Tell me everything you know about Guinea pigs.

[CatchingBabies]

Ok so we've made the decision to add a pair of Guinea pigs to our home.

I've got a 4 x 2 foot indoor cage that I believe to big enough for 2 piggies and found a perfect space in our house to put it. I don't really know what else I need though and what I should be looking for in our new piggies and was hoping you could advise.

So males or females? Which are more sociable / friendly?

Babies or adults? (Either way from local rescue)

I plan on keeping them on fleece with puppy training pads underneath. Anyone else use this method? Does it work?

Any particular brands of hay or food recommended?

Other than what I've listed and water bottle / house / toys is there anything else I will need?

Thanks for your help in advance xx

Catching - I'm very excited for you for tomorrow. Hope it all goes smoothly. You'll soon be one of us (piggie slave)

Not much to say that hasn't already been said. Just adding to the general pig fandom here. We have had 2 boys/ boy (neutered) & girl/ now 3 girls.

After our boy died leaving his mature widow we wondered whether new babies would be too much for her. But hey - a year and a half on she's still going strong (must be at least 9 years old) and putting up with much ridiculous behaviour from the young 'uns.

The best result from the new arrivals is that one (not sure which) likes eating the old girl's hair and so instead of baths and emergency haircuts to remove large lumps of pooey hair, she is now sporting a permanent neatly trimmed bob.

They spend the winters indoors and have us wrapped around their pointy little paws with their cute wheeking and popcorning. Its lovely to get home on a cold winters day to be met with welcoming excited wheeeeks.

In summer they live in our shed at night and are outside from 8 till late heroically keeping our lawn trimmed. One of my favourite parts of the day is going out in the dusk to get them in for the night.

The piggies are home 🎉🎉🎉🎉
They are absolutely terrified at the moment so I've left them alone with lots of parsely to settle in. They have spent the whole time hid in their house.

Glad they're home Catching. They'll soon settle in and it won't take them long to realise that if they wheek loud enough you'll fetch them something from the fridge.

New Piggies

They'll be scared, bear in mind all they know at the moment is each other.
They need to get used to their new house, new noises, new food bowls, new voices.
Once they get to know you and the fact you'll feed them , you'll win them over.
Until then, you'll see food disappear, droppings arrive and hear the scampering of little clawed feet when you make a noise.

All perfectly normal. They are prey animals but they love to eat. That's the way to their hearts .

When you want to catch them, the safest way to is corall them into a box.

Thanks for the advice, I've spent most of the day just watching them and talking to them. I've also been giving them fruit and veggies in tiny portions but often so I've given them about 10 portions today so they associate me coming into the room / making noise with a nice treat.

Seems to be working so far as one of them took a piece of carrot from
my hand tonight!! The other one is more scared, she just bolts out grabs what I've put down and hides away to eat it. They've done great for their day here though!

You do realise they'll expect 10 servings as a daily minimum from now on. They'll be very judgey if you don't continue

It's good that they're getting braver. You may find that one of them is always nervier than the other but they will settle fairly quickly with bribes.

You wait till they start wheeling and shouting to you
You know you cannot wait for your child to start speaking ... and then ....

It's pretty much the same
My girls also call to the children next door if they hear them when we're out in our run. They've been 'fostered' by them many times when we've been out for the day and so the piggies regard them as second tier slaves 😆
Slaves that cuddle and spoil them rotten

Wheeking not wheeling ... that sounds too energetic for fat pigs.
It's the phone autocorrects with a language all of its own

Aye Aye East my guineas saw your post and demanded I buy them skateboards and hoverboards.
They saw the correction and they were crushed.
Nothing a handful of curly red topped salad leaf can't fix though

Ok so Lilo (in photo) will now happily run up to me and squeak at me until I give in to her many demands. As soon as I open the cage and start talking she's sniffing around for whatever treat I've brought. When I was filling her hay rack before she came over and sniffed my hand as well. I haven't attempted to touch her as I don't want to push it.

Stitch I haven't seen at all, she won't come out the hidey so I've been dropping some treats into there just so she's also getting some veg and lilo is more than happy to eat both shares. Is this the right thing to do? I've tried coaxing her out but she's not interested.

Forgot the picture!

Still early days Catching - one pig will always be the nosier/cheekier/more confident/greedier one.

Make sure your quieter piggie has her share of treats by putting little heaps of food in seperate piles.
Have some 1:1 cuddle time with each one (hope you have willing hands to help. DD and I have 5 pigs, DH will cuddle one but doesn't 100% trust them . My new pigge did a soft pooh (they eat their first pooh) but she missed and it squished on DH. He was thrilled - not)

Gorgeous piggies - we need more pigtures once they settle.

So you would say to handle them? I've not done that so far as I thought it would scare them too much.

Oh and forgot to say I put the treats in two piles but the quieter one won't eat them unless they are in their hidey so the more confident pig eats hers and runs over to eat the others because quiet piggie is frozen to the spot not touching them.

Stitch may well be popping out when you're not there. Give her time, she'll get used to you. I'd get them out for cuddles now. You may find catching them tricky, but they usually settle down happily in laps for cuddles and attention.

You might want to have them on an old towel. They sometimes wee on you especially when young and nervous. As they get older and comfortable sitting with you they do try to tell you they want a wee.
They also poo
With a towel you can wrap them a bit and so you've more control whilst they are wriggly and skittish.
As they gain confidence in sitting with you they will start to chat to you

Haha will remember the towel trick! They aren't really young though, 3 years old so not old but not babies.

Did the Rescue tell you anything about their background? I'm guessing at 3yo they were someones pets, and for whatever reason, were rehomed.

All my piggies except GP3 (he was a 6 week piglet) were adults when we got them.
We say when they come to live with us it's the First Day of Their New Lives.
They get new names.
New house.
New owners.

Some settle in straight away , paws under the table .
Others (like GP5) took longer.

Ours all give a 'sign' when they want to pee. Either stamping their feet, walking backwards or just being agitated. GP8 pokes her bum into the crook of my arm.
We have to read these signs and put them in the carry box or face the consequences

Pigs don't always like laps preferring shoulders where they can chew your earrings, or under your chin or high up your chest.

Shai aka Naughty Girl is 5 years old and very comfortable to the point of being gross. The other day she got very comfy high up my chest, ducked her head down and ate a poo one she really enjoyed chewing then gave me a guinea pig kiss on the lips!

BTW is guinea kiss means they are sniffing your breath to see if you have eaten anything good that they would like. Notice how they steal food out of each others mouths.

Millie the Alpha Pig does not like sitting on humans at all. She thoroughly licked DD2 hands, arms and face passive aggressive grooming, its a dominance thing. Looked longingly at the top of DD's head. Millie wanted to look out at the garden. DD let her sit on top of the sofa with a steading head in case Millie plopped down on the window sill.

They all have characters

Oh yes , the charm that is the Pooh Kiss ( but equally

Made a complete breakthrough with lilo today!! She stood and let me stroke her, although I was distracting her with kale.

Re: backgrounds - they were pets yes, usually story kids got bored, parents didn't really like them anyway and they ended up stuck in a hutch in the garden being ignored. They have been in the rescue for 7 months.

The rescue told me stitch was the more dominant and confident piggie but that lilo was timid and would take some time to come round, it's been the complete opposite though!

Ah, yes, you are doing well with the bribing there
DD was trying to bribe my Himalayan piggie with a spinach leaf today but she was being uncorruptable .

Have you have a look through the food threads? This time of year is good for pigs, lots of fresh food and ear high grass.

My pigs were out in their runs today (we have large hutch+small run and large run+small hidey house) . I put the two sows into the smaller run today because my new piggie GP8 went a bit overboard on grass on her last grazing day .

We buy hay from The Range or Jolleys Petshop. (Huge bags, I keep it in a clean lockable dustbin in the garage) . They're not using deep bedding at the moment so it lasts a bit longer (still changed daily)

Ecobale equine bedding from a saddlery (it's chopped cardboard) on the floor.

Newspaper from wherever I can poach them from.
Cardboard boxes from work as the base layer.

Very sad how many are given up because the "kids lost interest" .
I am unrepentant in telling people in petshops just how much is involved in their care before they buy them.
When I hear a parent say "We;ll get you a guinea-pig" airily to their DC , my hackles rise a tad.
Unless you have one at home aleady, there's no A guinea-pig .
DD has her photos on the iPhone.
I told some parents exactly the low down of the cleaning, the feeding etc. And , Yes, it is the parents' responsibilty, and I was out cleaning the bedding in the pouring rain and feeding at 7am.
Because the children might promise, but they don't do it.

My DD does a lot of the Pig Work, but I own 40% of the Pigs so I might as well clean and feed them all. She makes up breakfasts and helps with the big clean.
And she goes into the run to catch them.