I've ever pronounced it) is a large white rabbit... with eyeliner and some black specks on her. Everyone loves her, she's super sweet. They brought her by, because... she was eating too much and I think the thought was they couldn't afford it any longer? The same people brought in the four chins and the rabbit, and they all seem well cared for, just needing to find new homes. Legume does eat quite a bit... but she's at least a 5-7 pound rabbit, if not larger... they do that. So she'll just eat us out of house and home until she finds her new one. :)
We have another chin coming in today. Don't know much about it other than that it was the daughter's chin, she went to college (I think? maybe she's in high school... same difference) and now doesn't have time. Which is sort of one of those things, I hear that and want to send a sideways glance into the chin room... they don't have time for one, but I can manage to care for how many? Anyway, we get to meet this chin today at 3 pm.
But anyway.... the topic of water bottles has come up. We already are DONE cleaning water bottles for January! Who-hoo!! Water bottles are cleaned once a month. If they start looking grimy or if a chin is sick (or other such circumstances), they'll be changed out more often, but for the majority of chins, they get a new water bottle once a month. Most chins are on the glass ryerson bottles, so they're not a good breeding ground for bacteria or anything of that nature. They stay reasonably clean. The reason we only change once a month? I counted yesterday... some of the cages (especially like the rabbit and guinea pig ones) have multiple bottles, but most just have the one... we have 88 bottles in use right now. Just keeping a few spares washed (among everything else that needs to be done) can prove to be a task... much less having that many spares.
Let's see, what else. For anyone worried about the pigeons in the small cage, they have been upgraded to a 40"+ cage. They are going outside at some point, but since we made a jump from the 60s to the 20s in about a week, I'm not sure now's quite the time. But they have been upgraded to a larger cage and water bowls hanging off the sides of their cage (to keep more of the shavings out.. they still get some in).
Oh! We adopted out Carter! He went home to someone who had been checking our website and saw that he was available. So now we just have the two rabbits (Legume and BunnyLove) and all the chins. The prairie dogs Spoon & Winnie (if you happened to stop by and see them in the short time they were here), went home to a family that has several of our chins and a prairie dog of their own.
Ok, two more things before I get back to work. First, shipping costs. In general, the shopping cart is set high. I would rather refund shipping than eat the costs when it doesn't cover shipping. For example, I have an order going out tomorrow for a jar of supplement. The jar is $8.50, shipping came out to $7.50. This person is in California, so actual shipping? $9.97. Yikes. I paid it and I'll ship it and just eat the cost. But here's the thing... that $2.47 that I just lost on shipping? By the time I pay for the jar, and pay for the herbs that go in it... I'm probably paying this person to take the jar. We just don't make that much money on this stuff that we sell. I would LOVE to make $2.50 on an $8.50 item, but that's just not how it works... and of course, that's not counting the box, packaging materials, tape. None of which is expensive -- I usually add ~ $0.75 to each order to cover these costs -- but I do still need to somehow pay for them. So more like a loss of $3.22 just on shipping, plus cost of everything that went into it, and my time, and so on. So, starting 2016 (and I added this in one of the policy notes to the webstore), if the actual shipping comes out higher than the charged shipping, people will have a choice to either paypal additional monies over to cover the cost, or they can get their order refunded. This doesn't happen often, maybe a few times a year, but I need to make sure this gets addressed and this is how we're going to deal with it.
And lastly, with the shop. The wood shop is in my basement, next to the chin room. I had someone text the other night at like 2 am, wanting to come later that day (say, 7 am) to get a chin and cage and everything. Ok, here's the thing. Again, I appreciate the business, the orders, I really do. However, Hammond has a noise ordinance. Past a certain time at night and before a certain time in the morning, you can't make loud noise. Most of the neighbors here are wonderful, but the few pricks ruin it for everyone and they will report you. I've never been reported, but my one neighbor has been multiple times, before they moved. I'm not going to upset the neighbors because I appreciate them when everyone goes to the wrong house and they kindly point them to the correct house... I don't need them to tell my people to get lost because I keep them up all night. Now, this of course is not to say that I have never cut wood or power sanded or something when it's late (*looks around innocently*). I try to keep it to an absolute minimum... say, if I forgot someone's coming for their order and realized late at night, they're coming first thing in the morning. But I won't abuse it for the people who absolutely cannot wait another hour or two, or day or two, to come get their chins. If this has been you, you know I'm not mean about it or anything like that, I'll just come out and say, hey, noise ordinance, I'm not going to cut this late at night and I can't do it at 6 am either, so either come later in the day, or I can see if maybe I have a piece of wood already cut that might work for you, or something. But please don't get offended when I say that I won't cut 20 shelves for you at 11 pm. It's nothing against you. I just want to continue to do this in the future, and the best way to do so is to keep the peace with the neighbors. And whichever ones reported my neighbor are still out there... so let's all keep the peace.
Happy New Year!
Partially because, as you may have noticed, the webstore has been closed and will likely be closed for much of January. There's a note on the Supplies for Sale page, and the webstore link on the navbar has gone bye-bye. Naturally, some people will still figure out the link to the webstore and will still order... and the link is elsewhere on the website. Some people have a direct link saved in their favorites, not their fault... others have told me over the years they've figured it out so they can "get around" the closed webstore. Here's the thing. I love you all and appreciate your orders... but it's still only me doing 98% of everything here. Maybe you met Joel, who helps me clean. Or maybe you've run into Mitchell and Liz, who have been helping out lately. I appreciate them more than anyone could possibly know, but the other 98%... still me. And that's fine, don't get me wrong, I'm not complaining. I just have had some people patiently waiting for their orders, and I would like to get those out... but every time I see another one come in, especially lately when I have so many around the holidays, I've been having an "ugh" moment. Add that to the 4" stack of paperwork on my desk that needs to be dealt with, and the books that need to be finalized for the year, and the orders that need to be finished so I can refund whatever excess shipping there is... and you can see why the store needed to be closed for at least a little bit. I'm pretty sure I had it open all of 2015, which I feel was awesome, as it was closed much of 2014. I do need a bit of time as things have gotten busier, but it will be back open soon... and if you just can't wait, and find yourself a link to the webstore and order something... I will personally add it to the back of the order list, and will get to it sometime...
Anyway. Moving along onto new stuff. We had some new rescues come in. Chappie, Chippie, Little Chappie, Little Chippie, and Legume. The non "little" versions are the parents, a black velvet and standard grey, and the little ones are the daughters... a black velvet and a standard grey. They came in because the owners said that once the female had the babies, she turned bitchy and started spraying. Then, apparently, the male started biting. The babies they said are fine. I was told that the male couldn't be separated from the female or else he'd bite... but as these are rescue chins and, according to the previous owners, sound like they could take some effort to get adopted, I told them they would be separated. And I did, with no bites, no sprays, no nothing. Yay for that. We shall see how things continue to go.
Legume (pronounced Lay-goom... is that really how you pronounce it? That's not how I've ever pronounced it) is a large white rabbit... with eyeliner and some black specks on her. Everyone loves her, she's super sweet. They brought her by, because... she was eating too much and I think the thought was they couldn't afford it any longer? The same people brought in the four chins and the rabbit, and they all seem well cared for, just needing to find new homes. Legume does eat quite a bit... but she's at least a 5-7 pound rabbit, if not larger... they do that. So she'll just eat us out of house and home until she finds her new one. :)
We have another chin coming in today. Don't know much about it other than that it was the daughter's chin, she went to college (I think? maybe she's in high school... same difference) and now doesn't have time. Which is sort of one of those things, I hear that and want to send a sideways glance into the chin room... they don't have time for one, but I can manage to care for how many? Anyway, we get to meet this chin today at 3 pm.
But anyway.... the topic of water bottles has come up. We already are DONE cleaning water bottles for January! Who-hoo!! Water bottles are cleaned once a month. If they start looking grimy or if a chin is sick (or other such circumstances), they'll be changed out more often, but for the majority of chins, they get a new water bottle once a month. Most chins are on the glass ryerson bottles, so they're not a good breeding ground for bacteria or anything of that nature. They stay reasonably clean. The reason we only change once a month? I counted yesterday... some of the cages (especially like the rabbit and guinea pig ones) have multiple bottles, but most just have the one... we have 88 bottles in use right now. Just keeping a few spares washed (among everything else that needs to be done) can prove to be a task... much less having that many spares.
Let's see, what else. For anyone worried about the pigeons in the small cage, they have been upgraded to a 40"+ cage. They are going outside at some point, but since we made a jump from the 60s to the 20s in about a week, I'm not sure now's quite the time. But they have been upgraded to a larger cage and water bowls hanging off the sides of their cage (to keep more of the shavings out.. they still get some in).
Oh! We adopted out Carter! He went home to someone who had been checking our website and saw that he was available. So now we just have the two rabbits (Legume and BunnyLove) and all the chins. The prairie dogs Spoon & Winnie (if you happened to stop by and see them in the short time they were here), went home to a family that has several of our chins and a prairie dog of their own.
Ok, two more things before I get back to work. First, shipping costs. In general, the shopping cart is set high. I would rather refund shipping than eat the costs when it doesn't cover shipping. For example, I have an order going out tomorrow for a jar of supplement. The jar is $8.50, shipping came out to $7.50. This person is in California, so actual shipping? $9.97. Yikes. I paid it and I'll ship it and just eat the cost. But here's the thing... that $2.47 that I just lost on shipping? By the time I pay for the jar, and pay for the herbs that go in it... I'm probably paying this person to take the jar. We just don't make that much money on this stuff that we sell. I would LOVE to make $2.50 on an $8.50 item, but that's just not how it works... and of course, that's not counting the box, packaging materials, tape. None of which is expensive -- I usually add ~ $0.75 to each order to cover these costs -- but I do still need to somehow pay for them. So more like a loss of $3.22 just on shipping, plus cost of everything that went into it, and my time, and so on. So, starting 2016 (and I added this in one of the policy notes to the webstore), if the actual shipping comes out higher than the charged shipping, people will have a choice to either paypal additional monies over to cover the cost, or they can get their order refunded. This doesn't happen often, maybe a few times a year, but I need to make sure this gets addressed and this is how we're going to deal with it.
And lastly, with the shop. The wood shop is in my basement, next to the chin room. I had someone text the other night at like 2 am, wanting to come later that day (say, 7 am) to get a chin and cage and everything. Ok, here's the thing. Again, I appreciate the business, the orders, I really do. However, Hammond has a noise ordinance. Past a certain time at night and before a certain time in the morning, you can't make loud noise. Most of the neighbors here are wonderful, but the few pricks ruin it for everyone and they will report you. I've never been reported, but my one neighbor has been multiple times, before they moved. I'm not going to upset the neighbors because I appreciate them when everyone goes to the wrong house and they kindly point them to the correct house... I don't need them to tell my people to get lost because I keep them up all night. Now, this of course is not to say that I have never cut wood or power sanded or something when it's late (*looks around innocently*). I try to keep it to an absolute minimum... say, if I forgot someone's coming for their order and realized late at night, they're coming first thing in the morning. But I won't abuse it for the people who absolutely cannot wait another hour or two, or day or two, to come get their chins. If this has been you, you know I'm not mean about it or anything like that, I'll just come out and say, hey, noise ordinance, I'm not going to cut this late at night and I can't do it at 6 am either, so either come later in the day, or I can see if maybe I have a piece of wood already cut that might work for you, or something. But please don't get offended when I say that I won't cut 20 shelves for you at 11 pm. It's nothing against you. I just want to continue to do this in the future, and the best way to do so is to keep the peace with the neighbors. And whichever ones reported my neighbor are still out there... so let's all keep the peace.
Happy New Year!
Tuesday, December 8, 2015
Breeding
Had someone ask the other day about breeding. Well, actually, happens all the time, but the other day was notable, because they actually asked reasonable questions that would help determine if they wanted to breed.
I believe they decided against it.
But let me share with you just one kind of interesting tidbit on why it's not your get-rich-quick scheme, and it actually is work.
One of my runs is a mosaic male, and he has three standard females. I got them back sometime in the summer, and they've been in breeding. Maybe a week or two ago, one of his females littered. Two babies. All standard grey.
For those that don't know, a mosaic x grey pairing should result in about 50% white / 50% grey babies. Pay attention, this will be important later.
So she has her two babies. Maybe a week later, another of his females has babies. Three of them, all standard grey. So out of 5 babies... all grey... at least two should have been white. But nope, all five, standard grey.
Now here's where the money part comes in... guess what color flies off the shelves? I'll give you a hint, it's not grey. So all those people who would think, ok they stuck these pairings together, going to get lots of white babies to sell for lots of $$$, the world works against you sometimes.
So, the chin that has three babies, one of hers gets out. The feeder was empty, and the baby literally crawled up the inside of the feeder and out of the cage. Caught him and put him back. Filled the feeder up so this can't happen again. Few days later, I have people here, and they tell me something small ran across the floor, maybe a baby chinchilla. Sure as shit, same one. We catch him, put him back. Turns out, that cage they're in has one small section of wire that's missing a crossbar... yep, the turd got out from there. So I put more wire on top of that and now he's secure.
And then a day or so later, one of the three babies die. Which of course, is sad, but statistically, chinchilla mortality is right around 20-25%, so that's about right, for 1 in 5 to die.
So even for the person considering that they were going to have 5 standard babies to sell, now it's down to four. And mind you, again, they're standards. I love me some standard greys, and one of my customers the other day said something I really liked -- that the standard grey is the "classic" color (haha), I like how he put it -- but pet people often want something unusual. I'm actually surprised how many violets and whites I've found homes for this year.... but not nearly so many standards.
Some people want the standards because, in general, they tend to be less expensive. But the grand majority of phone calls I get start out something like, "I want a chinchilla... but do you have something other than grey... I'd like to get an unusual one..." Just saying, those standards will have a hard time moving.
I believe they decided against it.
But let me share with you just one kind of interesting tidbit on why it's not your get-rich-quick scheme, and it actually is work.
One of my runs is a mosaic male, and he has three standard females. I got them back sometime in the summer, and they've been in breeding. Maybe a week or two ago, one of his females littered. Two babies. All standard grey.
For those that don't know, a mosaic x grey pairing should result in about 50% white / 50% grey babies. Pay attention, this will be important later.
So she has her two babies. Maybe a week later, another of his females has babies. Three of them, all standard grey. So out of 5 babies... all grey... at least two should have been white. But nope, all five, standard grey.
Now here's where the money part comes in... guess what color flies off the shelves? I'll give you a hint, it's not grey. So all those people who would think, ok they stuck these pairings together, going to get lots of white babies to sell for lots of $$$, the world works against you sometimes.
So, the chin that has three babies, one of hers gets out. The feeder was empty, and the baby literally crawled up the inside of the feeder and out of the cage. Caught him and put him back. Filled the feeder up so this can't happen again. Few days later, I have people here, and they tell me something small ran across the floor, maybe a baby chinchilla. Sure as shit, same one. We catch him, put him back. Turns out, that cage they're in has one small section of wire that's missing a crossbar... yep, the turd got out from there. So I put more wire on top of that and now he's secure.
And then a day or so later, one of the three babies die. Which of course, is sad, but statistically, chinchilla mortality is right around 20-25%, so that's about right, for 1 in 5 to die.
So even for the person considering that they were going to have 5 standard babies to sell, now it's down to four. And mind you, again, they're standards. I love me some standard greys, and one of my customers the other day said something I really liked -- that the standard grey is the "classic" color (haha), I like how he put it -- but pet people often want something unusual. I'm actually surprised how many violets and whites I've found homes for this year.... but not nearly so many standards.
Some people want the standards because, in general, they tend to be less expensive. But the grand majority of phone calls I get start out something like, "I want a chinchilla... but do you have something other than grey... I'd like to get an unusual one..." Just saying, those standards will have a hard time moving.
Monday, December 7, 2015
Colors & Combos and Whatnot
Ok so I know on my ads that it says something like, if we don't have what you're looking for, let us know and we'll see if we can get it.
And often, we can get it something specific.
But I should note, these requests need to be in the realm of possibilities as far as chinchilla genetics.
For example. Let me share some basics about the color beige, as far as genetics. The beige gene, in any form, comes with red eyes.
They can be jellybean red, like this...
Or they can be ruby, like this...
...but regardless, they're red. The beige gene comes with red eyes. And just so we're all on the same page, that means any color with the beige gene. Beige comes in two main types, homo (lighter more champagne-y color) and hetero (darker beige). Tan chinchillas also have a beige gene. The lighter ones look like a regular beige, where the beige color wraps around the belly... and they extend out to dark tans, which look more brown / chocolate-y in color. But tans are also beiges, they are beige + ebony gene. Pink whites, sometimes called beige mosaics, also have a beige gene. They have beige + white gene. So, all of these colors are going to have red eyes, which again, can vary from jellybean red to dark ruby red.
... and the point of all of this is that no matter how much you want it, I can't get in a beige / tan / pink white... with black eyes. It's just not in the realm of possibilities, because genetically, those chins are going to have red eyes.
Now, I can take pictures to minimize this. See the tan pictured up above? If I took pictures with a flash, her eyes would look more red. In real life, they look like the pic -- but if I flash the pictures, this chin will look completely different. So even if you think I've somehow come up with a tan with non-red eyes... I haven't. I've just learned over the years that the glaring red eyes turn people off, and since the eyes often are not nearly so glaringly red in real life... I can take pics to minimize them.
One more color that people have been having fun with lately are the mosaics. I think of the term mosaic as referring to an actual mosaic, like a white with some grey chinchilla. But really, just about every color can have a mosaic. All it is is adding the white gene to an existing color. So, there is such thing as a beige mosaic (pink white), sapphire mosaic (white sapphire), violet mosaic (white violet), and so on. They all have varying degrees of the original color on their body, but the base color is white, for mosaics.
I should note, these are not paint by number chins. I have had quite a few people lately who have said, oh well, they'd like one with a white nose. Oooh but a dark face. Oh wait, can it have a blaze up the face? Oh and maybe like a really dark spot somewhere on it's body? As neat as it would be to custom-color a chin.... again, it's not realistic.
And neither is getting super stark differentiation between body colors. Unlike guinea pigs, where you can see red, and then super stark demarcation line, and then black... you don't see that very often in chins. They tend to have more of a blended look. Because of that, when you do see one with very stark demarcation between colors, everyone goes OOOOOOOOOH PRETTYYYY. Like this:
...you may recognize her as Owl, one of my chins. If I had a penny for every time someone said, oh well when she has a baby that looks like her, I want it... I could have retired years ago. It's unusual. It's a fluke, and it doesn't reproduce itself. She's had I think three babies here so far. I'd have to check my herd book, to be certain, but they've all been just your average chin. The current one is here, growing out for show, and he's just your average pink white. Mostly white, has a light beige spot on his rump. But the point is... none of them have looked like her, or even had super unusual coloring... you just get what you get.
Again, all this said, someone looking for a blazed mosaic... I can probably find that. Someone looking for a silver mosaic, I can find that. But not your blazed, spotted, white nosed, zebra striped chin... if it exists, I probably can't find it....
And often, we can get it something specific.
But I should note, these requests need to be in the realm of possibilities as far as chinchilla genetics.
For example. Let me share some basics about the color beige, as far as genetics. The beige gene, in any form, comes with red eyes.
They can be jellybean red, like this...
Or they can be ruby, like this...
...but regardless, they're red. The beige gene comes with red eyes. And just so we're all on the same page, that means any color with the beige gene. Beige comes in two main types, homo (lighter more champagne-y color) and hetero (darker beige). Tan chinchillas also have a beige gene. The lighter ones look like a regular beige, where the beige color wraps around the belly... and they extend out to dark tans, which look more brown / chocolate-y in color. But tans are also beiges, they are beige + ebony gene. Pink whites, sometimes called beige mosaics, also have a beige gene. They have beige + white gene. So, all of these colors are going to have red eyes, which again, can vary from jellybean red to dark ruby red.
... and the point of all of this is that no matter how much you want it, I can't get in a beige / tan / pink white... with black eyes. It's just not in the realm of possibilities, because genetically, those chins are going to have red eyes.
Now, I can take pictures to minimize this. See the tan pictured up above? If I took pictures with a flash, her eyes would look more red. In real life, they look like the pic -- but if I flash the pictures, this chin will look completely different. So even if you think I've somehow come up with a tan with non-red eyes... I haven't. I've just learned over the years that the glaring red eyes turn people off, and since the eyes often are not nearly so glaringly red in real life... I can take pics to minimize them.
One more color that people have been having fun with lately are the mosaics. I think of the term mosaic as referring to an actual mosaic, like a white with some grey chinchilla. But really, just about every color can have a mosaic. All it is is adding the white gene to an existing color. So, there is such thing as a beige mosaic (pink white), sapphire mosaic (white sapphire), violet mosaic (white violet), and so on. They all have varying degrees of the original color on their body, but the base color is white, for mosaics.
I should note, these are not paint by number chins. I have had quite a few people lately who have said, oh well, they'd like one with a white nose. Oooh but a dark face. Oh wait, can it have a blaze up the face? Oh and maybe like a really dark spot somewhere on it's body? As neat as it would be to custom-color a chin.... again, it's not realistic.
And neither is getting super stark differentiation between body colors. Unlike guinea pigs, where you can see red, and then super stark demarcation line, and then black... you don't see that very often in chins. They tend to have more of a blended look. Because of that, when you do see one with very stark demarcation between colors, everyone goes OOOOOOOOOH PRETTYYYY. Like this:
...you may recognize her as Owl, one of my chins. If I had a penny for every time someone said, oh well when she has a baby that looks like her, I want it... I could have retired years ago. It's unusual. It's a fluke, and it doesn't reproduce itself. She's had I think three babies here so far. I'd have to check my herd book, to be certain, but they've all been just your average chin. The current one is here, growing out for show, and he's just your average pink white. Mostly white, has a light beige spot on his rump. But the point is... none of them have looked like her, or even had super unusual coloring... you just get what you get.
Again, all this said, someone looking for a blazed mosaic... I can probably find that. Someone looking for a silver mosaic, I can find that. But not your blazed, spotted, white nosed, zebra striped chin... if it exists, I probably can't find it....
Friday, November 6, 2015
Well now...
...someone got their panties in a twist. Was it you? Hi!! *waves*
Don't know what I'm talking about? That's alright, I'll share. I've gotten multiple comments from "anonymous" to quite a few blog posts over the last 24 hours. All of which are bitchy, nasty, and some downright mean. And because they clearly want attention (I mean, why else would someone keep reading the blog and keep posting negative comments if they think I'm such a horrible person... other than wanting attention), might as well give it to them.
Just in case any of you saw the comments (which I am leaving up by the way), and wondered, "hmm, I wonder how Ashley would respond to this..."... I will tell you. That's what this blog post is going to be about.
Let's start with the first one.
The first comment references the post I made about people being late for appointments. Post -- http://nightsatthechinchillarescue.blogspot.com/2015/10/appointments.html -- in case you don't care to read it, it's short and talks about people being late to appointments, and I mention that I don't think people would forget that the had doctors appointments (versus they do that to me all the time). That post earned me this comment:
You honestly compare your time to that of a doctor's? You think you are that important?
Really! You're freaking UNEMPLOYED and people might interrupt your LAUNDRY?
Waaaa!
Guess what? I sure do! In all honesty... which should I value my time any less than anyone else's? What makes the doctor's time more important than mine? What makes my time more important than anyone else's? Nothing. But that's exactly the point. I try my best to be on time for things. In all the years I've been doing this, I can only think of one instance (which I blogged about) when I was not here when I said I would be (and in all fairness, I left 45 minutes after a scheduled appointment when they did not show up...and then they showed up [so they said] shortly after I left). I do my best to be courteous to other people's time. All I ask is that people be respectful of my time.
Let me add that my state of employment is none of anyone's business. This will come up again in more comments from this person, but it should not matter if I am doing laundry, or cleaning house, or feeding chins, I feel like if I schedule someone at 5 pm, I expect them to show up at 5 pm. If that is considered "high expectations" in today's world, boy the world is going to hell in a handbasket quickly. The point is, it doesn't matter what the person is interrupting if they show up late... it's simply that I feel that we should all respect each other's time. Let's be honest. If I was supposed to drop off supplies at someone's house and said I'd be there at 8 pm. And I don't show up til 10 pm. Let's say they're in bed. Well, I'm only interrupting their sleep, according to this stream of logic, right? *shakes head*
Moving on...the next one revolves around vet bills. The post in question -- http://nightsatthechinchillarescue.blogspot.com/2015/06/sad-day-today.html -- talks about a few months ago adoption where the chin got sick and the people took her to the vet. I offered to pay up to $600 for vet bills (as that would have left the rescue with super low funds), they wanted me to pay more than that, keep her overnight at the vet, and pay for another few tests in the morning (which easily would have brought the bill to $900). The comment I earned:
Shouldn't YOU have money for vet bills?
...yes and no. Yes, I should have money for vet bills. However, the amount spent should be reasonable. Paying $600 for vet bills is hardly petty cash. When I ask on the adoption form, "do you have money for vet bills?" -- the main thing I want to know is, can they afford to at least take the chin to the vet. I'm not saying the people have to drop thousands on the chin, but at least be able to take the chin in, see what's wrong, and potentially treat, or if not possible, put the chin down. That's all. I've met people who've spent $10-$15,000 on chinchilla vet bills, and my personal opinion is that it's not worth it. Everyone's got their limits, but mine is lower than that. I have no problem with someone spending a few hundred on vet bills and then getting to the point where they say, ok, they can't afford anymore, and they put the chin down. At least it ends the suffering. However, I feel like offering to pay $600 (and I did end up paying very close to that for the final bill) is plenty. I don't feel the need to bankrupt the rescue to save one chin, especially when (in this instance) the vet agrees with me that the chin is likely to pass anyway. I have money for vet bills, yes. But I have a limit as well. And I think everyone should.
Moving along. We have several comments on the one post about the recent claim show -- http://nightsatthechinchillarescue.blogspot.com/2015/10/show-and-blue-cloud-and-other-stuff.html -- this is a longer post, and several things are mentioned. First, I talk about how I find it frustrating that many people expect that we will deliver chinchillas, then I talk a little about the blue cloud mine being shut down, and then just a little paragraph about my chins placing phase champ and 2nd place at the claim show. Which earned me three comments (who-hoo, popular post):
First:
Only a second at a CLAIM SHOW? Pathetic! And you have the nerve to criticize others, especially those new to showing, for their slow performance? AND some for their health problems?
Oh, I forgot. You are NICE. Sad that you still live with mommy and daddy, even though your health is fine. Minus the dizziness that you whine about. Other people have REAL health problems. Yet you judge them. I've seen it.
Most rescued don't rip people off like you do. Why buy a rescue standard for Oct $100 when you can get a pedigreed standard for the same?
Pathetic? That's funny. Have you ever been to a show? Let me educate those of you who are reading and have not. Let's say you go to a show. Let's say you watch how some of the big breeders place. Whether we're talking about Ritterspach, or Ryerson, or Jags, or Hummel, or whoever... these people have all won high awards and surely some Grand Show Champions at some shows. But at those same shows, often some of the animals they have brought along have earned 2nd place awards. Sure, it's not anything to write home about, I'd like my animals to place better of course, but it's not like getting no award (which doesn't happen often, but has happened over the years to some people). 2nd place is hardly pathetic. And I notice, this person failed to mention that my other chin got Phase Champ. I'm going to guess that's somewhat above pathetic, but see, they want to bring me down and focus on the one that didn't do so great (which mind you... she got a second because she was smaller than some of the show bunnies, not because of being off color, or loose fur, or other faults).
Reading this post, I have a decent idea of who (or a friend of who) might be behind these posts. The ONLY person I have EVER commented negatively about at a show was one person, who was a backyard breeder. There are several breeders who are starting out now, who I've talked to, who can tell you, I have been perfectly nice to them, I have never put them down, I have never said anything bad about them or to them. If someone wants to breed, the right way, by all means. I'll help however I can. Advice or whatever. Heck, talk to Meredith, she started breeding after she got a chin from me and then several from elsewhere and learned about the right way to do it -- she can tell you I'd never not help someone out who wanted help. Heck, I post occasionally about how I answer emails when people have all sorts of questions and never intend to adopt. I don't care.
Here's the problem with this backyard breeder who I have in mind, who is literally the only one I can think of that I would have talked negatively about and about the health of her chins (all true stuff, by the way... sorry if the truth hurts). She went to large chinchilla breeders and would ask for their cheapest runt chins. The $50 ones, to breed. Ones that should never be bred. She'd buy chins that she knew didn't come with a pedigree, from good breeders, and then later bug the breeders for those pedigrees (even though they were sold as pet only, not for breeding), so she could breed them. She'd get fur chewing chins and breed those. It got so bad -- she had 300 chins SEIZED from her house in Waukesha with 2' of chinchilla feces surrounding the foundation of the house when the house was declared uninhabitable (due to the toxic ammonia levels and filth) and her children were taken away. Is that the wrong way to go about chinchilla breeding? YES!!!!!! A BIG RESOUNDING YES!!! I'm sorry if you all don't like to hear it, but I will NOT condone that sort of thing. I will post about how bad it is so that people know the difference between how it should be, and how some people do it the wrong way, which only harms the chins (and the poor people who get them) in the long run. I don't care if you all think it makes me sound mean or cruel or what, but some of us are breeding to try to better the species and create better chins, and people like that, who just breed anything together, and breed chinchillas with KNOWN health concerns, is just irresponsible and should not be done.
Don't quite get what the comment about me being nice has to do with anything.
But oh, by the way. I have lived on my own since about Feb / March 2014. That means... going on 2 years in a few months. Guess this person isn't as up to date as they think. I have my own house. Surprise? This person says (later) they know more than I think -- apparently not this! And this isn't recent either!
And I'm glad to hear my health is fine! Thank you for the update! How wonderful of you to notify me! Would you like to pay my ER bill from a month ago, and would you like to see and pay the neurologist bills for the dizziness, migraines, nausea, etc, that go back to high school? I do not feel the need to share everything about my personal life on this blog. It's a chinchilla blog, so of course, sometimes my health does come into play as I am allergic to the chins and dust and bedding and my health (for example, feeling dizzy) can impact what I can do with the chins if I'm not feeling well on a certain day. However... just because I don't post on facebook "oh poor me, I have this and this and this health problem, feel bad for me, poor poor poor me" doesn't mean I feel great all the time. It's called being an adult and doing what you need to do to get through the day, despite how you feel. As far as the comment saying some people have real health problems -- sure, people do. I don't deny that. Others fake it though, for attention. The problem is when someone states, "oh they're in the hospital cause they're dying," and their facebook post tags them 50 miles from a hospital in their home address at that exact time...pardon me when I don't believe them. I believe those with real health problems, not those faking to get sympathy.
As far as ripping people off, you say you could get a rescue standard in October for $100. Um... rescue standards in October were $65 (as they are now, since the sale was extended). So, best guess is maybe you meant that I have standard babies in October which are $110. And the one I had, which just went to his new home, didn't come with a pedigree because he was the runt and was tiny tiny. Not good conformation, loose fur. His siblings look nice, but he looked very "pet" -- which is fine, so he went to a pet home. And like a responsible breeder, I didn't feel he should be bred, hence, no pedigree to the new home. I suppose that's the ethical way to go about it, but not everyone knows what that means...
I want to mention something, that I'm not sure everyone realizes. The website is NWI Chinchillas. Not NWI Chinchilla Rescue (that is a page on the website, but it's more than just that). Therefore, not every chinchilla listed up on the website is a rescue, and does not have to be, as my website encompasses the rescue, but also just chinchillas for sale in general. Rescues are $75 for grey adults, $100 for mutation adults. On sale, those drop down to $65 and $75. If that's too much for someone, look for another rescue to adopt from. Yes, I have heard that there's some rescue in Indiana that has chinchillas for adoption for $20. If you prefer that adoption fee, by all means, go there and adopt one. This isn't Walmart, we don't price match. My prices and adoption fees are staying what they are. If you, or anyone, feels it's a ripoff, feel free to go somewhere else. I'm not holding a knife to anyone's throat and making them get chins from me. But it's amazing how many people do...
Oh, and one last comment on that post... a $100 pedigreed standard... probably isn't that great of a chin. Not saying you can't find a great one if someone's selling out or something, but your average person is going to ask more than $100 for an awesome standard that would be worth breeding. Just saying.
Second comment, same post:
You've been doing this for how many years? I've seen you badmouth fairly new breeders for not placing well at National shows. Spotlight you, with all your knowledge (ha ha ha) be WINNING speed by now? Especially since you claim to work for a big name breeder?
For most of this comment, see above. But I should mention, I did get reserve white male at Nationals last year (2014). That means, he was the second best white male at the National show. Amazing how that goes un-noticed. I think that's pretty decent for a small breeder with something like 20 breeding animals. I acknowledge that I could potentially be doing better, overall. I could be showing more chins. However, even this year, I'm only up to about mid-teens as far as the number of kits born, and the number of those that I've kept to grow out and show has not been all that many. Look through the show records. Most years, I've showed 5 chins or less per year, and many years, I only went to Nationals, or Nationals and the WI show. It's only within the last year or so I've ventured out to Ohio and further for shows. To show, animals have to be the right age, be in prime, etc etc. If you only go to one show a year, and only have maybe 15 babies born a year, guess how many are perfectly ready and in prime for that one show? Maybe one or two. Likewise, if I selected the wrong chin to grow out, then when it got older, and it turned out that it liked to lay on its back in it's pee, it'd go to a pet home. Nothing wrong with that, but point being, that chin wouldn't get shown (and I can think of a beige male who I would have shown, except he loved doing that). Sure, there are small breeders who are doing wonders with their small numbers of chins. Wendy comes to mind. But there's also a lot of smaller breeders who occasionally produce some good chins, but often don't have oodles to show because they just don't have oodles of babies as it is. And that's how it is here. Which is partially why I've upped the numbers of chins here, so I do have a better chance to have chins to show, as I do enjoy it.
And I "claim" to work for a big name breeder? Call up Jim. He'll vouch for me. I'm actually set to start delivering to pet stores with him this upcoming week. Think it's a joke? Call.
And third comment, same post:
And what's got you sooo riled up to badmouth this person? You should mind your own business. Shame on you that you don't know all of the circumstances.
I'm not positive whether this is aimed at me or one of the previous comments, but if it is aimed at me...
Lying, deceit, the wrong way of doing things. Should I go on? I don't appreciate people faking health concerns for sympathy. I don't appreciate people breeding any two chins that happen to be male and female together because they feel like just randomly having babies, regardless of the health concerns of the parents. It's unethical. It's wrong. It's not good practice, and this person in mind is a disgrace to the chinchilla industry. When the 300 chins seized story hit the news, people saw that and I read many comments on news site about how all chinchilla breeders are horrible and how dare we all be monsters like that. Um... no. Most of us want our chinchillas in great health, great clean conditions, and so on. This person painted a horrible image of what the chinchilla industry / community is, and that hurts all of us, not just me. And I should mind my own business? Who's the one commenting on all my blog posts?
Oh wait, one more comment that I almost missed. Same post:
I know more than you think. Ashley has her head up a fairly major breeder's arse, so that's why people badmouth her anonymously. She's earned it. She knows it.
Let me start by saying -- you know more than you think, but you missed that I have NOT lived with my parents for almost 2 years now? Really up-to-date on my life, oh yeah.
As for the rest -- excuse me? I work for Jim. Call him. Ask him. You know how that started? I asked if I could come by and learn. I started helping to grade out chinchillas. It progressed and now I help do that still, move around breeders, do stuff around the barns, build shipping crates, epoxy cages, and so on and so forth. My friends in the chinchilla community actually tell me that I'm lucky to be able to be there so often and to learn what I do. And I tend to agree. I have learned quite a bit and picked up some little things here and there. Useful use-able info. My head up his ass? No idea what you're talking about. He says I work hard and we get a lot accomplished when I'm there and he has another set of hands to help put on valves and run the chinchillas around and such.
This is directed to Anonymous herself -- since you say I've earned the badmouthing and I know it (that's a good one!) -- tell me, what have I done to earn it? All ears.
^ I don't honestly have a clue what that's about. I go over there, do what is asked as far as helping out with chinchilla stuff, and go home. Badmouthing for what? Only thing I can think is maybe people are jealous. But.. Jim says if other people wanted to come and learn, his doors are open... but almost no one ever wants to. So... who's fault is that if they're not coming? So I am interested to learn what I'm doing to earn the badmouthing. Can't wait to hear this...
And the last post that has comments on it: http://nightsatthechinchillarescue.blogspot.com/2015/10/taking-advantage-of-niceness.html -- that post talks about how I had two people who wanted chins held over my normal holding period, and how I was being nice and doing that for them. But I basically say in the post, people are taking advantage of this, and other places aren't this lenient, so I probably need to toughen up. Which earned this comment:
What a bitch! No wonder you can't get people to adopt from you.
By the way, which is it? Are you between jobs? Or is there a "guy you work for:?
Funny, as long as I've known who you are, you've been between jobs. That's not BETWEEN jobs. That's unemployable.
A bitch. Really? Let me ask you all, this is a question for everyone. Let's say you're having to rehome the family dog, and someone tells you, they need to think about it. So you say, ok, take a few days to think about it, let me know by Saturday. Saturday comes, Saturday goes. It's like a week or two later. You haven't listed the dog anywhere as needing to be rehomed, because this person you think will come through.... but they're not getting back to you. But more and more time passes, and you try to call them and they don't call you back that day, or the next, and then just as you're thinking, ok, fine, they're not interested, they call. Doesn't that make you at least the tiniest bit frustrated? Come on, I feel like if we're all honest, that's not that far of a stretch. This is exactly what I'm talking about.
I feel like we all have expectations of how long things should take. For the rescue, we actually have set guidelines. 7 day hold without deposit, 30 day with. I don't think it's asking too much to say, ok, if you can't decide or pick up within 7 days, or put down a deposit, the chin will no longer be on hold for you. I feel if they know that's the situation, that's fair. Period. And I don't feel that I should need to keep stretching this for people. I honestly feel, if people feel like they won't be able to pick up within 30 days, then they don't need to be putting down a deposit yet. Simple as that.
Oh, and I can't get people to adopt from me? Honey. *laughs* In 2015 alone, from Jan. 1 - Sept. 29 (that's as far as my Happy Customers page is completed thus far), I have had 95 animals (mostly chinchillas, with a guinea pig or two and a rabbit) go to their new homes. NINETY-FIVE. As in 95, five shy of 100. Plus the animals in October (which aren't listed on there yet), PLUS I have three more going home tomorrow. Oh yeah, I TOTALLY cannot get people to adopt from me (*dripping sarcasm* -- in case you couldn't tell).
Unemployable? Hardly. Again, see above, I don't share every detail of my job life on this blog because, hello, chinchilla blog. Not blog about my life in general. So just because someone has heard me say that I'm not working at that exact time means I'm unemployable? Not quite. But just to humor everyone...I worked for 8 years at Meijer in different positions. Cashier. Planogram clerk. Fashions clerk. Eventually left there to work at two different law firms as an attorney for awhile. Never did like the desk job, and was eventually let go from both, because neither had time to train (despite both knowing I needed to be trained when hiring me...but then realizing... nope, they really didn't have time). So then I worked at Pet Supplies Plus for almost a year as a manager. Liked that better, but had bitchy customers, and one of those went to corporate and complained, and you know the saying, the customer is always right. Yadda yadda. Lied through her teeth, but you know, that's who they believe. So here I am.
Out of the entire time since I was 18 and started working at Meijer, I have had all of 17 months that I have not been at one job or another. 17 months. Since I was 18, and I'm going on 31 now, so for the last 12-13 years (which, psst, is 153 months, since I'm almost 31), I've only not worked for 17 of those. 17 divided by 153 = 11% of the time, I have not been working. Hardly all the time, and definitely not as long as I've known most people.
Well... that's it as far as responding to blog comments. We'll see if this post gets me any more comments, or if they'll be able to resist.
Before I go, I want to note something though. Anyone who knows me, knows this about me -- I'm a very straightforward person. If I have a problem with someone specifically, like a friend is aggravating me or something, I would much rather tell them, so they are aware. And vice versa. If I'm driving someone absolutely nuts, I'd much rather they just tell me, because I very well may not realize it and may be able to correct whatever it is I'm doing.
However... this whole talking behind the back thing... I feel like it's cowardly. I feel like, whoever this Anonymous is...if they have this much of a problem with me, they could have easily contacted me and talked with me. Not doing so, in my opinion, just makes them look hateful and vindictive. I actually had people message and text me today asking what's up with the blog and asking if I made anyone mad recently. I don't think this stuff reflects on me as much as it reflects on this person, to go through all my blog posts and nitpick everything. And really, if someone doesn't like what I'm doing, how I'm running the rescue, or whatever the case may be... don't read it. Don't look at my facebook page. Simple as that.
At the end of the day, this is a country with free speech -- I have my opinion and am entitled to it, and they're entitled to theirs. But someone posting this sort of stuff on the blog anonymously just seems childish. Which is about, sadly, what I would come to expect from this person who I think might be behind this.
Going to bed now... we shall see what the morning brings..... oh and we'll be at the Kane County Fairgrounds tomorrow and Sunday for the Chicago Pet Show in St. Charles, IL. Come by and see us! 10-5 both days.
Don't know what I'm talking about? That's alright, I'll share. I've gotten multiple comments from "anonymous" to quite a few blog posts over the last 24 hours. All of which are bitchy, nasty, and some downright mean. And because they clearly want attention (I mean, why else would someone keep reading the blog and keep posting negative comments if they think I'm such a horrible person... other than wanting attention), might as well give it to them.
Just in case any of you saw the comments (which I am leaving up by the way), and wondered, "hmm, I wonder how Ashley would respond to this..."... I will tell you. That's what this blog post is going to be about.
Let's start with the first one.
The first comment references the post I made about people being late for appointments. Post -- http://nightsatthechinchillarescue.blogspot.com/2015/10/appointments.html -- in case you don't care to read it, it's short and talks about people being late to appointments, and I mention that I don't think people would forget that the had doctors appointments (versus they do that to me all the time). That post earned me this comment:
You honestly compare your time to that of a doctor's? You think you are that important?
Really! You're freaking UNEMPLOYED and people might interrupt your LAUNDRY?
Waaaa!
Guess what? I sure do! In all honesty... which should I value my time any less than anyone else's? What makes the doctor's time more important than mine? What makes my time more important than anyone else's? Nothing. But that's exactly the point. I try my best to be on time for things. In all the years I've been doing this, I can only think of one instance (which I blogged about) when I was not here when I said I would be (and in all fairness, I left 45 minutes after a scheduled appointment when they did not show up...and then they showed up [so they said] shortly after I left). I do my best to be courteous to other people's time. All I ask is that people be respectful of my time.
Let me add that my state of employment is none of anyone's business. This will come up again in more comments from this person, but it should not matter if I am doing laundry, or cleaning house, or feeding chins, I feel like if I schedule someone at 5 pm, I expect them to show up at 5 pm. If that is considered "high expectations" in today's world, boy the world is going to hell in a handbasket quickly. The point is, it doesn't matter what the person is interrupting if they show up late... it's simply that I feel that we should all respect each other's time. Let's be honest. If I was supposed to drop off supplies at someone's house and said I'd be there at 8 pm. And I don't show up til 10 pm. Let's say they're in bed. Well, I'm only interrupting their sleep, according to this stream of logic, right? *shakes head*
Moving on...the next one revolves around vet bills. The post in question -- http://nightsatthechinchillarescue.blogspot.com/2015/06/sad-day-today.html -- talks about a few months ago adoption where the chin got sick and the people took her to the vet. I offered to pay up to $600 for vet bills (as that would have left the rescue with super low funds), they wanted me to pay more than that, keep her overnight at the vet, and pay for another few tests in the morning (which easily would have brought the bill to $900). The comment I earned:
Shouldn't YOU have money for vet bills?
...yes and no. Yes, I should have money for vet bills. However, the amount spent should be reasonable. Paying $600 for vet bills is hardly petty cash. When I ask on the adoption form, "do you have money for vet bills?" -- the main thing I want to know is, can they afford to at least take the chin to the vet. I'm not saying the people have to drop thousands on the chin, but at least be able to take the chin in, see what's wrong, and potentially treat, or if not possible, put the chin down. That's all. I've met people who've spent $10-$15,000 on chinchilla vet bills, and my personal opinion is that it's not worth it. Everyone's got their limits, but mine is lower than that. I have no problem with someone spending a few hundred on vet bills and then getting to the point where they say, ok, they can't afford anymore, and they put the chin down. At least it ends the suffering. However, I feel like offering to pay $600 (and I did end up paying very close to that for the final bill) is plenty. I don't feel the need to bankrupt the rescue to save one chin, especially when (in this instance) the vet agrees with me that the chin is likely to pass anyway. I have money for vet bills, yes. But I have a limit as well. And I think everyone should.
Moving along. We have several comments on the one post about the recent claim show -- http://nightsatthechinchillarescue.blogspot.com/2015/10/show-and-blue-cloud-and-other-stuff.html -- this is a longer post, and several things are mentioned. First, I talk about how I find it frustrating that many people expect that we will deliver chinchillas, then I talk a little about the blue cloud mine being shut down, and then just a little paragraph about my chins placing phase champ and 2nd place at the claim show. Which earned me three comments (who-hoo, popular post):
First:
Only a second at a CLAIM SHOW? Pathetic! And you have the nerve to criticize others, especially those new to showing, for their slow performance? AND some for their health problems?
Oh, I forgot. You are NICE. Sad that you still live with mommy and daddy, even though your health is fine. Minus the dizziness that you whine about. Other people have REAL health problems. Yet you judge them. I've seen it.
Most rescued don't rip people off like you do. Why buy a rescue standard for Oct $100 when you can get a pedigreed standard for the same?
Pathetic? That's funny. Have you ever been to a show? Let me educate those of you who are reading and have not. Let's say you go to a show. Let's say you watch how some of the big breeders place. Whether we're talking about Ritterspach, or Ryerson, or Jags, or Hummel, or whoever... these people have all won high awards and surely some Grand Show Champions at some shows. But at those same shows, often some of the animals they have brought along have earned 2nd place awards. Sure, it's not anything to write home about, I'd like my animals to place better of course, but it's not like getting no award (which doesn't happen often, but has happened over the years to some people). 2nd place is hardly pathetic. And I notice, this person failed to mention that my other chin got Phase Champ. I'm going to guess that's somewhat above pathetic, but see, they want to bring me down and focus on the one that didn't do so great (which mind you... she got a second because she was smaller than some of the show bunnies, not because of being off color, or loose fur, or other faults).
Reading this post, I have a decent idea of who (or a friend of who) might be behind these posts. The ONLY person I have EVER commented negatively about at a show was one person, who was a backyard breeder. There are several breeders who are starting out now, who I've talked to, who can tell you, I have been perfectly nice to them, I have never put them down, I have never said anything bad about them or to them. If someone wants to breed, the right way, by all means. I'll help however I can. Advice or whatever. Heck, talk to Meredith, she started breeding after she got a chin from me and then several from elsewhere and learned about the right way to do it -- she can tell you I'd never not help someone out who wanted help. Heck, I post occasionally about how I answer emails when people have all sorts of questions and never intend to adopt. I don't care.
Here's the problem with this backyard breeder who I have in mind, who is literally the only one I can think of that I would have talked negatively about and about the health of her chins (all true stuff, by the way... sorry if the truth hurts). She went to large chinchilla breeders and would ask for their cheapest runt chins. The $50 ones, to breed. Ones that should never be bred. She'd buy chins that she knew didn't come with a pedigree, from good breeders, and then later bug the breeders for those pedigrees (even though they were sold as pet only, not for breeding), so she could breed them. She'd get fur chewing chins and breed those. It got so bad -- she had 300 chins SEIZED from her house in Waukesha with 2' of chinchilla feces surrounding the foundation of the house when the house was declared uninhabitable (due to the toxic ammonia levels and filth) and her children were taken away. Is that the wrong way to go about chinchilla breeding? YES!!!!!! A BIG RESOUNDING YES!!! I'm sorry if you all don't like to hear it, but I will NOT condone that sort of thing. I will post about how bad it is so that people know the difference between how it should be, and how some people do it the wrong way, which only harms the chins (and the poor people who get them) in the long run. I don't care if you all think it makes me sound mean or cruel or what, but some of us are breeding to try to better the species and create better chins, and people like that, who just breed anything together, and breed chinchillas with KNOWN health concerns, is just irresponsible and should not be done.
Don't quite get what the comment about me being nice has to do with anything.
But oh, by the way. I have lived on my own since about Feb / March 2014. That means... going on 2 years in a few months. Guess this person isn't as up to date as they think. I have my own house. Surprise? This person says (later) they know more than I think -- apparently not this! And this isn't recent either!
And I'm glad to hear my health is fine! Thank you for the update! How wonderful of you to notify me! Would you like to pay my ER bill from a month ago, and would you like to see and pay the neurologist bills for the dizziness, migraines, nausea, etc, that go back to high school? I do not feel the need to share everything about my personal life on this blog. It's a chinchilla blog, so of course, sometimes my health does come into play as I am allergic to the chins and dust and bedding and my health (for example, feeling dizzy) can impact what I can do with the chins if I'm not feeling well on a certain day. However... just because I don't post on facebook "oh poor me, I have this and this and this health problem, feel bad for me, poor poor poor me" doesn't mean I feel great all the time. It's called being an adult and doing what you need to do to get through the day, despite how you feel. As far as the comment saying some people have real health problems -- sure, people do. I don't deny that. Others fake it though, for attention. The problem is when someone states, "oh they're in the hospital cause they're dying," and their facebook post tags them 50 miles from a hospital in their home address at that exact time...pardon me when I don't believe them. I believe those with real health problems, not those faking to get sympathy.
As far as ripping people off, you say you could get a rescue standard in October for $100. Um... rescue standards in October were $65 (as they are now, since the sale was extended). So, best guess is maybe you meant that I have standard babies in October which are $110. And the one I had, which just went to his new home, didn't come with a pedigree because he was the runt and was tiny tiny. Not good conformation, loose fur. His siblings look nice, but he looked very "pet" -- which is fine, so he went to a pet home. And like a responsible breeder, I didn't feel he should be bred, hence, no pedigree to the new home. I suppose that's the ethical way to go about it, but not everyone knows what that means...
I want to mention something, that I'm not sure everyone realizes. The website is NWI Chinchillas. Not NWI Chinchilla Rescue (that is a page on the website, but it's more than just that). Therefore, not every chinchilla listed up on the website is a rescue, and does not have to be, as my website encompasses the rescue, but also just chinchillas for sale in general. Rescues are $75 for grey adults, $100 for mutation adults. On sale, those drop down to $65 and $75. If that's too much for someone, look for another rescue to adopt from. Yes, I have heard that there's some rescue in Indiana that has chinchillas for adoption for $20. If you prefer that adoption fee, by all means, go there and adopt one. This isn't Walmart, we don't price match. My prices and adoption fees are staying what they are. If you, or anyone, feels it's a ripoff, feel free to go somewhere else. I'm not holding a knife to anyone's throat and making them get chins from me. But it's amazing how many people do...
Oh, and one last comment on that post... a $100 pedigreed standard... probably isn't that great of a chin. Not saying you can't find a great one if someone's selling out or something, but your average person is going to ask more than $100 for an awesome standard that would be worth breeding. Just saying.
Second comment, same post:
You've been doing this for how many years? I've seen you badmouth fairly new breeders for not placing well at National shows. Spotlight you, with all your knowledge (ha ha ha) be WINNING speed by now? Especially since you claim to work for a big name breeder?
For most of this comment, see above. But I should mention, I did get reserve white male at Nationals last year (2014). That means, he was the second best white male at the National show. Amazing how that goes un-noticed. I think that's pretty decent for a small breeder with something like 20 breeding animals. I acknowledge that I could potentially be doing better, overall. I could be showing more chins. However, even this year, I'm only up to about mid-teens as far as the number of kits born, and the number of those that I've kept to grow out and show has not been all that many. Look through the show records. Most years, I've showed 5 chins or less per year, and many years, I only went to Nationals, or Nationals and the WI show. It's only within the last year or so I've ventured out to Ohio and further for shows. To show, animals have to be the right age, be in prime, etc etc. If you only go to one show a year, and only have maybe 15 babies born a year, guess how many are perfectly ready and in prime for that one show? Maybe one or two. Likewise, if I selected the wrong chin to grow out, then when it got older, and it turned out that it liked to lay on its back in it's pee, it'd go to a pet home. Nothing wrong with that, but point being, that chin wouldn't get shown (and I can think of a beige male who I would have shown, except he loved doing that). Sure, there are small breeders who are doing wonders with their small numbers of chins. Wendy comes to mind. But there's also a lot of smaller breeders who occasionally produce some good chins, but often don't have oodles to show because they just don't have oodles of babies as it is. And that's how it is here. Which is partially why I've upped the numbers of chins here, so I do have a better chance to have chins to show, as I do enjoy it.
And I "claim" to work for a big name breeder? Call up Jim. He'll vouch for me. I'm actually set to start delivering to pet stores with him this upcoming week. Think it's a joke? Call.
And third comment, same post:
And what's got you sooo riled up to badmouth this person? You should mind your own business. Shame on you that you don't know all of the circumstances.
I'm not positive whether this is aimed at me or one of the previous comments, but if it is aimed at me...
Lying, deceit, the wrong way of doing things. Should I go on? I don't appreciate people faking health concerns for sympathy. I don't appreciate people breeding any two chins that happen to be male and female together because they feel like just randomly having babies, regardless of the health concerns of the parents. It's unethical. It's wrong. It's not good practice, and this person in mind is a disgrace to the chinchilla industry. When the 300 chins seized story hit the news, people saw that and I read many comments on news site about how all chinchilla breeders are horrible and how dare we all be monsters like that. Um... no. Most of us want our chinchillas in great health, great clean conditions, and so on. This person painted a horrible image of what the chinchilla industry / community is, and that hurts all of us, not just me. And I should mind my own business? Who's the one commenting on all my blog posts?
Oh wait, one more comment that I almost missed. Same post:
I know more than you think. Ashley has her head up a fairly major breeder's arse, so that's why people badmouth her anonymously. She's earned it. She knows it.
Let me start by saying -- you know more than you think, but you missed that I have NOT lived with my parents for almost 2 years now? Really up-to-date on my life, oh yeah.
As for the rest -- excuse me? I work for Jim. Call him. Ask him. You know how that started? I asked if I could come by and learn. I started helping to grade out chinchillas. It progressed and now I help do that still, move around breeders, do stuff around the barns, build shipping crates, epoxy cages, and so on and so forth. My friends in the chinchilla community actually tell me that I'm lucky to be able to be there so often and to learn what I do. And I tend to agree. I have learned quite a bit and picked up some little things here and there. Useful use-able info. My head up his ass? No idea what you're talking about. He says I work hard and we get a lot accomplished when I'm there and he has another set of hands to help put on valves and run the chinchillas around and such.
This is directed to Anonymous herself -- since you say I've earned the badmouthing and I know it (that's a good one!) -- tell me, what have I done to earn it? All ears.
^ I don't honestly have a clue what that's about. I go over there, do what is asked as far as helping out with chinchilla stuff, and go home. Badmouthing for what? Only thing I can think is maybe people are jealous. But.. Jim says if other people wanted to come and learn, his doors are open... but almost no one ever wants to. So... who's fault is that if they're not coming? So I am interested to learn what I'm doing to earn the badmouthing. Can't wait to hear this...
And the last post that has comments on it: http://nightsatthechinchillarescue.blogspot.com/2015/10/taking-advantage-of-niceness.html -- that post talks about how I had two people who wanted chins held over my normal holding period, and how I was being nice and doing that for them. But I basically say in the post, people are taking advantage of this, and other places aren't this lenient, so I probably need to toughen up. Which earned this comment:
What a bitch! No wonder you can't get people to adopt from you.
By the way, which is it? Are you between jobs? Or is there a "guy you work for:?
Funny, as long as I've known who you are, you've been between jobs. That's not BETWEEN jobs. That's unemployable.
A bitch. Really? Let me ask you all, this is a question for everyone. Let's say you're having to rehome the family dog, and someone tells you, they need to think about it. So you say, ok, take a few days to think about it, let me know by Saturday. Saturday comes, Saturday goes. It's like a week or two later. You haven't listed the dog anywhere as needing to be rehomed, because this person you think will come through.... but they're not getting back to you. But more and more time passes, and you try to call them and they don't call you back that day, or the next, and then just as you're thinking, ok, fine, they're not interested, they call. Doesn't that make you at least the tiniest bit frustrated? Come on, I feel like if we're all honest, that's not that far of a stretch. This is exactly what I'm talking about.
I feel like we all have expectations of how long things should take. For the rescue, we actually have set guidelines. 7 day hold without deposit, 30 day with. I don't think it's asking too much to say, ok, if you can't decide or pick up within 7 days, or put down a deposit, the chin will no longer be on hold for you. I feel if they know that's the situation, that's fair. Period. And I don't feel that I should need to keep stretching this for people. I honestly feel, if people feel like they won't be able to pick up within 30 days, then they don't need to be putting down a deposit yet. Simple as that.
Oh, and I can't get people to adopt from me? Honey. *laughs* In 2015 alone, from Jan. 1 - Sept. 29 (that's as far as my Happy Customers page is completed thus far), I have had 95 animals (mostly chinchillas, with a guinea pig or two and a rabbit) go to their new homes. NINETY-FIVE. As in 95, five shy of 100. Plus the animals in October (which aren't listed on there yet), PLUS I have three more going home tomorrow. Oh yeah, I TOTALLY cannot get people to adopt from me (*dripping sarcasm* -- in case you couldn't tell).
Unemployable? Hardly. Again, see above, I don't share every detail of my job life on this blog because, hello, chinchilla blog. Not blog about my life in general. So just because someone has heard me say that I'm not working at that exact time means I'm unemployable? Not quite. But just to humor everyone...I worked for 8 years at Meijer in different positions. Cashier. Planogram clerk. Fashions clerk. Eventually left there to work at two different law firms as an attorney for awhile. Never did like the desk job, and was eventually let go from both, because neither had time to train (despite both knowing I needed to be trained when hiring me...but then realizing... nope, they really didn't have time). So then I worked at Pet Supplies Plus for almost a year as a manager. Liked that better, but had bitchy customers, and one of those went to corporate and complained, and you know the saying, the customer is always right. Yadda yadda. Lied through her teeth, but you know, that's who they believe. So here I am.
Out of the entire time since I was 18 and started working at Meijer, I have had all of 17 months that I have not been at one job or another. 17 months. Since I was 18, and I'm going on 31 now, so for the last 12-13 years (which, psst, is 153 months, since I'm almost 31), I've only not worked for 17 of those. 17 divided by 153 = 11% of the time, I have not been working. Hardly all the time, and definitely not as long as I've known most people.
Well... that's it as far as responding to blog comments. We'll see if this post gets me any more comments, or if they'll be able to resist.
Before I go, I want to note something though. Anyone who knows me, knows this about me -- I'm a very straightforward person. If I have a problem with someone specifically, like a friend is aggravating me or something, I would much rather tell them, so they are aware. And vice versa. If I'm driving someone absolutely nuts, I'd much rather they just tell me, because I very well may not realize it and may be able to correct whatever it is I'm doing.
However... this whole talking behind the back thing... I feel like it's cowardly. I feel like, whoever this Anonymous is...if they have this much of a problem with me, they could have easily contacted me and talked with me. Not doing so, in my opinion, just makes them look hateful and vindictive. I actually had people message and text me today asking what's up with the blog and asking if I made anyone mad recently. I don't think this stuff reflects on me as much as it reflects on this person, to go through all my blog posts and nitpick everything. And really, if someone doesn't like what I'm doing, how I'm running the rescue, or whatever the case may be... don't read it. Don't look at my facebook page. Simple as that.
At the end of the day, this is a country with free speech -- I have my opinion and am entitled to it, and they're entitled to theirs. But someone posting this sort of stuff on the blog anonymously just seems childish. Which is about, sadly, what I would come to expect from this person who I think might be behind this.
Going to bed now... we shall see what the morning brings..... oh and we'll be at the Kane County Fairgrounds tomorrow and Sunday for the Chicago Pet Show in St. Charles, IL. Come by and see us! 10-5 both days.
Tuesday, October 27, 2015
Taking advantage of niceness
People, please don't take advantage of the fact that I'm nice. I really shouldn't be, and as the years have gone on, I can even tell, myself, that I'm less nice than I used to be.
Case in point. I have a dark ebony female here with a pedigree if someone wanted it. She's about 5 months old, and I was going to sell her as a pet, most likely. Well, someone emails asking about a dark ebony female for breeding, and I asked them what age they're looking for. Well, 5 months or older. Ok, so I mention her. So, this is literally October 1st. So, we go back and forth, she wants to know about the parents, colors, weights, ranch brands, what's in their lines. Don't get me wrong, this stuff is important if you're going to breed.
However, what is also important is my time and my policies here.
Including the policy that we only hold for 7 days without a deposit. Well, that passed way at the beginning, when she was still asking questions about the pedigrees. Fine, I thought, ok, well she's going to come get the chin, and I hadn't listed the chin yet, so that saves me effort if she buys one I haven't had to list or anything yet.
Until she starts taking about a week and a half to respond to my emails. On October 17th, she tells me that, after I've told her everything under the sun about this chin, that she's very interested but she's unsure if she's going to be able to make the trip, and not sure she wants to put down a deposit because she's not sure she can make it here in 30 days. Which I feel is fair and honest, so I tell her, the 30 days is flexible (which it is, to an extent), but I would need to have some idea of when she's coming to get the chin. So she waits 9 days to email me back (26th) and finally says, she has to talk to her husband. What was she doing for the 9 days???
My patience has worn out, as this chin still hasn't been listed, and is now a month older (and harder to find a home for, the older they get), and she's no closer to adopting. She also mentions, in this email:
... which I feel is a crock of shit because we've already gone over how large this girl is, how large the parents are, and all that... and then she says this. So this was my response:
I
don't have any mosaic females that are any older than I think like 2-3
months right now. And as with this female, could not easily say how
large they will turn out. That is just the gamble you take with buying
one young, and why most breeders will buy one that's full grown so
there's no guesswork.
...which is the truth. You want one that you FOR SURE know is going to be exactly what you want, especially for something like breeding, buy an ADULT. I could see this person turning into one of those who would get a chin now, and then complain later when it doesn't mature into the right size or right build or whatever. I could just see it.
-----Moving along to my next case in point-----
I have another chin here, Hershey, and a critter nation cage that are on hold for someone. This person originally emailed me in the middle of September and decided they wanted to put down a hold on Hershey and this cage, and I received their money order for the deposit on October 1st. They were set to come get him and the cage somewhere in there, and ended up having to back out. They're from WI and had been planning on coming to see some friends in Chicago and I guess that didn't work out.
Well, I tell her on the 1st that I get the money order, and ask if I missed any emails, cause I hadn't heard from her about pickup. Nope, I didn't. So, I have the money order for the hold for 30 days, so not a big deal, but I don't hear from her for a bit, so on the 15th, I send her an email asking about when she's planning to pick up, and reminding her she only has 30 days total to do so. I get an email two days later, saying they basically haven't been able to work out this Chicago trip with their friends, and that maybe they'll just come down and stay in a hotel. And so then they ask me what hotels are around, and ask about coming November 1st.
First, I am not Travelocity, if you're able to find me, surely you can find hotels near me? I emailed her a few that are around here, but specified that I don't know what they're like because I've always lived in this area, so I've never stayed at any that are close to my home. And then thought, why am I looking up hotels? Can't she make the effort? She's the one adopting. Anyway...
So moving along, I emailed her back that day to let her know that the 1st would work, but is filling up with appointments, so we need to set a time asap. Today is the 26th and I have yet to hear back. So today, I called her AND emailed her. On the phone I left a message saying I need her to call me back, as her 30 days is almost up, and I told her I'd send her an email as well. Mentioned that I will extend the 30 days by another 10, until the 11th, because I understand things come up, but that's it.
When people put down the deposit, I ALWAYS specify that you have 30 days. Can't make it in 30 days? You don't need to put down a deposit and you don't need that specific chin. There are almost no occasions when I feel like hanging onto a chin for months and months while you get your act together to get over here. There's just not. I can have that chin listed and someone can come and adopt it in the meantime. Same with that cage she wants -- I could have had it sold 10x over in the past month if she didn't want it. No problem whatsoever. And she wants to look at a used wheel I have so that's been sitting around waiting for her to come by as well.
I told her, if she isn't able to come by to adopt, by the 11th, she can still adopt, she'll just have to put down another deposit to hold the chin / cage (if even here) for more than 7 days. And she'll have forfeited the 1st deposit. Don't like it? Tough cookies. Even before I revised the sales policy, this 30 days with non-refundable deposit has been this way forever.
...and the thing is, all these people are taking advantage. The first person has been taking advantage of me being nice and hanging onto the chin without a deposit and (in my eyes, potentially) dragging everything out so she has more time. Nope, come the 1st, that chin gets listed if I haven't heard from her and don't have a deposit. Same with Hershey and the cage on the 11th. A humane society wouldn't hold for freaking 1 day for you. Someone gets there 5 minutes before you, guess they get to adopt, and you get left out. Sorry. I try to be nice, and that's why I do the 7 days, because I understand people work, and since I travel a lot, I'm not always home either, but that's what gets me walked all over. And from here on out, it's not going to be this wishy washy shit. You can't pick up in 30 days? Don't put down a deposit until you know you can, because otherwise, day 30 passes, and you lost that deposit. So sorry. Don't let the door hit you on the way out.
Case in point. I have a dark ebony female here with a pedigree if someone wanted it. She's about 5 months old, and I was going to sell her as a pet, most likely. Well, someone emails asking about a dark ebony female for breeding, and I asked them what age they're looking for. Well, 5 months or older. Ok, so I mention her. So, this is literally October 1st. So, we go back and forth, she wants to know about the parents, colors, weights, ranch brands, what's in their lines. Don't get me wrong, this stuff is important if you're going to breed.
However, what is also important is my time and my policies here.
Including the policy that we only hold for 7 days without a deposit. Well, that passed way at the beginning, when she was still asking questions about the pedigrees. Fine, I thought, ok, well she's going to come get the chin, and I hadn't listed the chin yet, so that saves me effort if she buys one I haven't had to list or anything yet.
Until she starts taking about a week and a half to respond to my emails. On October 17th, she tells me that, after I've told her everything under the sun about this chin, that she's very interested but she's unsure if she's going to be able to make the trip, and not sure she wants to put down a deposit because she's not sure she can make it here in 30 days. Which I feel is fair and honest, so I tell her, the 30 days is flexible (which it is, to an extent), but I would need to have some idea of when she's coming to get the chin. So she waits 9 days to email me back (26th) and finally says, she has to talk to her husband. What was she doing for the 9 days???
My patience has worn out, as this chin still hasn't been listed, and is now a month older (and harder to find a home for, the older they get), and she's no closer to adopting. She also mentions, in this email:
I am very interested in a
good size female. The male I would want to eventually pair her with is
only about 600 grams. He is young and may get a tad bit bigger but he
won't be huge.
He's a tov white and I am hoping to put him with a nice dark eb female.
I may also be looking for a nice mosaic female soon to pair with a dark eb male I have.
... which I feel is a crock of shit because we've already gone over how large this girl is, how large the parents are, and all that... and then she says this. So this was my response:
I mean
no offense, but I need to hear back from you with a firm decision in
the next, let's say 5 days -- so by the end of the day on the 1st.
Since your original email at the end of September, I've hung onto this
chin because I kept telling myself that you were going to get back to me
and come here to adopt her. As time's gone on, more time as passed
between getting emails back from you, and really, I do my best to be
fair. We only hold chinchillas for 7 days without a deposit. I tell
that to people all the time, so why I've hung onto her this long (I told
you about her on October 1st, so 26 days), is a good question. But
what it ends up coming down to is this -- most people I sell chinchillas
to are pet people. Sure, the ones that do well at shows, those tend to
go to breeding homes with other breeders, but many of them sell as
youngsters, and the older they get, the more difficult that is. Right
now, I'm between jobs and selling quite a bit of chinchillas that I
might otherwise keep, and the older she gets, and the longer I hang onto
her for you, the harder she will be to find a home for if you don't end
up getting her, which is why I feel like I have to set a firm time
frame on this. I've already been more than lenient on that 7 day hold, I
just feel like I can't continue this forever.
As
far as your email -- the only way to know a chinchilla's adult size is
to buy an adult. Sometimes you put two large chinchillas together and
get a small one. Sometimes you put two small chinchillas together and
get a large one. Somewhat it is the genes, but it's also the individual
chin. The guy I work for breeds chinchillas, and when he weans them,
he often marks babies with notations for red, small, lacking veiling.
It's amazing how many he marks small, when weaning, that end up being
huge later on. But the thing is, you don't know until they're full
grown, exactly how they're going to turn out.... which is why you often
see people buying chinchillas to breed at a show, or after a show, when
the chinchillas is at least 8-10 months old, usually full size or
almost, and already having been evaluated.
Another
note on size is this -- weight isn't everything. I have a chinchilla
here who looks like she might easily be 1000 grams. She's more like
650. While you definitely don't want to breed a small chinchilla, as
that's not the breed standard and definitely don't want to run into
problems with birthing, most of the show chins are in the 600-800 range,
and the fur is what makes them look "large." I used to buy chinchillas
at a show and think, omg it's huge! and come home and weigh it... and
it would be 600-700 grams. Not saying they're all that way, but some of
what goes into them looking large (and on the show table, it's how they
look, not how much they weigh) is their conformation and how long their
fur is.
For
males, 600 grams is plenty. Could go bigger, but don't want HUGE. Most breeders will tell you, you don't
want a huge male, because the huge ones tend not to breed. Most people
use males that are smaller than, or the same size as, the females,
because you also don't want a huge male impregnating a female and then
having her unable to pass overly large kits.
...which is the truth. You want one that you FOR SURE know is going to be exactly what you want, especially for something like breeding, buy an ADULT. I could see this person turning into one of those who would get a chin now, and then complain later when it doesn't mature into the right size or right build or whatever. I could just see it.
-----Moving along to my next case in point-----
I have another chin here, Hershey, and a critter nation cage that are on hold for someone. This person originally emailed me in the middle of September and decided they wanted to put down a hold on Hershey and this cage, and I received their money order for the deposit on October 1st. They were set to come get him and the cage somewhere in there, and ended up having to back out. They're from WI and had been planning on coming to see some friends in Chicago and I guess that didn't work out.
Well, I tell her on the 1st that I get the money order, and ask if I missed any emails, cause I hadn't heard from her about pickup. Nope, I didn't. So, I have the money order for the hold for 30 days, so not a big deal, but I don't hear from her for a bit, so on the 15th, I send her an email asking about when she's planning to pick up, and reminding her she only has 30 days total to do so. I get an email two days later, saying they basically haven't been able to work out this Chicago trip with their friends, and that maybe they'll just come down and stay in a hotel. And so then they ask me what hotels are around, and ask about coming November 1st.
First, I am not Travelocity, if you're able to find me, surely you can find hotels near me? I emailed her a few that are around here, but specified that I don't know what they're like because I've always lived in this area, so I've never stayed at any that are close to my home. And then thought, why am I looking up hotels? Can't she make the effort? She's the one adopting. Anyway...
So moving along, I emailed her back that day to let her know that the 1st would work, but is filling up with appointments, so we need to set a time asap. Today is the 26th and I have yet to hear back. So today, I called her AND emailed her. On the phone I left a message saying I need her to call me back, as her 30 days is almost up, and I told her I'd send her an email as well. Mentioned that I will extend the 30 days by another 10, until the 11th, because I understand things come up, but that's it.
When people put down the deposit, I ALWAYS specify that you have 30 days. Can't make it in 30 days? You don't need to put down a deposit and you don't need that specific chin. There are almost no occasions when I feel like hanging onto a chin for months and months while you get your act together to get over here. There's just not. I can have that chin listed and someone can come and adopt it in the meantime. Same with that cage she wants -- I could have had it sold 10x over in the past month if she didn't want it. No problem whatsoever. And she wants to look at a used wheel I have so that's been sitting around waiting for her to come by as well.
I told her, if she isn't able to come by to adopt, by the 11th, she can still adopt, she'll just have to put down another deposit to hold the chin / cage (if even here) for more than 7 days. And she'll have forfeited the 1st deposit. Don't like it? Tough cookies. Even before I revised the sales policy, this 30 days with non-refundable deposit has been this way forever.
...and the thing is, all these people are taking advantage. The first person has been taking advantage of me being nice and hanging onto the chin without a deposit and (in my eyes, potentially) dragging everything out so she has more time. Nope, come the 1st, that chin gets listed if I haven't heard from her and don't have a deposit. Same with Hershey and the cage on the 11th. A humane society wouldn't hold for freaking 1 day for you. Someone gets there 5 minutes before you, guess they get to adopt, and you get left out. Sorry. I try to be nice, and that's why I do the 7 days, because I understand people work, and since I travel a lot, I'm not always home either, but that's what gets me walked all over. And from here on out, it's not going to be this wishy washy shit. You can't pick up in 30 days? Don't put down a deposit until you know you can, because otherwise, day 30 passes, and you lost that deposit. So sorry. Don't let the door hit you on the way out.
Monday, October 26, 2015
Show and blue cloud and other stuff
Let me start with the thing that's on the top of my mind. Adopting. Let me share with you a few snippets of emails just from this morning:
Hello my name is Anthony I would like to adopt a chinchilla but I would like to know if I have to pick up the chinchilla.
and
I live in Brookfield, Wisconsin 53005, I was wondering if there is a way you can bring a chinchilla here for adoption, or...
...keep in mind, these are just from this morning. As in, give it a week and I'll have a minimum of 10 emails or messages or texts asking this. Here's the short answer:
YES, you have to come to the rescue to adopt.
The only, and I mean ONLY time when that would not apply would be if I was going to a show, and you happened to be going as well, or lived in that area and were going to meet me at the show or at my hotel near the show. So, in a year, you'd have maybe 5-7 opportunities for that, and you would need to be in either central Ohio near Jenera (well, I'm there all the time), near Madison, WI, or near Auburn, IN. Otherwise... you're outta luck. And for example, that WI one... is once a year. You miss it by a week or two (for example, I don't know where Brookfield, WI is, but even if it's close to Madison... they shoulda emailed me a few weeks ago when I was in the area...), and you're outta luck, cause I won't be back until next year.
Here's the thing. If you can't drive to the rescue or find some way to get here, what is there to make me think that you're going to drive to the vet, if needed? Yes, I know, you can ship in all supplies, whether from me, or from Amazon, or whatever. But you know what you can't ship in? Vet care. If your chin gets sick, yes, I realize, a cat and dog vet can come to the house if you pay enough (though, you usually see this in cases where the animal needs to be put down, not emergency care). If your chin needs an x-ray, or fluids, or a wound sewn up, do you think a vet is going to do this in your living room? The answer is no, they're going to tell you to bring it in. And if you say you can't, well, they're not going to be able to help you.
I feel that coming to the rescue is an important part of adopting. It shows effort on your part. You want everything handed to you and the chin delivered? That shows lack of effort, to me.
For the persistent people, I have told them, I can bring you a chin, that you have paid for in full and filled out all docs for beforehand, for 50 cents per mile roundtrip. So if you're 30 miles away from here, 60 miles x $0.50 = $30. Which would also need to be paid ahead of time. No one has ever taken me up on that. No, they want free delivery. And mind you, most people that I'm talking about aren't 20 minutes away. No, they're 4 hours away, so 8 hours roundtrip. That is an absolute minimum of $50 worth of gas, if not more. And that's just gas, we're not including that I probably need to eat sometime in that 8 hours. Plus, it's 8 hours of my time. Plus, I either need my phone or a gps to find your place... none of this is free.
Let's just say all we consider is the gas, which is $50. For someone adopting a baby standard grey, which are on sale for $110 right now, that brings the price down to $60 that the rescue gets. $50 currently adopts you a senior chin, $75 (down to $65 right now for the sale) adopts you a standard grey adult. So by delivering you a baby standard grey and eating the gas cost, I've basically given you a considerably more expensive chin for about the price of a senior. If you can give me some awesome reason why I should do that, by all means, I'd love to hear it.
To be perfectly honest, here's the reason why it's not worth me eating the gas cost and using my time and paying for food and the effort to bring that chin to you (unless you really are going to pay mileage) -- because I could drop the chin cost and have someone else drive to my door to get it. Do I want to eat the $50 and 8 hours of my time and deliver it to you? Or do I want to list a baby standard grey as $60 and watch people flock to my door to get it? I think, if that's all I'm going to get out of it, I'm going to do the second, and never have to leave my house. Hence, mileage, if you want me to drive.
Personally, I don't care if you think it's reasonable or not. You want a plumber to come out to your house? $60 service call. You want the electrician? $75 service call. Why should a rescue be any different? In fact, you're likely going to be paying the rescue LESS for the chinchilla than you would ever pay these service people, who charge you a fortune to come out to start with... so why should we not charge anything for our time? They have no problem doing it, and most people have no problem paying it.
Moving along. In case you didn't hear, the blue cloud mine has been shut down. Apparently, it was on Bureau of Land Management land, and some environmentalists didn't like that they were mining on BLM land, so once the current supply of blue cloud has been exhausted... we all very well may be out of luck. The blue sparkle mine is still running, but blue cloud has stopped. Just so everyone's aware. I don't sell blue cloud, so this really doesn't affect anyone buying dust from me, but affects people showing.
Moving along again. Went to the claim show in Ohio on Saturday. Brought a beige male who got phase champ (best male in the dark beige phase), and Pancake, who got another 2nd. Their main comment was simply that she's not big enough, and she is a bit smaller than some of the show bunnies, but I was talking to Jim and he looked at her and said she's definitely still too nice to sell as a pet, so she's likely going to go with either that one chin I have that looks like his butt was dipped in white paint, or a pink white male that I have here.
I also want to post about the change in my sales policy and health guarantee, and I will do that, but either later today or maybe tomorrow. Too long to add to this post and I need to get some other stuff done...
Hello my name is Anthony I would like to adopt a chinchilla but I would like to know if I have to pick up the chinchilla.
and
I live in Brookfield, Wisconsin 53005, I was wondering if there is a way you can bring a chinchilla here for adoption, or...
...keep in mind, these are just from this morning. As in, give it a week and I'll have a minimum of 10 emails or messages or texts asking this. Here's the short answer:
YES, you have to come to the rescue to adopt.
The only, and I mean ONLY time when that would not apply would be if I was going to a show, and you happened to be going as well, or lived in that area and were going to meet me at the show or at my hotel near the show. So, in a year, you'd have maybe 5-7 opportunities for that, and you would need to be in either central Ohio near Jenera (well, I'm there all the time), near Madison, WI, or near Auburn, IN. Otherwise... you're outta luck. And for example, that WI one... is once a year. You miss it by a week or two (for example, I don't know where Brookfield, WI is, but even if it's close to Madison... they shoulda emailed me a few weeks ago when I was in the area...), and you're outta luck, cause I won't be back until next year.
Here's the thing. If you can't drive to the rescue or find some way to get here, what is there to make me think that you're going to drive to the vet, if needed? Yes, I know, you can ship in all supplies, whether from me, or from Amazon, or whatever. But you know what you can't ship in? Vet care. If your chin gets sick, yes, I realize, a cat and dog vet can come to the house if you pay enough (though, you usually see this in cases where the animal needs to be put down, not emergency care). If your chin needs an x-ray, or fluids, or a wound sewn up, do you think a vet is going to do this in your living room? The answer is no, they're going to tell you to bring it in. And if you say you can't, well, they're not going to be able to help you.
I feel that coming to the rescue is an important part of adopting. It shows effort on your part. You want everything handed to you and the chin delivered? That shows lack of effort, to me.
For the persistent people, I have told them, I can bring you a chin, that you have paid for in full and filled out all docs for beforehand, for 50 cents per mile roundtrip. So if you're 30 miles away from here, 60 miles x $0.50 = $30. Which would also need to be paid ahead of time. No one has ever taken me up on that. No, they want free delivery. And mind you, most people that I'm talking about aren't 20 minutes away. No, they're 4 hours away, so 8 hours roundtrip. That is an absolute minimum of $50 worth of gas, if not more. And that's just gas, we're not including that I probably need to eat sometime in that 8 hours. Plus, it's 8 hours of my time. Plus, I either need my phone or a gps to find your place... none of this is free.
Let's just say all we consider is the gas, which is $50. For someone adopting a baby standard grey, which are on sale for $110 right now, that brings the price down to $60 that the rescue gets. $50 currently adopts you a senior chin, $75 (down to $65 right now for the sale) adopts you a standard grey adult. So by delivering you a baby standard grey and eating the gas cost, I've basically given you a considerably more expensive chin for about the price of a senior. If you can give me some awesome reason why I should do that, by all means, I'd love to hear it.
To be perfectly honest, here's the reason why it's not worth me eating the gas cost and using my time and paying for food and the effort to bring that chin to you (unless you really are going to pay mileage) -- because I could drop the chin cost and have someone else drive to my door to get it. Do I want to eat the $50 and 8 hours of my time and deliver it to you? Or do I want to list a baby standard grey as $60 and watch people flock to my door to get it? I think, if that's all I'm going to get out of it, I'm going to do the second, and never have to leave my house. Hence, mileage, if you want me to drive.
Personally, I don't care if you think it's reasonable or not. You want a plumber to come out to your house? $60 service call. You want the electrician? $75 service call. Why should a rescue be any different? In fact, you're likely going to be paying the rescue LESS for the chinchilla than you would ever pay these service people, who charge you a fortune to come out to start with... so why should we not charge anything for our time? They have no problem doing it, and most people have no problem paying it.
Moving along. In case you didn't hear, the blue cloud mine has been shut down. Apparently, it was on Bureau of Land Management land, and some environmentalists didn't like that they were mining on BLM land, so once the current supply of blue cloud has been exhausted... we all very well may be out of luck. The blue sparkle mine is still running, but blue cloud has stopped. Just so everyone's aware. I don't sell blue cloud, so this really doesn't affect anyone buying dust from me, but affects people showing.
Moving along again. Went to the claim show in Ohio on Saturday. Brought a beige male who got phase champ (best male in the dark beige phase), and Pancake, who got another 2nd. Their main comment was simply that she's not big enough, and she is a bit smaller than some of the show bunnies, but I was talking to Jim and he looked at her and said she's definitely still too nice to sell as a pet, so she's likely going to go with either that one chin I have that looks like his butt was dipped in white paint, or a pink white male that I have here.
I also want to post about the change in my sales policy and health guarantee, and I will do that, but either later today or maybe tomorrow. Too long to add to this post and I need to get some other stuff done...
Monday, October 19, 2015
Appointments
Frankly, I'm sick of people being late, forgetting about appointments, etc. Let me be more specific. A few days ago, I set an appointment with someone who wanted to come see the hamsters, for 11 am today. 11 comes. 11 goes. 11:15 comes, 11:15 goes. I'm working on laundry and other stuff, and I intend to go upstairs and get their phone number so I can text them. By 11:25, I'm upstairs and texting, and ask if they're still coming.
Oh, their son is sick and they're home and "OMG they completely forgot." Seriously? Would you forget if you had a doctor's appointment? I highly doubt it. If nothing else, if you couldn't make it, you'd call, apologize profusely, and reschedule. But yet, people think oh they can make an appointment at a rescue and oh if they forget, no big deal, I have nothing better to do than sit home and wait for them. Right? Oh wait, their time is valuable. But apparently, MINE isn't. It's getting old.
Someone I know in the chin community just implemented an appointment fee, and after this recent influx of people not showing up or showing up super late (within the last week or two, had four people show up over 30 minutes late, or not at all, and only ONE of them texted to let me know they were going to be late).... it's sounding quite appealing. So here's how it works:
To make an appointment, people have to put down a $15 deposit. If they show up, within 15 minutes of their scheduled appointment time, that $15 is credited towards whatever they buy / get / whatever. If they show up late, forget, never show up, whatever, they don't get that $15 back. Tough cookies.
I like this. I think I will be implementing this soon.
Oh, their son is sick and they're home and "OMG they completely forgot." Seriously? Would you forget if you had a doctor's appointment? I highly doubt it. If nothing else, if you couldn't make it, you'd call, apologize profusely, and reschedule. But yet, people think oh they can make an appointment at a rescue and oh if they forget, no big deal, I have nothing better to do than sit home and wait for them. Right? Oh wait, their time is valuable. But apparently, MINE isn't. It's getting old.
Someone I know in the chin community just implemented an appointment fee, and after this recent influx of people not showing up or showing up super late (within the last week or two, had four people show up over 30 minutes late, or not at all, and only ONE of them texted to let me know they were going to be late).... it's sounding quite appealing. So here's how it works:
To make an appointment, people have to put down a $15 deposit. If they show up, within 15 minutes of their scheduled appointment time, that $15 is credited towards whatever they buy / get / whatever. If they show up late, forget, never show up, whatever, they don't get that $15 back. Tough cookies.
I like this. I think I will be implementing this soon.
Current Stuff
So, we have a sale going on. You may have noticed. So as usual, multiple chins are on hold. Since my computer's still in the shop, the website's not up to date, which is not helping anything.
And people wanting to look at multiple chins when they come by, which is fine, but holding multiple chins, not so much. You want to look at all the available females when you come by? Great, I will gladly show you them all. You want me to hold them all until a week from now so you can see them all? Uh... no. Sorry, but no. Our holds (without deposit) are for 7 days, for ONE chinchilla. You may still get here, and decide you don't want to adopt that one chinchilla. You may pick another one. You may decide you don't like any, and go home without one. But I won't hold 5 and prevent 5 from being adopted for a week, and then you come here and go home with one. Sorry, no can do.
Moving along, if we don't have an appointment set up yet, and my schedule changes, I apologize... but it happens. Had someone email me the other day, asking about a certain day, and I told them, yep, have that day open. So they said, oh they'll email closer to that day. That's fine. In the meantime, my schedule changed and I won't be here that day. Well, if I'd had a scheduled appointment, I might have been more concerned about the schedule change... but if I had a penny for every person who said they'll "email me later" and never did, I'd be rich. So I don't bank on it. So with no appointment, wasn't concerned about the schedule change, and now I won't be around for them to come that day.
Which brings me to my next thing. I have had people email and ask, well can someone else help them (on a day I'm not available). That's actually kind of funny. Who else? I can't get people to help me out at a one-day expo, much less someone else come by and help out with adoptions and questions and stuff that actually requires some knowledge (and knowledge of all the chins and products here and all). In case it's not clear (which, maybe it's not)... everything that's done.. is me. I update the website. I post the chins. I make the houses. I clean the cages (with help). I answer the emails. I fill the orders. I mail the orders. I feed and water the critters. I handle the adoptions. I handle supply sales. I book all the expos. I find (usually less than successfully) help for the expos. Not saying any of this is rocket science difficult.... but it's all me. So, no, there's no one else to help someone with an adoption, or really, with anything. Just me.
Which can be kind of funny on phone calls too. Cause people tell me they spoke with someone about adopting. Always me. The best part is when we're talking about food, or treats, or something, and basically we're disagreeing. Like they'll say "oh I give a box of raisins everyday," and I'll tell them, "that's not good, you'll want to stop that, because..." and then their next statement is, "well I called your rescue last week and spoke with someone and they said the raisins were fine!" Um.... I know *I* didn't say that, and I'm the only one here, so unless they called the wrong rescue... that didn't happen. Which, I suppose for that, is kind of convenient that I'm the only one here, because I know what I said or didn't say.
And people wanting to look at multiple chins when they come by, which is fine, but holding multiple chins, not so much. You want to look at all the available females when you come by? Great, I will gladly show you them all. You want me to hold them all until a week from now so you can see them all? Uh... no. Sorry, but no. Our holds (without deposit) are for 7 days, for ONE chinchilla. You may still get here, and decide you don't want to adopt that one chinchilla. You may pick another one. You may decide you don't like any, and go home without one. But I won't hold 5 and prevent 5 from being adopted for a week, and then you come here and go home with one. Sorry, no can do.
Moving along, if we don't have an appointment set up yet, and my schedule changes, I apologize... but it happens. Had someone email me the other day, asking about a certain day, and I told them, yep, have that day open. So they said, oh they'll email closer to that day. That's fine. In the meantime, my schedule changed and I won't be here that day. Well, if I'd had a scheduled appointment, I might have been more concerned about the schedule change... but if I had a penny for every person who said they'll "email me later" and never did, I'd be rich. So I don't bank on it. So with no appointment, wasn't concerned about the schedule change, and now I won't be around for them to come that day.
Which brings me to my next thing. I have had people email and ask, well can someone else help them (on a day I'm not available). That's actually kind of funny. Who else? I can't get people to help me out at a one-day expo, much less someone else come by and help out with adoptions and questions and stuff that actually requires some knowledge (and knowledge of all the chins and products here and all). In case it's not clear (which, maybe it's not)... everything that's done.. is me. I update the website. I post the chins. I make the houses. I clean the cages (with help). I answer the emails. I fill the orders. I mail the orders. I feed and water the critters. I handle the adoptions. I handle supply sales. I book all the expos. I find (usually less than successfully) help for the expos. Not saying any of this is rocket science difficult.... but it's all me. So, no, there's no one else to help someone with an adoption, or really, with anything. Just me.
Which can be kind of funny on phone calls too. Cause people tell me they spoke with someone about adopting. Always me. The best part is when we're talking about food, or treats, or something, and basically we're disagreeing. Like they'll say "oh I give a box of raisins everyday," and I'll tell them, "that's not good, you'll want to stop that, because..." and then their next statement is, "well I called your rescue last week and spoke with someone and they said the raisins were fine!" Um.... I know *I* didn't say that, and I'm the only one here, so unless they called the wrong rescue... that didn't happen. Which, I suppose for that, is kind of convenient that I'm the only one here, because I know what I said or didn't say.
Wednesday, September 30, 2015
Feast or Famine
I know, I know, the title could reflect my ability to write these blog posts as well. I hear from many people, either I write 10 in one week, or none for a month. Yep, that would be me.
Well, things have really picked up in the last few days. Things were going slow, slow enough that I was (and still am) planning on doing another sale, but in the last few days, had lots of inquiries about chinchillas.
Been keeping busy around here. We had the Darien expo a bit ago, sold a decent amount of stuff (very nice amount for Darien), and made $8.50 in donations. Nothing to write home about, but better than the $3 (over two days) we made at Celebration of Wildlife last year. Well anyway, few good days, then I went off to work in Ohio and came back and immediately landed myself in the ER because of asthma complications. So, things ground to a halt for a day or two, I called up people and rescheduled appointments, but for the most part, things are back on track. Still don't feel well, the pills they have me on for my cold (which is what triggered the asthma flare-up to start with) are making me not feel so great, but I am plowing along and trying to keep things going, cause this is the busy season!
Unfortunately, we missed the Lake County Pet Expo, which was super disappointing for us, as that's the only expo that gives back to the rescues, and every year, each rescue in attendance gets a share of the profits, which is usually something like $200. As rescues never have anywhere near enough money, that would have been awesome to get, and would have helped out tremendously, but we'll do fine without it. That was literally the day after the ER visit, and I could not risk my health to spend all day there (and not at home resting).
This weekend, though, is going to be Celebration of Wildlife. This will be our second year, and we're hoping people come out and see us, it's at Sunset Hill Farm in Valpo from 10-5 on Sunday..... last year, over two days we had no sales, it was too hot to bring the chins, and $3 in donations... so this year is sort of going to be the test year... if it's that bad again this year, we likely may not go next year. But we shall see. In the meantime, all the supplies and everything are still loaded in the blazer, and on my to-do list today is to add in a few more items (things we sold out of at the last expo), and then that'll all be packed and ready for this weekend.
But been keeping busy just around here as well. Chins have been getting adopted. We had one lady and her family who moved out of the house due to an abusive husband... the thing they really wanted was a chinchilla with everything and wanted to do it for under $200. And it is do-able, and we made it work. The key is, they didn't get a baby, they got Chinchy, a 5-6 year old grey male who is super sweet and would do great with their family with kids, plus my handpicking of supplies and cage and shelves and such. But it is do-able to do it cheaper...(just not with the opinion that you're going home with a baby chin).
So he went home. Lee also went home. Lee actually went home with a buddy! We had a white extreme mosaic male here who we'd had to spray with blu-kote because he got injured in a tussle with some other chins, and Lee's new family wanted Lee to have a buddy (if at all possible), and so we got the two of them together, and they went home yesterday.
This morning, we had a little violet girl go home. Had someone email saying they wanted to come by and get supplies and wanted to get a little chin, came by, picked out their girl, and we got them set up with a nice cage and everything they'd need.
Have several other people scheduled to come later on this week, and the one person I was talking to had asked about cages, so I sent her pics and prices. And she asked if I could go any lower on the cages, and I told her, unfortunately, I couldn't. I'm sure I've gone over this a million times, but let me one more time.... the large cage which we sell for $120 (without shelves). I have bought three of them this year and paid $299.91 for those (combined -- the price fluctuates). That means for three cages, I have made $60.09. Don't get me wrong, $60 isn't nothing. But often people look at it and say, "oh the cage is $120, shes making $120." No, most I'm making might be $20-ish. If I can't get the cage on sale from the place I get it, the cage may go up to $110 for the cage. Well, then, add in tax and we're at $117.70 and and all of a sudden I'm making $2.30 for selling the cage. Thing is, the exact amount doesn't matter too much, the point is, I want to have those two different cage options here for sale so that when people want to get a cage, they have good cage options at reasonable prices. But it's not like you spend $120 and I make $120. It's like you spend $120 and I make $20, if that.
Same goes for the toys. I dunno how I managed to do it, but I already blew through my last order of loofah. Yep, cut it all up, dyed it all, and now need more. And when I order from the place I order, I literally clear them out. Like I will type in a quantity until it says "only x in stock, reduce amount for checkout" and then I will order the exact amount they have. Right now, it's somewhere in the 50's. Anyway, point being. I made like four halloween loofah toys today, I have more dyed loofah that I need to use to make zany loofah toys.. but I still need to order more, because now I'm fresh out of loofah. And because I have to ship this stuff, it's not economical to get just a few pieces, so I just put in an order for like $175 worth of loofah. Now, I can't easily quantify how many toys and loofah bags and whatever that will make, because what I will be using it for will depend on what sells. I do cut up and dye a lot of loofah at a time, but typically it's to make a certain toy, or bagged loofah, or whatever. But I get a lot of people who give off the impression that the prices of my toys (and everything else) are solely profit... not so much. The loofah itself... or wood itself... or whatever itself... it all adds up. I realized I'm getting low on the 2" x 3" wood blocks I use in all my toys, so I emailed the guy who cuts those for me (I don't have a wood planer, and don't plan to get one). Well, the last time I got blocks, it was like $150-200. Sure, the toys go for more money than the parts they're made of, but it's not all free (though that would be nice!!).
So I looked at my list of the things we sold at the last expo, and packed up those items for the Celebration of Wildlife. Started putting more grommets and hooks on the new hammocks and got some pics of those on my phone, so I can start listing those.
Received an email from Celebration saying to not forget our raffle basket, so I made that up, so that's all ready to go now. Yay.
Realized that some of the hammocks and cuddle buddies that are on the webstore... aren't here anymore. Whoops. Deleted those items.
So then today I cleaned the critter nation that's set to go home soon, and then that same person wants to look at this one used wheel that we have, so I washed the wheel and the washers and wingnuts are drying right now.
Cleaned another of the cages that I need to fix up to sell, and started spray painting it... until I ran out of paint. Guess that will wait for another day.
Well, things have really picked up in the last few days. Things were going slow, slow enough that I was (and still am) planning on doing another sale, but in the last few days, had lots of inquiries about chinchillas.
Been keeping busy around here. We had the Darien expo a bit ago, sold a decent amount of stuff (very nice amount for Darien), and made $8.50 in donations. Nothing to write home about, but better than the $3 (over two days) we made at Celebration of Wildlife last year. Well anyway, few good days, then I went off to work in Ohio and came back and immediately landed myself in the ER because of asthma complications. So, things ground to a halt for a day or two, I called up people and rescheduled appointments, but for the most part, things are back on track. Still don't feel well, the pills they have me on for my cold (which is what triggered the asthma flare-up to start with) are making me not feel so great, but I am plowing along and trying to keep things going, cause this is the busy season!
Unfortunately, we missed the Lake County Pet Expo, which was super disappointing for us, as that's the only expo that gives back to the rescues, and every year, each rescue in attendance gets a share of the profits, which is usually something like $200. As rescues never have anywhere near enough money, that would have been awesome to get, and would have helped out tremendously, but we'll do fine without it. That was literally the day after the ER visit, and I could not risk my health to spend all day there (and not at home resting).
This weekend, though, is going to be Celebration of Wildlife. This will be our second year, and we're hoping people come out and see us, it's at Sunset Hill Farm in Valpo from 10-5 on Sunday..... last year, over two days we had no sales, it was too hot to bring the chins, and $3 in donations... so this year is sort of going to be the test year... if it's that bad again this year, we likely may not go next year. But we shall see. In the meantime, all the supplies and everything are still loaded in the blazer, and on my to-do list today is to add in a few more items (things we sold out of at the last expo), and then that'll all be packed and ready for this weekend.
But been keeping busy just around here as well. Chins have been getting adopted. We had one lady and her family who moved out of the house due to an abusive husband... the thing they really wanted was a chinchilla with everything and wanted to do it for under $200. And it is do-able, and we made it work. The key is, they didn't get a baby, they got Chinchy, a 5-6 year old grey male who is super sweet and would do great with their family with kids, plus my handpicking of supplies and cage and shelves and such. But it is do-able to do it cheaper...(just not with the opinion that you're going home with a baby chin).
So he went home. Lee also went home. Lee actually went home with a buddy! We had a white extreme mosaic male here who we'd had to spray with blu-kote because he got injured in a tussle with some other chins, and Lee's new family wanted Lee to have a buddy (if at all possible), and so we got the two of them together, and they went home yesterday.
This morning, we had a little violet girl go home. Had someone email saying they wanted to come by and get supplies and wanted to get a little chin, came by, picked out their girl, and we got them set up with a nice cage and everything they'd need.
Have several other people scheduled to come later on this week, and the one person I was talking to had asked about cages, so I sent her pics and prices. And she asked if I could go any lower on the cages, and I told her, unfortunately, I couldn't. I'm sure I've gone over this a million times, but let me one more time.... the large cage which we sell for $120 (without shelves). I have bought three of them this year and paid $299.91 for those (combined -- the price fluctuates). That means for three cages, I have made $60.09. Don't get me wrong, $60 isn't nothing. But often people look at it and say, "oh the cage is $120, shes making $120." No, most I'm making might be $20-ish. If I can't get the cage on sale from the place I get it, the cage may go up to $110 for the cage. Well, then, add in tax and we're at $117.70 and and all of a sudden I'm making $2.30 for selling the cage. Thing is, the exact amount doesn't matter too much, the point is, I want to have those two different cage options here for sale so that when people want to get a cage, they have good cage options at reasonable prices. But it's not like you spend $120 and I make $120. It's like you spend $120 and I make $20, if that.
Same goes for the toys. I dunno how I managed to do it, but I already blew through my last order of loofah. Yep, cut it all up, dyed it all, and now need more. And when I order from the place I order, I literally clear them out. Like I will type in a quantity until it says "only x in stock, reduce amount for checkout" and then I will order the exact amount they have. Right now, it's somewhere in the 50's. Anyway, point being. I made like four halloween loofah toys today, I have more dyed loofah that I need to use to make zany loofah toys.. but I still need to order more, because now I'm fresh out of loofah. And because I have to ship this stuff, it's not economical to get just a few pieces, so I just put in an order for like $175 worth of loofah. Now, I can't easily quantify how many toys and loofah bags and whatever that will make, because what I will be using it for will depend on what sells. I do cut up and dye a lot of loofah at a time, but typically it's to make a certain toy, or bagged loofah, or whatever. But I get a lot of people who give off the impression that the prices of my toys (and everything else) are solely profit... not so much. The loofah itself... or wood itself... or whatever itself... it all adds up. I realized I'm getting low on the 2" x 3" wood blocks I use in all my toys, so I emailed the guy who cuts those for me (I don't have a wood planer, and don't plan to get one). Well, the last time I got blocks, it was like $150-200. Sure, the toys go for more money than the parts they're made of, but it's not all free (though that would be nice!!).
So I looked at my list of the things we sold at the last expo, and packed up those items for the Celebration of Wildlife. Started putting more grommets and hooks on the new hammocks and got some pics of those on my phone, so I can start listing those.
Received an email from Celebration saying to not forget our raffle basket, so I made that up, so that's all ready to go now. Yay.
Realized that some of the hammocks and cuddle buddies that are on the webstore... aren't here anymore. Whoops. Deleted those items.
So then today I cleaned the critter nation that's set to go home soon, and then that same person wants to look at this one used wheel that we have, so I washed the wheel and the washers and wingnuts are drying right now.
Cleaned another of the cages that I need to fix up to sell, and started spray painting it... until I ran out of paint. Guess that will wait for another day.
Sunday, September 6, 2015
Shipping of Packages
Wanted to bring this up... you'll see why.
I posted on facebook yesterday about how (in a nutshell), I had scheduled a package pickup with USPS, had put four packages on the porch, and had received email notification that the pickup was complete. Yet... the packages were still on the porch the next morning, so I called the local post office and they said they would send someone out to pick them up.... yet they did not. I was out of town for the following two days, and the packages sat on my porch that entire time, while I received mail every day, and yet didn't get picked up.
So I posted on facebook about this, and about how useless USPS is, and saying sorry that the packages haven't gone out yet.
I noticed, shortly after this, that another vendor had posted on facebook something about, they go to the post office IN PERSON (they used the caps), because it's more personal, and how it's sad everything's automated. I don't know if that was intended as a jab at me and the rescue store, but I feel like it very well may have been, which is why I'm writing this post.
Let me tell you why I ship the way I do, and why I cannot do (at least, not all the time), what this other person does --
This other vendor only sells non-perishable items. As in, no chinchilla food, no treats, no time sensitive things, like when someone is gonna run out of rood and orders more. They have houses, hammocks, etc etc, but things that can wait. So, there's no rush for them to get out of orders, cause no one's chinchilla is gonna run out of food while waiting on their non-food order. AND... they posted that they ship in batches, only TWO times per month. I ship almost every other day. A lot of times it's just one or two packages, but it's OFTEN. With it being that often, it's really not practical for me to run to the post office every time.
The post office touts their package pickup, which is free. They even have commercials for it on TV, saying the mailman will already be here, they can pick it up. Clearly, as shown in my example, that doesn't work as flawlessly as they'd like people to think, but it is a service the offer. And a useful service, because when it works (that's the key, isn't it?), I don't have to drive to the post office, wait in line, drop off packages, and so on.
Now, let's also talk about price. This other vendor has several hammocks available, and they are nicer (shape-wise... like they're not squares) than mine. She has for each of them, $6 shipping. And maybe she's shipping them in a little priority mail box, I don't know. But for $6 shipping, per hammock, she can afford to go to the post office. You know what my hammocks are set at for shipping in the webstore? $3.50. And at that price, maybe I make $0.25-$0.50 on shipping. You order two of them, and it'll go up to $6.50, but chances are, you will end up with some of that refunded, cause it really won't cost $6.50 to ship two. I usually ship hammocks in first class envelopes (assuming the order is only hammocks or other small items), and can get maybe 4-5 of them in there, probably for under $5 total shipping. I'm not making much on shipping, and that's fine, because I feel that gouging on shipping is ripping people off. You want to make $10 profit off your item, fine, raise the price so that you make $10 profit, but don't have an item that costs nothing to ship and charge a fortune for shipping. Packaging just doesn't cost that much.
Anyway, reason I wanted to talk about price is because price is different when you go to the post office versus when you ship at home. Did you know that? If you get an account with USPS and print out your own labels and such and stick them on the package themselves... you can save yourself and your customers money. Lookie dat. If that vendor is really going to the post office in person, that's great for her, but her customers are paying more than they need to for shipping. Sometimes it's not a lot, but sometimes it's the difference between $40 shipping and $20 shipping on heavy packages going far, no joke. Which is yet another reason I use USPS's automated shipping, is because it's cheaper. Then, once I've paid the shipping cost and sent out the item to be shipped, I can refund the excess to the customer, who is typically happy to get back some money.
So I'm not doing it because I don't want to deal with real life people, or don't want to support people with real jobs, or whatever else reasons people might say "horrible automation, go away!!!" I'm doing it to save myself time, which gets orders done quicker if I'm not driving to the post office all the time, and to save the customers money on shipping. I'm trying to help the customers out, and in no way is it meant to be non-personal or whatever... but until someone wants to volunteer to go for me to literally hand the packages to the mail man at the post office... things will be done this way. If anyone would like this to change, by all means, volunteer, and you can stop by every time I have a package ;) haha
I posted on facebook yesterday about how (in a nutshell), I had scheduled a package pickup with USPS, had put four packages on the porch, and had received email notification that the pickup was complete. Yet... the packages were still on the porch the next morning, so I called the local post office and they said they would send someone out to pick them up.... yet they did not. I was out of town for the following two days, and the packages sat on my porch that entire time, while I received mail every day, and yet didn't get picked up.
So I posted on facebook about this, and about how useless USPS is, and saying sorry that the packages haven't gone out yet.
I noticed, shortly after this, that another vendor had posted on facebook something about, they go to the post office IN PERSON (they used the caps), because it's more personal, and how it's sad everything's automated. I don't know if that was intended as a jab at me and the rescue store, but I feel like it very well may have been, which is why I'm writing this post.
Let me tell you why I ship the way I do, and why I cannot do (at least, not all the time), what this other person does --
This other vendor only sells non-perishable items. As in, no chinchilla food, no treats, no time sensitive things, like when someone is gonna run out of rood and orders more. They have houses, hammocks, etc etc, but things that can wait. So, there's no rush for them to get out of orders, cause no one's chinchilla is gonna run out of food while waiting on their non-food order. AND... they posted that they ship in batches, only TWO times per month. I ship almost every other day. A lot of times it's just one or two packages, but it's OFTEN. With it being that often, it's really not practical for me to run to the post office every time.
The post office touts their package pickup, which is free. They even have commercials for it on TV, saying the mailman will already be here, they can pick it up. Clearly, as shown in my example, that doesn't work as flawlessly as they'd like people to think, but it is a service the offer. And a useful service, because when it works (that's the key, isn't it?), I don't have to drive to the post office, wait in line, drop off packages, and so on.
Now, let's also talk about price. This other vendor has several hammocks available, and they are nicer (shape-wise... like they're not squares) than mine. She has for each of them, $6 shipping. And maybe she's shipping them in a little priority mail box, I don't know. But for $6 shipping, per hammock, she can afford to go to the post office. You know what my hammocks are set at for shipping in the webstore? $3.50. And at that price, maybe I make $0.25-$0.50 on shipping. You order two of them, and it'll go up to $6.50, but chances are, you will end up with some of that refunded, cause it really won't cost $6.50 to ship two. I usually ship hammocks in first class envelopes (assuming the order is only hammocks or other small items), and can get maybe 4-5 of them in there, probably for under $5 total shipping. I'm not making much on shipping, and that's fine, because I feel that gouging on shipping is ripping people off. You want to make $10 profit off your item, fine, raise the price so that you make $10 profit, but don't have an item that costs nothing to ship and charge a fortune for shipping. Packaging just doesn't cost that much.
Anyway, reason I wanted to talk about price is because price is different when you go to the post office versus when you ship at home. Did you know that? If you get an account with USPS and print out your own labels and such and stick them on the package themselves... you can save yourself and your customers money. Lookie dat. If that vendor is really going to the post office in person, that's great for her, but her customers are paying more than they need to for shipping. Sometimes it's not a lot, but sometimes it's the difference between $40 shipping and $20 shipping on heavy packages going far, no joke. Which is yet another reason I use USPS's automated shipping, is because it's cheaper. Then, once I've paid the shipping cost and sent out the item to be shipped, I can refund the excess to the customer, who is typically happy to get back some money.
So I'm not doing it because I don't want to deal with real life people, or don't want to support people with real jobs, or whatever else reasons people might say "horrible automation, go away!!!" I'm doing it to save myself time, which gets orders done quicker if I'm not driving to the post office all the time, and to save the customers money on shipping. I'm trying to help the customers out, and in no way is it meant to be non-personal or whatever... but until someone wants to volunteer to go for me to literally hand the packages to the mail man at the post office... things will be done this way. If anyone would like this to change, by all means, volunteer, and you can stop by every time I have a package ;) haha
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