cannibalistic behaviour?

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Spishkey

Spishkey

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I'm getting rather concerned over a certain piggy of ours.
a few weeks back i posted about a sow who aborted three babies (didnt even realise she was pregnant) and on route to the vets she ate nearly a whole baby (vet said it was to 'save' the baby from preditors, although baby was already dead)
well shes done it again, shes ate another piggy. this time it was a 4 week old that was sharing the run with her, mum1 and one of her 6 week old babys.

little bubs was the survivor of 3, there mother had died from a respitory infection, that also killed the other two siblings. Little bubs had been getting on really well (i originally thought she was a he, but i was wrong, so she got to stay with aunty piggy :))
i did my rounds yesterday, cleaning, feeding, watering, grooming, all was well.
at veggy time in the afternoon there wasnt much left of little bubs and the mother who aborted her babies was happily chewing on the remains.

not only do i feel queasy still over it, I'm worried about how little bubs died, when just 3 hours before she was fit as a fiddle? did the older piggy kill her? i didnt think piggys ate meat, let alone each other? I'm guessing its far from normal before and should i be thinking of splitting this piggy away from the smaller ones?
 
If it is 100% her I would have her split now! I've never ever read or heard anything like it!

I googled it and this is what I found!

Guinea pigs might eat them, if the babies are unhealthy.

Male Guinea Pigs Will Eat Them So never ever Put The Boars And Babies Together
 
neither have i hence why I'm so worried, I'm hoping one of the more experienced members could shed some ight on the behaviour, or is this piggy just an odd one out?
 
JoanneG111 said:
If it is 100% her I would have her split now! I've never ever read or heard anything like it!

I googled it and this is what I found!

Guinea pigs might eat them, if the babies are unhealthy.

Male Guinea Pigs Will Eat Them So never ever Put The Boars And Babies Together
Click to expand...

but isnt that referring to a mother whos just given birth, they can 'tell' if the baby is healthy or not? i can understand her eating the babies she'd aborted, but a healthy 4 week old non related female? my mind is boggling
 
I have heard of another case in my time on here; from a sow that was living in very bad surroundings (and in fact dying soon after herself).

As you say, it seems to be a protective instinct; guinea pig moms as a matter of fact eat the afterbirth. If they are in a situation where they can't move away from a dead baby, they might do the same in order to protect any other pups and themselves.
 
Ooohhh god,,,well look at it this way they are rodents after all and rats and mice also rodents eat there own so I'm guessing it is poss i once had a dog who killed her 5day old pup i was so so upset has she had a c-section (was a rescue) we were worried about her bonding to it she only had one baby i needed to bottle feed it for 5 days and in between she started to except the baby and i was able to go out 1hour a day and leave mum and baby together this day day 5 i was half an hour late and came back and she had killed her baby by mauling it 8...
 
clairelove said:
Ooohhh god,,,well look at it this way they are rodents after all and rats and mice also rodents eat there own so I'm guessing it is poss i once had a dog who killed her 5day old pup i was so so upset has she had a c-section (was a rescue) we were worried about her bonding to it she only had one baby i needed to bottle feed it for 5 days and in between she started to except the baby and i was able to go out 1hour a day and leave mum and baby together this day day 5 i was half an hour late and came back and she had killed her baby by mauling it 8...
Click to expand...

I am not sure whether she'd killed it - but I am sure that that baby would not have thrived in any way; you seem to have a girl with very strong atavistic instincts.
 
the only thing i could find on google is gp-s only eat each other when highly stressed or there are too many in one cage. surely my runs are big enough? (2metres by 1m20 for 4 piggys?)
 
my god just found another page on google were it says a couple was charged with cruetly after letting a gp get so hungry it ate its cage mate :( disgusting

(which is not the case here as they are very well fed piggys might i add!)


and thats all i can find on google :(
 
i dont know what to do, should i seperate her? try and find a sow bigger than herself and pair them up?
 
Ive come across this a couple of times and I'm going to try and put it across in a way I hope doesnt sound too horrible etc

First thing if it were me i'd stop googling, the internet can be a wundering full place but it can also be very conflicting and worring.

When a sow gives birth to get the baby going she will lick it, if the baby doesnt move when the mum has been licking/cleaning it for a while she can and they do get carriered away and will over groom, which with full term babies normally means ears usaully get bitten, but I have had back legs chewed etc, it is by the mum over grooming as she wants to get her baby going.

From reading various articles in magazines and through my own experiances with this my thory is; when a mum has finished giving bith she normally eats the afterbirth and in some cases, sadly like yours she can eat the babies, especailly if they are prem or dead, this is to "get rid" of any tracr or smell of the birth, thus protecting mum and any live babies from preditors untill they move, this is mother nature and sadly it can be really distressing.

In the case of the older baby I'm wundering if the baby has died and the sow has just been trying to get it going again and has just gone too far, its hard to tell.

Again if it were me I would be tempted to leave them together unless I see her been agresive towards the other mum and babies, the 4 week old baby couls have just died as happens sometimes.

You say you have 4 pigs is that inclueding the remaining babies?

If you have 4 adult females together I was going to say that if you really dont know what to do to calm your mind I would suggest spliting your females into 2 pairs, like I say I hope this hasnt come out sounding to horrible and hope it makes some sort of sense.
Ive been there finding dead babies half eaten and know what your going through, big hugs.
 
Surely the most likely reason is that the baby died suddenly, and the sow was behaving as CavyWonders describes. The stuff on the internet about stress, overcrowding and starvation just don't seem to quite fit with your set-up.
 
To be honest I never look up things on the internet, its just to conflicting and can get you paniking, I have 2 books I swear by, written by vets who have studied guinea pigs especailly and they are great, and just genral observing over the last 7-8 years.

Sometimes I find a dead guinea, but I dont worry why it has died etc as like I say its mother nature and when its their time its their time whatever age they are, they can be fit and well one day then dead the next when you go and say good morning
 
CavyWonders said:
To be honest I never look up things on the internet, its just to conflicting and can get you paniking, I have 2 books I swear by, written by vets who have studied guinea pigs especailly and they are great, and just genral observing over the last 7-8 years.

Sometimes I find a dead guinea, but I dont worry why it has died etc as like I say its mother nature and when its their time its their time whatever age they are, they can be fit and well one day then dead the next when you go and say good morning
Click to expand...

Why would you not worry if a piggy died? I do understand what you are saying sometimes it is just there time, but that isn't always the case they could have caught something that could be passed to your remaining herd, which you could save!
 
I mean in a short time not case, then I would consider quarentining any pigs that may have been living with the ones that had died aswell as the ones next to and above, anyways this is a little off topic and I hope Spishkey is able to read the replies and maybe feel a little easier.
 
thank you all for the advice, in this run it is two adult females, the young baby that died/got killed, and another young sow of around 6 weeks old. so now theres the two adult sows and one baby left in there. i could pull the young sow out and try pairing her with another sow, but it feels wrong taking her from her mother but may be a safer option? the adult sow in question, ive never ever seen her be aggressive to another pig, but she is what id call 'alpha' piggy of that particular group and the rest follow her lead.
 
if it were me I would leave them as they are, that area if fine for 3 pigs and at 6 weeks she should be a good size, maybe just add some smaller extra hidy houses big enough for the 6 week old so if she does fell threatened at any time she can go into the smaller hide.

The best thing you can do is just observe them from a didstance a bit more than what you would normally do, so you can see them but your not close enough to be "sensed" and then you can just see their behaviour but if you havent seen any nastyness then I'd still think the baby "just" died and the other sow was tryng to protect the remaining 2 by clearing the evidence to protect from preditors, even through there are non really in a home enviroment guineas still do certain acts that their wild ansestors do.
 
One of the rescues over here have a sow that gave birth a while ago and she ate half her stillborn baby:)>>>
Its not common but does happen,i use to know someone who was a rat breedergrrrr
She had one rat that no matter how many times she had babies she would eat all of them,sometimes some of them just arent fit to be mothers similar to a small population of the human race i guess;)
 
Guinea pigs eat the placenta after giving birth, to prevent the scent attracting predators. They will attempt to eat stillborn babies for the same reason. If the babies were alive last time you saw them, then it may look like they were killed, but this is most unlikely to be the case.
 
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