Okay so we initially started out with 2 piggies that we bought from Petsmart. One of them was wonderful (corny) and the other one (Digby) Just started attacking him and they were not happy. We ended up having to return digby
so we waited a few months and we've just gotten a new baby! He is 2 months old! Its been about a week and they're in separate cages. I brought Corny up to the babies cage and they immediately started wheeking and Corny paced around his cage over and over and over. We put them back in separate rooms and they were wheeking back and forth between the rooms! Is this a good sign? After our first experience I'm just a little nervous! Any advice would be lovely!
Hi and welcome!
I wish you the best of luck that your two boys will be character compatible. Please be aware that dominance behaviour is part and parcel of guinea pig life, and that you are going to see a LOT of it especially during bonding. You also have to be aware that all boars go through a hormonal teenage phase between 4-14 months before they reach a more settled adulthood. At least, with a slight difference in ages, your boys will at least not always hit the spikes quite at the same time. Ultimately, all depends on whether the boys will still mesh in their adult boar identities; a lot depends on how dominant your youngster turns out to be.
Firstly, you have to weigh up whether you want to conduct a full quarantine now that you have let the two boys meet already and they are desperate to get together, or whether you'd rather risk having to treat both if there is a health problem.
Importance Of Quarantine
Before bonding, let the boys get to know each other through the bars for a night or so. Then conduct the bonding on grounds that is neither boar's territory and doesn't smell of either. As one of them is a baby, make sure that he has got a tunnel or a hidey (a cardboard box with two small exits on opposite sides that you fill with some soft hay) so the little one has got an escape in case the humping is getting too lively.
Please read our guides carefully before you start. Be aware that you cannot separate once you have initiated the bonding process. 5 minute meetings don't constitute bonding nor are they anything else but utterly frustrating for the piggies. You have to give your boys time to work through the bonding ritual in their own way and only interfere if there is a fight with bloody bites or if the humping is so incessant that the pursued guinea pig cannot eat or sleep in peace. You have to accept all mild to medium dominance behaviours. Unlike you, guinea pigs instinctively understand what is going on and can deal with it.
Introducing And Re-introducing Guinea Pigs
Dominance Behaviours In Guinea Pigs
Illustrated Bonding Behaviours And Dynamics
Make sure that your boys have plenty of space in their cage, so they can get away from each other at need. many fights happen because that is not the case. Also make sure that each has his own hidey, food bowl and water bottle, well out of reach of the other one.
Boars: A guide to successful companionship.
If there are problems along the way, especially when your boys hit the teenage hormones, you can find tips about what you can do before and after a fall-out in this thread here.
Please be aware that by handing back a boy to the pet shop, you condemn to a single at the best and to euthanasia at the worst, as a aggressive piggies or "biters" will not sell. It is not the little boy's fault that he is not character matched anf being failed by humans.
Boars: Bullying, Fighting, Fall-outs And What Next?
