Chokito
New Born Pup
Greetings all from Australia - thanks for this incredibly informative and well supported forum.
We have several guinea pigs in our care, as follows:
2 x American guinea pig boars approx 5 years old (housed separately, had to be separated due fighting a couple of years ago) - one is desexed, one is not
1 x Abyssinian guinea pig boar approx 3 years old (recently bereaved, had been housed with his brother until ) - not desexed
2 x new guinea pig boars approx 8 weeks old (brothers, housed together) - not desexed
I have a bit of a challenge with a recently bereaved Abyssinian guinea pig boar, is a very dominant character who about a month ago lost his much smaller, submissive brother to illness. Vet has checked him out and considers him to be very healthy, although he does drink an unusually large amount of water. He is almost 3 years old.
I'm not sure of the best approach to give him companionship and restore his quality of life going forward.
He shows a lot of interest in bonding with a pair of 8 week old brother boars which we have caged adjacent to him, but when introducing them he relentlessly humps them, which I understand is normal dominance behaviour - one of the boars (the larger of the little brothers) seems to react unfavourably to the humping, and is showing signs that he'll challenge the big Abyssinian as he gets older.
We have tried a couple of long bonding sessions with these guys on neutral territory and have found that the young boars play well with the older American guinea pig boars, who have mellowed to the point where they are look like very good potential 'uncles' for the young guys. It looks like we could create some workable bonding pairs with these.
However, I'm worried about the Abyssinian - he doesn't get on well with either of the American guinea pig boars, but popcorns and gets excited around the little guys. But as they are housed together, creating a trio with these three seems risky.
I feel bad for the Abyssinian & don't want him to be lonely - he looks out of his cage very longingly at the new little guys, seems sad and lonely at times. Not really sure what to do.
We have several guinea pigs in our care, as follows:
2 x American guinea pig boars approx 5 years old (housed separately, had to be separated due fighting a couple of years ago) - one is desexed, one is not
1 x Abyssinian guinea pig boar approx 3 years old (recently bereaved, had been housed with his brother until ) - not desexed
2 x new guinea pig boars approx 8 weeks old (brothers, housed together) - not desexed
I have a bit of a challenge with a recently bereaved Abyssinian guinea pig boar, is a very dominant character who about a month ago lost his much smaller, submissive brother to illness. Vet has checked him out and considers him to be very healthy, although he does drink an unusually large amount of water. He is almost 3 years old.
I'm not sure of the best approach to give him companionship and restore his quality of life going forward.
He shows a lot of interest in bonding with a pair of 8 week old brother boars which we have caged adjacent to him, but when introducing them he relentlessly humps them, which I understand is normal dominance behaviour - one of the boars (the larger of the little brothers) seems to react unfavourably to the humping, and is showing signs that he'll challenge the big Abyssinian as he gets older.
We have tried a couple of long bonding sessions with these guys on neutral territory and have found that the young boars play well with the older American guinea pig boars, who have mellowed to the point where they are look like very good potential 'uncles' for the young guys. It looks like we could create some workable bonding pairs with these.
However, I'm worried about the Abyssinian - he doesn't get on well with either of the American guinea pig boars, but popcorns and gets excited around the little guys. But as they are housed together, creating a trio with these three seems risky.
I feel bad for the Abyssinian & don't want him to be lonely - he looks out of his cage very longingly at the new little guys, seems sad and lonely at times. Not really sure what to do.