Chinchilla Breeding

Question
Hello,
I am also an expert, just in guinea pigs, but I also rescue and breed a variety of exotic animals. I currently have 2 chinchillas that I am hoping will produce babies for me, the female should be due in December- January, hopefully Christmas babies, but anyways before I had the female in with another male, I am pretty sure he was a hetero Ebony because he was grey with a grey belly, not white, but they were in together for a long enough period to have babies from 3-4 heat cycles, but they never produced any babies for me. I have now since got a new male, and the two seem to be acting more like they want to mate and breed, they definatly cuddle more, and I have seem the male try to mate with the female. My question is, is it common for chinchilla males to be sterile, I am hoping that the female is ok and will produce this time, but I am not counting on it, all of the chinchillas have been 1 year or older, my female is 1 1/2 years, the old male was 1 year, and my new male is about 8-10 months. Any advice would be helpful.

Answer
I'm 90% certain that your hetero ebony could be sterile.  This is just something that happens when type breeds with type breeds with type and so forth.  There's nothing that can be done--this is just genetics and nature at work.  In my own experience, my standard grey males have made the best mates for a variety of females.  I haven't really seen the reverse condition in females.

If you're looking to breed (and I recommend it) especially for color combinations, use a standard grey male with any variety of female.