I bet some of you have seen their adorable faces before, and have no idea what exactly a chinchilla really is. Is it a cross between a squirrel and a rabbit?
Well, no. Chinchillas are rodents from South America. They live in burrows and crevices in the Andes Mountains. Their closest relatives are actually guinea pigs. They are actually believed to be the softest animals in the world, and they make up a huge portion of the fur industry. It takes 100-200 chinchillas to make a single fur coat. As you can imagine, due to over hunting for their fur, chinchillas were made almost extinct in the early 1900's. It is now illegal to hunt or trap wild chinchillas. Their population hasn't fully recovered, and they are still endangered in the wild.
The domestication of the chinchilla first started in the 1920's when Mathias F. Chapman trapped 12 wild chinchillas and brought them back to California as breeding stock for fur. All domestic chinchillas are said to have come from these original 12 chinchillas. While fur farms still exist, the chinchilla has also become a lovable, popular pet.
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