Hi everyone - can I reconvene the group of knowledgeable piggie people who contributed to that long thread started by Electra (and hijacked shamelessly by me) a few weeks back? Need some advice.
The time has come for the male babies to be separated from their mothers/sisters. We have four male babies and an adult male of about a year who is their Dad and who has lived alone for his whole life, apart from when he was in with our females. I wanted to try to introduce Horris (male) to one of his sons as I feel he'll be happier with a companion. At the moment, though, none of the babies are old enough for rehoming, so I was planning to put all four babies and Horris together? We have a double decker hutch, with each floor measuring 5 x 2ft. There's a ramp connecting the two levels but it can be locked.
All the boars, including Horris, are in a run on my kitchen floor as I type. There's a lot of chasing, rumbling and mounting going on (so much so that I removed one of the babies to check that he really IS a male) but no real aggression. However I would say that Horris seems quite anxious - the little ones are chasing him all over the cage.
They can stay there for a while but when I put them in the hutch (which is new, so neutral) do I:
put them all in together, leaving the ramp down?
put Horris in with one of the babies (the one we're most likely to keep) and the other two underneath with the ramp locked?
I suppose what I'm trying to ask in a very longwinded way is - do male gps do better in pairs or groups?
Whisp - if you see this - do you want a pair of males? It would probably be the fluffy white with grey smudge on nose (Sarah's litter) and the brown Aby (Furball's litter) on that photo link on old thread. Or can do new photo if you like. I would love to keep them all and we do have the cage space, just about - but think that 8 gps is probably a bit mad...