So a while back me and my sisters got guineapigs, Hers is very active runs around and makes lots of noises, my pig however is always sleeping, she doesn’t play at all and she only ever comes out over her hideey for food, keep in mind i have ha her for about a year now, she also has no playmate, Should i be worried?
Is my guinea pig depressed?
- Thread starter penny771
- Start date
why is your piggy not bonded with your sisters piggy? Do you and your sister live in the same house? If you can’t/won’t bond yours and your sisters piggies, could you ensure your piggy and your sisters piggy’s cages are right next to each other so they can interact through the bars
guinea pigs are highly social and should never be kept alone, they are highly social animals and living with another piggy is essential, otherwise yes they can and do get lonely and depressed if they are on their own. She has no reason to come out of her hides for anything other than food if she doesn’t have company.
Please either attempt to bond her with your sisters piggy, following the correct neutral space bonding procedure, or find a suitable character compatible friend for your piggy via dating at a rescue centre.
guinea pigs are highly social and should never be kept alone, they are highly social animals and living with another piggy is essential, otherwise yes they can and do get lonely and depressed if they are on their own. She has no reason to come out of her hides for anything other than food if she doesn’t have company.
Please either attempt to bond her with your sisters piggy, following the correct neutral space bonding procedure, or find a suitable character compatible friend for your piggy via dating at a rescue centre.
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Hi and welcome
Please make sure first and foremost that your piggy is not ill. Are you weighing your guinea pigs once weekly in order to monitor their food intake? About 80% of what a guinea pig needs to eat in a day is unlimited hay - you cannot control this by eye but it makes the equivalent of a human breakfast, lunch and dinner all rolled into one. Veg and fresh herbs (please use fruit only as an occasional treat) make about an afternoon snack and 1 tablespoon of pellets per piggy per day the dessert. The more hay a piggy eats, the healthier and more ling-lived they will generally be.
If your piggy is losing weight, is not eating properly and is apathetic, they need to see a vet as soon as possible. Guinea pigs are prey animals and wired to suppress any early signs of illness to quite a big degree; when they show signs of illness, they are generally already very ill. In this case you need to step in with feeding support asap in order to keep them alive until your piggy can be seen by a vet and any treatment is kicking in. Without a constant supply of food, they will die. In a pinch, mushed up pellets will do. You can find practical tips on how to keep a piggy alive with what you have easily available until you can see a vet in the emergency and bridging care guide.
Vet services count as key services and should keep open as much as possible under lockdown conditions.
Take the time to read these guides here; they will help you work out what is going and whether an urgent trip to the vet is in order.
How Soon Should My Guinea Pig See A Vet? - A Quick Guide
Emergency, Crisis and Bridging Care until a Vet Appointment
Not Eating, Weight Loss And The Importance Of Syringe Feeding Fibre
Accessing veterinary care during coronavirus/Covid-19 lockdown
Is my guinea pig depressed?
Guinea pigs are group animals, they should never live on their own. But you can diagnose depression only after the medical angle as been sorted. You can push the two cages against each other and see whether that brings a change as a stop gap measure. Please note that you should NEVER put guinea pigs of different genders together (impregnation takes only seconds and happens faster than you can intervene) and that they do NOT do playtime. For guinea pigs every meeting is a full-on and then frustratingly aborting bonding session in order to form a working group. What they really need is round the clock company of their own kind - if necessary through the bars - and not little off and on meetings.
A single boar can live next to sows as long as he cannot break through or jump over a grid - especially Midwest grids. You may need to additionally cable-tie any grids and ensure that a determined boar (and they can be astonishingly persistent and athletic) can get at a sow in season. But they can only live together if one party is de-sexed. Guinea pigs are nonstop life-long breeding machines with a high fatality rate for mothers and babies due to their very far developed babies.
But guinea pigs of the same gender can live together if they like each other and want to be together. You only find that out during the complex bonding process on neutral ground to avoid territorial fights when one of the parties is feeling invaded when you stick a piggy simply into another piggy's cage. You ALWAYS need to double check the gender first.
Illustrated Sexing Guide
Companionship
Single Guinea Pigs - Challenges and Responsibilities
Moody guinea pigs: Depression, Bullying, Aggression, Stress, Fear and Antisocial Behaviour
Bonding and Interaction: Illustrated social behaviours and bonding dynamics
A Closer Look At Pairs (Boars - Sows - Mixed)
Please take the time to read the green information links. Without seeing and being able to handle the piggy in question we cannot tell you what is wrong. We can only give you the necessary information to make your own assessment and know what you need to do depending on the outcome.
All the links above are part of our comprehensive practical New Owners information resource which addresses all the areas we get the most questions and cries for help about. It has also information on life-long health monitoring, learning what is normal and what not, when to see a vet and what to do when a piggy is seriously ill - both in seeing a vet and keeping a piggy going at home until treatment can kick in and they are recovering. You can also find information on how you can make friends with your piggy in her own language ('piggy whispering') and understand where your piggy comes from and how guinea pig prey animal instincts work.
Getting Started - New Owners' Most Helpful Guides
I hope that this helps you?
Please make sure first and foremost that your piggy is not ill. Are you weighing your guinea pigs once weekly in order to monitor their food intake? About 80% of what a guinea pig needs to eat in a day is unlimited hay - you cannot control this by eye but it makes the equivalent of a human breakfast, lunch and dinner all rolled into one. Veg and fresh herbs (please use fruit only as an occasional treat) make about an afternoon snack and 1 tablespoon of pellets per piggy per day the dessert. The more hay a piggy eats, the healthier and more ling-lived they will generally be.
If your piggy is losing weight, is not eating properly and is apathetic, they need to see a vet as soon as possible. Guinea pigs are prey animals and wired to suppress any early signs of illness to quite a big degree; when they show signs of illness, they are generally already very ill. In this case you need to step in with feeding support asap in order to keep them alive until your piggy can be seen by a vet and any treatment is kicking in. Without a constant supply of food, they will die. In a pinch, mushed up pellets will do. You can find practical tips on how to keep a piggy alive with what you have easily available until you can see a vet in the emergency and bridging care guide.
Vet services count as key services and should keep open as much as possible under lockdown conditions.
Take the time to read these guides here; they will help you work out what is going and whether an urgent trip to the vet is in order.
How Soon Should My Guinea Pig See A Vet? - A Quick Guide
Emergency, Crisis and Bridging Care until a Vet Appointment
Not Eating, Weight Loss And The Importance Of Syringe Feeding Fibre
Accessing veterinary care during coronavirus/Covid-19 lockdown
Is my guinea pig depressed?
Guinea pigs are group animals, they should never live on their own. But you can diagnose depression only after the medical angle as been sorted. You can push the two cages against each other and see whether that brings a change as a stop gap measure. Please note that you should NEVER put guinea pigs of different genders together (impregnation takes only seconds and happens faster than you can intervene) and that they do NOT do playtime. For guinea pigs every meeting is a full-on and then frustratingly aborting bonding session in order to form a working group. What they really need is round the clock company of their own kind - if necessary through the bars - and not little off and on meetings.
A single boar can live next to sows as long as he cannot break through or jump over a grid - especially Midwest grids. You may need to additionally cable-tie any grids and ensure that a determined boar (and they can be astonishingly persistent and athletic) can get at a sow in season. But they can only live together if one party is de-sexed. Guinea pigs are nonstop life-long breeding machines with a high fatality rate for mothers and babies due to their very far developed babies.
But guinea pigs of the same gender can live together if they like each other and want to be together. You only find that out during the complex bonding process on neutral ground to avoid territorial fights when one of the parties is feeling invaded when you stick a piggy simply into another piggy's cage. You ALWAYS need to double check the gender first.
Illustrated Sexing Guide
Companionship
Single Guinea Pigs - Challenges and Responsibilities
Moody guinea pigs: Depression, Bullying, Aggression, Stress, Fear and Antisocial Behaviour
Bonding and Interaction: Illustrated social behaviours and bonding dynamics
A Closer Look At Pairs (Boars - Sows - Mixed)
Please take the time to read the green information links. Without seeing and being able to handle the piggy in question we cannot tell you what is wrong. We can only give you the necessary information to make your own assessment and know what you need to do depending on the outcome.
All the links above are part of our comprehensive practical New Owners information resource which addresses all the areas we get the most questions and cries for help about. It has also information on life-long health monitoring, learning what is normal and what not, when to see a vet and what to do when a piggy is seriously ill - both in seeing a vet and keeping a piggy going at home until treatment can kick in and they are recovering. You can also find information on how you can make friends with your piggy in her own language ('piggy whispering') and understand where your piggy comes from and how guinea pig prey animal instincts work.
Getting Started - New Owners' Most Helpful Guides
I hope that this helps you?
My sisters piggy is quite mean, we had them in the same cages a week after we got them but my sisters piggy was always being very rude to mine, like she legit bullies my pig, Penny (my piggy) definitely has anxiety, she does not act at all like my sisters pig. Therefore my sisters pig takes mega advantage of that and bullies her all the time. Me and my sister live together with our parents and my dad will not let me get another piggy for company, i keep telling him why they need playmates but he won’t listen, I would settle for playtime with my sisters pig but she is a straight up jerk and a fight almost always breaks out.. it’s not even a fight because my guinea pig always just sits there shrieking and always gets injured, our cages are in separate rooms btw and are pretty big and hard to move
if injuries are occurring, then that is a different matter. But you haven’t described what you mean by bullying - teeth chattering, chasing, mounting are all normal dominance behaviours, not bullying (unless it becomes relentless). Shrieking can simply be submission squealing and again is normal when the submissive piggy is telling the dominant that they accept the others dominance.
Two piggies have to have character compatibility to be able to form a bond and if they don’t have that then they won’t be able to get on.
even if they did get on, you couldn’t let them have play dates anyway - that’s not how piggies function, they must either be permanently bonded and be together all the time or never have physical contact - you can’t put two two piggies who don’t live together, together for playtime’s and then separate them again as to them each meeting is a bonding session which is cut short every single time and that causes stress to guinea pigs.
if you aren’t allowed to get another piggy, then being in side by side cages is the best option for Them. - they need interaction with their own kind To be happy. They may not like each other and be able to live together but they still need company from each other.
as mentioned though, you need to go to a vet and rule out medical issues first though
Two piggies have to have character compatibility to be able to form a bond and if they don’t have that then they won’t be able to get on.
even if they did get on, you couldn’t let them have play dates anyway - that’s not how piggies function, they must either be permanently bonded and be together all the time or never have physical contact - you can’t put two two piggies who don’t live together, together for playtime’s and then separate them again as to them each meeting is a bonding session which is cut short every single time and that causes stress to guinea pigs.
if you aren’t allowed to get another piggy, then being in side by side cages is the best option for Them. - they need interaction with their own kind To be happy. They may not like each other and be able to live together but they still need company from each other.
as mentioned though, you need to go to a vet and rule out medical issues first though
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yeah that makes sense, by bullying i mean my pig will be doing absolutely nothing and my sisters piggy will like full on attack, i have to separate them with a towel lol
Siikibam
Forum Donator 2022/23
What exactly does she do when she ‘attacks’? Does she bite, pull hair, chase, hump or what?
Bullying is not letting the other piggy eat or drink or move - which would result in weight loss.
Bullying is not letting the other piggy eat or drink or move - which would result in weight loss.
Well my sisters piggy does a lot of biting and hair pulling but she doesn’t do that other stuff
Basti & Dulce
New Born Pup
I was about to make a post asking about my two piggies that live together (same cage, but separated by a fence - because they used to live together, but fights occurred and the bond was broken). I didn't know about this information, Piggies&buns, the one about playtimes being stressful to them.
The whole thing is: they now live side by side, only separated by a fence with very large holes (the fence is made with the cubes we use to build the cage), but we've noticed that they're more quiet (too quiet, actually) lately. I don't know if it's because it's getting warmer in here, but I feel like they're not that active anymore. They're both 2 years old and I'm kinda worried about all this laziness.
Reading about temperature, I really don't think they're uncomfortable anymore (that's what I was thinking before), for it's always around 26-30°C here, which lots of posts say that is an awesome temperature for them (30 being the hotter it gets, but not frequent). The cage is indoors, no direct sunlight ever and in a cool room.
Their health is also perfectly fine, they're eating (veggies, hay and pellets), drinking fresh water, behaving normally (squeeking for food, etc.) BUT very quiet.
So...is it age? Is it the temperature (weather)?
I was thinking of putting them together every now and then to see if this would cheer them up, but then I read your comment and...well, now I'm glad I didn't do it.
So what could we make to have them more active, happier, etc? Am I worrying too much?
Thanks!
Humidity also plays a part in how comfortable they feel, as well as temperature, I don’t know what location you are in, but if you are keeping their cage as cool as possible and it’s normal for them, you’re comfortable etc, then it may not be an issue - I cannot comment though as I don’t know your location.
(I can say that here in my area, humidity and temperatures of 26-30 would be far too much for them and at those temperatures I am taking considerable action to cool them down. Mine are most active and most comfortable at around 18-20 degrees.
My boys are almost three years old and while they aren’t zooming constantly anymore, they are active.)
Having a look at your set up and working out whether it is enriching enough would be a good idea
Does each piggy have enough space? That is a minimum of 120cm x 60cm but if they’ve got more than that then that is much better
Do they get time out of their cage (individually)?
I use hay as bedding everywhere in their hutch (now my two do live in my shed so they also need it for warmth), but they spend a lot of time foraging through the hay and wandering around. I also scatter feed veg and pellets (i don’t use food bowls) so this keeps them occupied looking for other food items amongst the hay. It also means they eat a lotnof hay.
They also have lots of hideys, tunnels, boxes, which they spend a lot of time running through and playing in. I remove any hideys which are too cosy during the day so to stop them from just sitting around in them!
the guides below may help you
Enrichment Ideas for Guinea Pigs
Hot Weather Management, Heat Strokes and Fly Strike
Basti & Dulce
New Born Pup
As usual, lots of good advices in your postings. I live in a city called João Pessoa, in Brazil.
This is what it's looking lately around here. Humidity is high, most of the year, it's a coastal city, we're somewhat 200m from the ocean (2 blocks away from the beach). 18-20 degrees could only be achievable using an air-conditioner of some sort. We don't have the four seasons pretty defined here, it's mostly summer 80% of the year and "winter" during 3 or 4 months at most. And by "winter" I mean a little more rain and maybe 3-4 degrees lower from the temperatures you see above. Weather here is absurdly stable, let's put it like this.
Their C&C cage is made of 5x4 blocks with an upper level of 1x4 blocks. Each block being 30cm, 1.5m x 1.2m, the upper level 1.2m x 30cm. But since they fought and are separated, imagine this whole thing cut in the middle and each of them having access to a half of it all. Is it enough?
We have not that great access to products here and I'm not really sure what I could put inside the cage to keep them entertained. They've got some hideys, but we've never get any success with toys (I'm always trying some here and there), they just don't give any attention.
About the time out of their cage, it's kinda rare. Should we do it more often? Each one, individually, let them just wander around the house?
I'm gonna check the links you sent, thank you once again!
Siikibam
Forum Donator 2022/23
The space they have isn’t enough if you’ve split a 1.5x1.2 in half. They need 0.6m x 1.2m each.
With regards to toys, have a look at the link below. A paper bag (handles removed) stuffed with hay and some veg or a paper tube stuffed with hay is fun for them.
Enrichment Ideas for Guinea Pigs
With regards to toys, have a look at the link below. A paper bag (handles removed) stuffed with hay and some veg or a paper tube stuffed with hay is fun for them.
Enrichment Ideas for Guinea Pigs
Basti & Dulce
New Born Pup
Well, they now have 1.5m x 0.6m each, actually. Because 1.2m is the front side of the cage and it was split alongside the 1.5m length. Apart from that (which is the inferior level), they also get the 30cmx60cm little space up there, where is water and food located. We did this so they are always "burning some calories" going up and down the ramp, for they were getting a little bit fat. Now their hay intake, pellets and water is pretty taken care of, apart from the fresh food everyday (carrots, lettuce, tomatoes, peppers, fresh grass, cucumber and so on...)
And, yes, of course I'd love to give them more space, but the house won't allow it so easily. We're planning on moving in a few weeks or months, so we're looking for a place with plenty of room for them. When we moved to this apartment, they weren't a part of our lives, but now that they're family, we can plan ahead and prioritize them. Hope it all goes well and we find this better place.
Thanks for the toy suggestion, we're definitely doing something like this. I've read both threads (the Hot Weather Management I had read prior to posting) and maybe heat isn't really the bigger problem, but the lack of a bigger space, toys to entertain and more free roaming time. We're gonna fix this!
Thank you all!
Siikibam
Forum Donator 2022/23
If they’re a bit on the big side then you have to look at what you’re feeding them. Carrots and tomatoes shouldn’t be fed daily. Carrots are high in sugar and tomatoes are acidic. Veg should be a cup or 50g a day. Pellets should be a tablespoon a day for each piggy. Hay and more hay should make up the biggest part of their diet. It’s great that they get fresh grass though!
How much do they weigh?
Weight - Monitoring and Management
Long Term Balanced General And Special Needs Guinea Pig Diets
How much do they weigh?
Weight - Monitoring and Management
Long Term Balanced General And Special Needs Guinea Pig Diets