Piggies - married couple requiring separate bedrooms?!

[FlyingSpud]

My old married couple live in the kitchen. Nice big cage, generally very happy together and have previously happily shared their hidey house thing inside their cage.

Recently, however, there have been low key fisticuffs over who gets occupancy of the house. Sometimes they still snooze in there together, but often one of them gets left outside and squeaked at if they try and enter.

I'm going to buy them another little house so they can have one each. Is this kind of behaviour normal? Makes me sad that they need separate bedrooms

Don't have a married couple, mine are more like 'The Odd Couple'!

It sounds fairly normal, but sad that after such a happy marriage they want to go their separate ways. Maybe one of them snores.

I'd just let them have the option of separate rooms and leave them to it. Knowing pigs, once you've bought the extra house and rearranged everything in their cage, they'll decide they want to be together. So long as they're not seriously fighting, a certain amount of bickering is normal pig behaviour.

Definately normal pig behaviour. Maybe get a new housie (big enough to share if they want) and move everything round to confuse them. Piggies sometimes lose the urge to bicker when they go into the cage and are "Why,Whaaaat, that was there and that's moved....." (they are easily confused)

Our dearly departed neutered boar was a "Pigamist" ( guinea bigamist) with 2 wifeys.

They would happily share the haybox . They had a cardboard box inside it, usually the girls were in there and he would be at the edge of the haybox (where the food was )

Brilliant - thanks guys. Very helpful and reassuring to know it's normal. Funny little critters they are.

I'll buy them a new house tomorrow and mix things up

New house purchased. One of those bendy stick ones. They seem to be enjoying it with no more occupancy issues so far

A change is as good as a holiday for cavies.

Sounds good, FlyingSpud.

I have two married couples who live in adjacent cages - each cage has two pigloos and a tunnel, so they have a house each plus an extra hidey space when necessary. One of the pairs are very often to be found cuddled up together in the same pigloo, but the other two never share, ever. They are perfectly tranquil together but don't 'do' sharing!

Funny little critters indeed

My two have been inside this winter as DH got worried that as they are getting on in years, his house pig ban would be blamed for their inevitable demise.

As a result they have no sleeping quarters - just a big cage plus hay. They sleep at opposite ends of cage, bicker over food and generally treat each other with GP contempt. They do however do synchronised wheeking at the sound of a rustling plastic (food) bag.

When they were out in shed and it was cold they had a cat carrier house which they went in although often found the wife outside under a fleece while our boy lorded it in the cat carrier.

Think its normal - just like humans really.