Exercise: Aside from a clean cage and proper diet, exercise is important to keeping your chinchilla healthy. This is the main reason for having as big of a cage as possible for your chinchilla (with shelves). Chinchillas can get extra exercise by having a wheel in the cage (see cage article).
Even with these taken in to consideration your chinchilla will still need some ‘play time’. This is simply letting your chinchilla out of it’s cage into a room to run about. This room should be ‘chin proof’. In saying this I mean that the room is free of anything that will put your chinchilla in danger as he/she runs and plays. You must make sure there are no exposed electrical wires about and no harmful chemicals (as chinchillas will chew at just about anything). Another thing you might want to keep in mind is any little nooks and crannies in which the chinchilla will explore and get stuck in (or not want to come out of when time to go back in their cage). Many chinchilla owners will use bathrooms as they are small and much easier to control.
In any case, do not leave the chinchilla unattended by them selves or with young children.
If you can put toys out for the chinchilla to play with (boxes, tubes… etc.). The plastic balls in which you can put the chinchilla into to run about is great too, but I don’t believe it is as fun for the chin since they love to jump and explore.
Keep in mind that they are nocturnal animal and they will enjoy their play time more in the evening. Most chinchillas will tier out after 15 to 30 minutes.
