8 Week Old Sows - Is The Behaviour Ok?

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Spally67

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Hi all

We have just bought two sows, they are not sisters but have been together since birth. Obviously they are still very young but I just wanted to check that this behaviour is normal.

When we hold them they squeak. Not a high pitched squeal, but they do squeak throughout. Is this ok?

Also, we have been giving them some floor time on a blanket and then run around like mad, and one of them seems the nip at the other one. No blood, but it has happened a couple of times. I have read that they are just trying to show their dominance.

Thanks in advance for your advice.

x
 
Hi Spally welcome to the forum. The chatting you are hearing on the lap is nervousness, they will get used to laptimes slowy, they are also very young and yound piggies are skittish and nervous.

Start lap time for a short amount of time at first and build up. We started off we laptimes for 1 minute with new piggies then pop them back, slowly increasing the time. Give them a veggie treat while on your lap - They will soon associate you with food and good things but at first it takes a while to gain their trust.

Have a read of this thread here How Do I Settle Shy New Guinea Pigs?
How To Pick Up And Weigh Your Guinea Pig

The behaviour there is just them sorting out the hierarchy, make sure run times they have hideys in there to go into also, piggies are prey animals so having places to go and sit helps them feel more secure.

Welcome to the forum again
Lee
 
Welcome to the forum. My younger boys all still do that squeaky chatting when I pick them up...they'd rather be running around. Grouchy also pulls at my clothes the second I lift him, and if I'm wearing a v-neck, he just pulls my skin instead - ooowww! You'll love getting to know their wee personalities. Xx
 
Welcome! I have a thread very similar on this, extremely similar, about my two 5 week old sows called 'Should My Sows Have Already Established Dominance' where I mentioned they chase each other and squeak like crazy. This means something like 'don't worry about me, i'm not threatening you' or along the lines of that. It's to do with dominance! Guinea pigs tend to wheek-wheek when they are happy and make a sort of bubbly squeak which means 'get away from me'.
 
Thank you for the replies. Sounds like all quite normal then. I just want them to be content. They are getting more familiar with us all the time. Will have a look at he suggested links. Thanks again x
 
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