Confidence

[SallyM79]

Has anyone else found their children are more nervous than their piggies? My daughter has wanted guinea pigs for more than 2 years after visiting a farm and getting to hold and feed them. We have been to pet shops to see them many times since and back to the farm last summer and her requests for one have persisted. She is now 9 and we felt she is ready for them but now she is too scared to pick them up. The ones she held before were adult and used to being handled. Ours are babies and still skittish and shy so difficult to pick up but she panics. How do I get her more confident? I keep telling her she needs to spend time with them so they get used to her but not sure what else to do.

 

[Merab]

I don’t have children so have no experience of bringing them up, but my suggestion would be that your daughter is encouraged to sit with piggies.
She doesn’t need to hold them or handle them but simply watch them and talk to them so they get to know each other.
Perhaps she do an observation project - which piggy likes what food best?
Who is the braves? Who is first to the food bowl, that kind of thing.

Piggies who get handled in pet shops and farms tend to be scared rather than tame so encourage your daughter to see that lively piggies are happier.

Let us know how you all get on

 

[Swissgreys]

My daughter was exactly the same when we first got our piggies (she was also 9).
She was so excited, and then simply devastated that she was actually too scared to catch and hold them!

It really just takes time.
It also helps if you train your piggies to go into something when you catch them, as this is much less stressful for both the piggies and the child (and the Mummy!).

What worked for us was me catching them to begin with, and placing one on my daughters lap.
I made sure she was sitting down and had a large towel on her lap, and also sat next to her to make sure no one got dropped.
I also put a small piece of fleece on her lap for the piggy to burrow under, and this helped the piggy settle and increased my daughters confidence.

Another thing that helped was setting up a large floor time pen for the piggies and my daughter sitting in it too and offering various tasty treats to the pigs. It didn't take long until they were happily taking food from her hands.
Stick with it, but within a few months my daughter was very confident and to this day is still the chief piggy wrangler in our home.

Shortly after arrival:


A couple of months later:

 

[Wiebke]

Has anyone else found their children are more nervous than their piggies? My daughter has wanted guinea pigs for more than 2 years after visiting a farm and getting to hold and feed them. We have been to pet shops to see them many times since and back to the farm last summer and her requests for one have persisted. She is now 9 and we felt she is ready for them but now she is too scared to pick them up. The ones she held before were adult and used to being handled. Ours are babies and still skittish and shy so difficult to pick up but she panics. How do I get her more confident? I keep telling her she needs to spend time with them so they get used to her but not sure what else to do.

Hi and welcome!

Have you already got guinea pigs? If not, would you consider adopting an adult bonded pair that is used to handling and a home environment from a good standard rescue with mandatory quarantine/vet care, careful personality matching (the key to any successful piggy bond) and proper pregnancy watch/sexing/timely separating genders?

Guinea pigs are prey animals that live in groups. They should never be kept on their own. They are also not born as animated cuddly toys; it is the end and not the beginning of a process. While baby piggies are very cute, they are cute babies only for a few weeks, rambunctious hormonal teenagers for nearly a year and adults for 4-6 years of an average 5-7 year life span.
There are many advantages when starting out with older piggies who know who they are and who know a good home when they see one - they are a lot more relaxed and will teach your daughter to become more confident with handling pets rather than a wiggly youngster or a bitey teenager who is pushing dominance with a human that is not asserting their authority.
A good rescue can choose the perfect pair for your daughter as they know their piggies' personalities. It doesn't matter whether that is boars or sows or a mixed gender pair with one party de-sexed, as adult boars gradually mellow once past their teenage hormones and often become more cuddly as they age.

You may find these guides here helpful; they are part of our Wannabe Owners guide collection:
Boars, sows or mixed pairs; babies or adults?
Children And Guinea Pigs - A Guide For Parents (also deals with your concerns)
Companionship
Understanding Prey Animal Instincts, Guinea Pig Whispering And Cuddling Tips

Are Guinea Pigs For Me? - A Guide (Wannabe Owners Collection)
Also includes links to recommended good standard rescues whose practices and good care we can vouch for for several countries; any others you are on your own as anybody can call themselves a rescue or a breeder without any licensing or welfare controls in place in any English speaking countries - and the results can be accordingly. The same goes for any free-ads piggies, euthanising shelters without medical care and quarantine or pet shop adoptees without the same.

There is more practical information, including a whole chapter with tips on how to settle and interact with piggies (including safe picking up, lap time and piggy whispering) in our New Owners guide collection: Getting Started - New Owners' Most Helpful Guides

 

[SallyM79]

My daughter was exactly the same when we first got our piggies (she was also 9).
She was so excited, and then simply devastated that she was actually too scared to catch and hold them!

It really just takes time.
It also helps if you train your piggies to go into something when you catch them, as this is much less stressful for both the piggies and the child (and the Mummy!).

What worked for us was me catching them to begin with, and placing one on my daughters lap.
I made sure she was sitting down and had a large towel on her lap, and also sat next to her to make sure no one got dropped.
I also put a small piece of fleece on her lap for the piggy to burrow under, and this helped the piggy settle and increased my daughters confidence.

Another thing that helped was setting up a large floor time pen for the piggies and my daughter sitting in it too and offering various tasty treats to the pigs. It didn't take long until they were happily taking food from her hands.
Stick with it, but within a few months my daughter was very confident and to this day is still the chief piggy wrangler in our home.

Shortly after arrival:
View attachment 104197

A couple of months later:
View attachment 104198

Oh wow! That is reassuring. We have set up a pen in the living room today and she has been sitting in there with them. Sandy will let us stroke her nose and eventually let my daughter stroke her body too. Hopefully she will get to the same place as your daughter. I guess the piggies need to settle in a little more too to make it easier for her to pick them up.

 

[Tigermoth]

You’ve worked out our trick yourself! We had the same issue (and turned out I was a bit nervous of them too, which totally surprised me!) so we sat on the floor in a pen so if they ran away they wouldn’t get hurt (we lost one down the back of the sofa first lap time...) and got our confidence that way.

 

[Bill & Ted]

My grandchildren have been brought up with piggies, it just takes time and patience on both sides. Always play at ground level until your daughter is confident handling them and she can trust them not to jump. tubes and cardboard boxes are good for carrying them in too and from the cage x

 

[Sparklepetal]

Our guinea pigs nominally belong to the children (I'm really chief piggie slave though!). 7 year old son is very wary of them and will only stroke when someone else is holding, which is fine and I won't push him before he's ready. Ten year old daughter, whose birthday was the excuse to get piggies, is determined to be very involved with them but started out very nervous. She has found that wearing her big winter ski-type gloves has been really helpful for handling. She is worried about their scrabbly little claws scratching her and about nibbles from little teeth - the gloves solve both these problems. Another thing that has helped build her confidence and helped the piggies get to know her in return is her sitting in their C&C run when they have run time. They will now run over and climb onto her lap which she is thrilled with! I think the all-day availability during the school holidays sped things up, but she is just determined to spend as long as possible with them every day and is seeing the rewards. I hope you find some helpful ideas from everyone.

 

[PigglePuggle]

We had a similar thing when my junior piggy whispering apprentice aged 7 first met the piggies. He'd cuddled very tame adults before and was besotted with the idea of guinea pigs but he was really freaked out by 2 skittish youngsters! Sitting and watching them, holding out pieces of coriander for them, and explaining what their behaviours mean, helped a lot. Also sitting next to an adult holding them while he fed them veg and stroked them helped. And having them on a fleecy cuddle couch at laptime with an adult sitting nearby in case they make a sudden move. 8 months later he's really a professional piggy whisperer now, and the piggies are older and more settled too. He totally knows when a piggy is comfortable or not and knows its cool to say that a particular piggy doesnt want to be held today and say we put them back in the cage and suggest which other piggy is a bit more laid back and might be up for a cuddle. I think its all about kids getting to know the piggy personalities involved, although my junior piggy whisperer's favorite is Mad Piggle- she usually despises all hoomans and other piggies but she's a big soppy fluff ball for him!