My new outdoor guinea pig home!

Piggylove82

Piggylove82

Adult Guinea Pig
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Well, I finally finished painting and weatherproofing my new outdoor guinea pig hutch that I got from Ryedale Pet Homes! It is painted inside and out, and now has rubber waterproof feet and removable acrylic windows to let the light in and keep the weather out! It's a 6ft double storey with a removable ramp which has side rails and a bannister to help prevent any slips and falls from my precious pigs. Pictures below...
 
Thats amazing- really lovely. I like how the entire thing is accessible unlike hutches I have had in the past which look good but you need to be a contortionist to clean out.
 
Darcey15 said:
Thats amazing- really lovely. I like how the entire thing is accessible unlike hutches I have had in the past which look good but you need to be a contortionist to clean out.
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My old pets at home one was like that. It had a door each end and a middle mesh part and I was always trying to work out which door was the easiest to open to access that area 🤷🏻‍♀️
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Thanks x.

I've let them settle. They seem happy but are not venturing up or down their ramp independently yet. All in good time though. They are 4 and a half year old girls now and are set in their ways, I think 🙄. Maybe having a little protest at me changing their home 🤷🏻‍♀️.
 
Have you put an old bit of carpet on the ramp to help with grip? When I had a ramp in my hutch I had it outside the hutch in the run for a bit so my piggies could scent mark it and get used to walking on it. Then it went in the hutch on the ground floor so they could get used to it in the hutch before it went between the floors. My piggies went up and down it as soon as it was in position.
 
The grip is not an issue. It has steps close together. I have put cucumber juice smells on each step 😏 and Milly was very tempted, VERY tempted but then changed her mind 🙄.

They did the ramp in their previous hutch, no worries. Right now, it's sooo windy that with a hutch door open and me doing the tempting, one bigger gush of wind that goes into the hutch, and they run for their bed! They've been on each floor because I've picked them out and moved them. And they've explored both floors. In fact, when I put Milly on the ground floor having guided her using a piece of cucumber and she went DOWN the ramp, later she made her way back up without me even being there or seeing!

I do understand this home is very different for them, so I'm happy for them to go at their own pace.

Thank you for the advice though. If nothing happens, I may take the ramp out and lay it on their ground floor for them to get used to that way, then put it back in place and see if they use it. It really isn't a steep ramp for them this time and, I know although they might not officially be 'ramp users', unofficially they will use a ramp to travel between hutch floors,especially if something smells tastier upstairs!
 
Your hutch is amazing and I am very envious! Beautiful colours and beautifully painted, too. I made the mistake of getting the Kendal one from Home and Roost which sits so far above the run underneath that the ramp is very steep (and one piggy wouldn't go down it, even with a tunnel there). At the moment the hutch is inside the shed but once it goes outside again I will raise the ramp and add to it. However, as the ramp hole is also a problem -- far too long -- I do need to make it permanently smaller. Would you be able to tell me, please, the length of that opening is in your wonderful hutch? I'm not sure how much, or rather how little, space I can leave for them to come and up and down. I hope that's not a hassle.
 
KHBz said:
Your hutch is amazing and I am very envious! Beautiful colours and beautifully painted, too. I made the mistake of getting the Kendal one from Home and Roost which sits so far above the run underneath that the ramp is very steep (and one piggy wouldn't go down it, even with a tunnel there). At the moment the hutch is inside the shed but once it goes outside again I will raise the ramp and add to it. However, as the ramp hole is also a problem -- far too long -- I do need to make it permanently smaller. Would you be able to tell me, please, the length of that opening is in your wonderful hutch? I'm not sure how much, or rather how little, space I can leave for them to come and up and down. I hope that's not a hassle.
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Thank you for your kind comments x

The opening in the upper hutch floor is 13" x 7.5". Hope you manage to adapt your Kendal hutch 🤞🏻

I ordered a 6ft Chartwell from the same supplier. When I received the THREE boxes, parts were damaged and the tongue and groove side panels hadn't been constructed properly. They replaced them but the replacements had the same fault! Just seemed mass produced and substandard to me. So the whole kaboosh went back, along with my hutch covers, and I placed my order with ryedalepethomes.co.uk. This hutch is a complete unit, no seam in the back panel and 20mm log lap on the sides and on the rear of the hutch. It actually feels like I've made an investment in buying it.
 
Piggylove82 said:
Thank you for your kind comments x

The opening in the upper hutch floor is 13" x 7.5". Hope you manage to adapt your Kendal hutch 🤞🏻

I ordered a 6ft Chartwell from the same supplier. When I received the THREE boxes, parts were damaged and the tongue and groove side panels hadn't been constructed properly. They replaced them but the replacements had the same fault! Just seemed mass produced and substandard to me. So the whole kaboosh went back, along with my hutch covers, and I placed my order with ryedalepethomes.co.uk. This hutch is a complete unit, no seam in the back panel and 20mm log lap on the sides and on the rear of the hutch. It actually feels like I've made an investment in buying it.
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Thank you very much for this -- that's really helpful. I'm going to be making a lot of adaptations to our hutch (including an extension!) in the Spring. I agree their hutches aren't good at all -- very flimsy. As soon as we had constructed it we spent days putting a second, thicker roof ontop of the thin, bowed plywood as well as second walls all the way round, insulation packed inside, and making the thin plywood floor considerably more substantial. I know now where to go when we decide to give up on this one entirely. (And unfortunately ours is considerably less tasteful and elegant than yours as I complied with my daughters' choice of in-your-face-purple since it was a birthday present -- see my avatar and imagine that all over and inside out!)
 
KHBz said:
Thank you very much for this -- that's really helpful. I'm going to be making a lot of adaptations to our hutch (including an extension!) in the Spring. I agree their hutches aren't good at all -- very flimsy. As soon as we had constructed it we spent days putting a second, thicker roof ontop of the thin, bowed plywood as well as second walls all the way round, insulation packed inside, and making the thin plywood floor considerably more substantial. I know now where to go when we decide to give up on this one entirely. (And unfortunately ours is considerably less tasteful and elegant than yours as I complied with my daughters' choice of in-your-face-purple since it was a birthday present -- see my avatar and imagine that all over and inside out!)
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Glad to be of help x.

The purple is not so bad, hey! I wanted something subtle because it's the only thing painted in our garden DSC_0266.webp
 
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