Complete Care Preparation: Trying To Put Product To Good Use

ripcoconuttheguineapig

ripcoconuttheguineapig

New Born Pup
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I am somewhat new to guinea pigs, as in for a week in 2021 I had coconut in a starter kit due to the sad mistake of completely trusting a pet store, [ WHICH IN NO CIRCUMSTANCE SHOULD BE DONE KNOWINGLY OF OTHER SOLUTIONS] who ended up getting ringworm.

After having a hamster and giving it the proper care for its whole life, I have decided to restart on guinea pigs. Over time, I have racked up the best things to start proper care officially that I could (Because my female Syrian chewed my money faster than her own chew toys) , and all I currently need which i have space for is a lofted 10x3 wire cube and coroplast cage, which i need around 78 panels for.

If anybody has said amount, or any really of a somewhat preferably white color, please create a message for me or respond to the thread, and thank you.

Also, I posted this on the Newbie forum because I am new, and I wanted to spread this message and consequence story of pet stores and research as good as I possibly can, because people in my own area despite efforts to get them to, choose not to trust me.
 
Hiya- welcome to the forum, and I'm so glad you're researching everything properly. (I'm really into the proper hamster care world too :) )
Just to clarify, are you asking for recommendations of where to buy a 10 by 3 C and C cage?
 
ripcoconuttheguineapig said:
I am somewhat new to guinea pigs, as in for a week in 2021 I had coconut in a starter kit due to the sad mistake of completely trusting a pet store, [ WHICH IN NO CIRCUMSTANCE SHOULD BE DONE KNOWINGLY OF OTHER SOLUTIONS] who ended up getting ringworm.

After having a hamster and giving it the proper care for its whole life, I have decided to restart on guinea pigs. Over time, I have racked up the best things to start proper care officially that I could (Because my female Syrian chewed my money faster than her own chew toys) , and all I currently need which i have space for is a lofted 10x3 wire cube and coroplast cage, which i need around 78 panels for.

If anybody has said amount, or any really of a somewhat preferably white color, please create a message for me or respond to the thread, and thank you.

Also, I posted this on the Newbie forum because I am new, and I wanted to spread this message and consequence story of pet stores and research as good as I possibly can, because people in my own area despite efforts to get them to, choose not to trust me.
Click to expand...

Hi and welcome

We have got a special information collection for New Owners, which you may find very helpful; it is there to help you getting off the blocks correctly but also addresses many of unexpected practical issues and experiences that new owners come up against.
Over 15 years of experience with literally tens of thousands of questions (if not well over hundred thousand) and up to half a century of personal ownership knowledge have gone into our various guides. They are as practical and precise as we can make them, and the guides format allows us to update and add to occasionally.
Here is the link, which you may want to bookmark, browse, read and re-read at need as you go along. You will pick up different things at different levels of experience: Getting Started - Essential Information for New Owners


As to our ringworm guide, you may find that very helpful. Most vets and owners (and certainly pet shops or too many for sale breeders) are not aware just how crucial comprehensive hygiene is to prevent a return. Invisibly tiny ringworm spores can live to over 2 years to cause trouble again. It is highly likely that the infection happened at the store since it takes about 10-14 days between infection and actual outbreak. Sadly, far too many pet shop staff has no real knowledge or interest what they are selling; the laudable exceptions are to be teasured.
Ringworm: Hygiene, Care And Pictures


For that many grids, you can either look on Amazon or Ebay or contact a cage supplier for an estimate; or look on your local free-ads for second-hand grids if you live in an urban area. At that size, you do not need any lofts; guinea pigs are ground roamers and not climbers.
You will have to find a different solution for the underlay as I know from my own 9x6 grids floor layout. I use easy to clean and disinfect vinyl. If you want to use coroplast, you will need to cut any sheets to size with a stanley knife and use duct tape to then put them together. That area is too large for any standard sheets.

You will also have to consider the bedding for such a large area - if you use fleece, then you cannot overfill the machine or it will come out stinking and you also will have to consider the absorbent underlay. I use cotton towels but that means yet another load or two - you cannot wash them together with fleecy bed cover blankets or nobbly bath mats. Cotton towels are however still a lot cheaper than using puppy pads.

I would recommend a consider a slightly smaller 3x4 or 3x6 cage, which is still ample for tw guinea pigs.
 
It’s great you want to give your future pigs loads of space. If however you are trying to do it on a budget, a slightly smaller cage without a loft and just a pair of pigs would probably be a better way to go (especially at first). The cage can always be extended if required but slightly smaller may be more manageable, especially when just starting out.
 
thank you, i already had something in mind, i was just brainstorming ideas from popular cages i have seen online. i plan to actually do this way in the future from now, i am just educating myself. also if any mods are seeing this, change my location to US or something, i took it a bit literally...
 
I think it is great that you want to give your future piggies that much space! I started with a 3x3 c&c cage, which is generally considered enough space for two piggies, but quickly found I did not feel comfortable keeping them in that space. Three cage upgrades and a herd expansion later I am now happy with keeping 4 piggies in an equivalent of a little over a 4x7 c&c. Things I would have done differently looking back:
  • I would have started with the cage size I have now, both for the happiness of my guinea pigs and for cost effectiveness. I now have parts of the previous cages that I no longer use, fleeces that don’t fit properly, etc…
  • I started with a raised c&c using grids. However, it is quite hard reaching into such a cage as I was afraid of leaning on it too much and it then collapsing. I now use some melamine boards with short table legs as a base and then a c&c on top. It is sturdy enough to hold my weight so I can simply step into the cage for cleaning or picking up my piggies (or to simply sit and interact with them!) This is not difficult at all: the hardware store can cut the boards to the right size, and then you only have to drill holes and attach the table legs.
A coroplast base for a cage this large can be build out of different sheets or several pre-scored bases duct-taped together.

Regarding using fleece in such a large cage: it is a lot of washing, but I use multiple smaller liners in my cage that I rotate from areas that they mostly just pass through (and therefore don’t get dirty) to the most heavily used areas (hay area, their favourite hiding spots). That way I only do 3 piggy washes per week with 4 pigs in a large cage.
 
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