New cage

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Nibbley&Biscuits

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We have two male guinea pigs we have had for about a month, and want to put into a new bigger cage (140 x 105 CMS, C&C), to give them more room, as they seem to be sticking mostly to the bottom floor of their current 2 tier cage.

Any tips on what we should do when we put them into their new home to minimise any falling outs? They are definitely working out the dominance in the pair with plenty of minor scuffles, rumbling and chattering, and are about 4 months old so have also entered the bond testing teenage period, which we're carefully monitoring. When we put them in the new pen temporarily to clean the current cage, they turned it up a notch, but calmed down before too long.

Any tips on introducing male piggies to a new cage would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks
 
It’s great you’re getting a new cage.
Piggies aren’t climbers and their cage needs to be big enough in the bottom level. upper levels don’t count towards the cage size.
Boars need 12 square feet of single level living space.

The best thing is to put soiled bedding from the old cage into the new cage.
Or at least wipe any new bedding with soiled bedding to transfer scent.
That can help them realise it’s their space and hopefully minimise issues.

We recommend that you do not clean the whole cage in one go. Instead do half one day and the other half the next. That can also help.

Make sure all hides are two exit so no piggy can trap the other inside.
 
Piggies&buns said:
It’s great you’re getting a new cage.
Piggies aren’t climbers and their cage needs to be big enough in the bottom level. upper levels don’t count towards the cage size.
Boars need 12 square feet of single level living space.

The best thing is to put soiled bedding from the old cage into the new cage.
Or at least wipe any new bedding with soiled bedding to transfer scent.
That can help them realise it’s their space and hopefully minimise issues.

We recommend that you do not clean the whole cage in one go. Instead do half one day and the other half the next. That can also help.

Make sure all hides are two exit so no piggy can trap the other inside.
Click to expand...
So, we put them into their new cage this afternoon and they spent hours really enjoying the extra space, racing around, jumping and exploring the hides, so we thought they were going to be much happier, and there was no squabbling at all.

But this evening their excitement turned into constant rumbling, teeth chattering, and vocalising to each other and not being able to leave eachother alone. After a couple of hours of this, a few lunges, and a final one where they turned into a ball of fur for a second or two, we decided to separate them and put one in the old cage for the night so they can cool off. We put the cages close together so they can still see each other etc.

One does seem to be more vocal than the other and most of the time it's him that seems to instigate things, but the other one doesn't give in once things start up. Strangely it seemed to be the other way round a couple of weeks ago.

Even after being separated, they still carried on facing off at each other through the bars and making a racket for an hour or so, but seem to have finally lost interest for now.

Not sure of the right thing to do. Intend to reintroduce them in the morning after they've hopefully had a chance to calm down overnight.

They are both around 4 months old, so is this normal behaviour for their age? And do we just need to ride it out with them until they agree which one is boss (obviously intervening if there's a risk of serious injury)? We've had them for about a month and they had previously been housed together as a pair in the place where we got them from, apparently getting on well, but they're not siblings as far as I know. For the first few weeks they got along fine, but now the shock of the move to the new home is over and they've got used to things, they seemed to have turned their attention towards each other. And guessing the move to the new cage has just heightened things a bit more.

One of them seemed to have a scratch on his nose and a small mark on his mouth from a couple of days ago, but no other signs of injury so far.

Thanks for any advice or reassurance.
 
I’m sorry to hear this.

At four months old hormones start to rise and that is when any differences and incompatibilities can come to light. If they both want to be dominant then neither will back down and they can’t remain together.
You ride out dominance (chasing, mounting, rumbling) but is a line at which it stops being dominance. The fact you’ve said furball and have found some injuries you need to be prepared that things may not be good between them and actually it may already have gone too far.
It’s sad when bonds break but it is one is the issues in getting piggies as babies - they are ok as babies but once they become teens they can decide their bond doesn’t work.
A new cage can be the catalyst for a bond break but only if there are underlying issues between them anyway.
Reintroduction is not recommended where there has been a fight and it is only likely to happen again. Fights only happen when they can’t make things work.

If you do decide to try to reunite, then you must do it in neutral territory. Do not reintroduce by just putting them back into either of the two cages they are in now.
Put them on neutral territory. If all goes well, aside from normal dominance, then they can remain in neutral for several hours. During that time you need to transfer scent of both piggies into the cage by wiping soiled bedding into the cage.
If their don’t have compatibility and don’t want to be together, then things will not be ok in neutral territory. There will be an escalation in behaviour and possibly a fight. If that happens then it is clear that their bond is sadly over. They will need to move back to separate cages. Unfortunately that is then a permanent arrangement. They will need to remain separated but side by side for life.

I know it’s sad. I’ve been there myself with one of my pairs. I took the risk and rehomed a pair of babies. They were with me for 9 weeks, hit 18 weeks old and then had a huge fight. Theyve lived side by side for almost two years now. One of them has just recently been bonded to one of my other bereaved boars.

Please read the guides below before you do anything as they explain more. They explain what behaviours you want and what you don’t and whether you should attempt to reintroduce at all based on what you have seen so far.
We can only advise based on what you have said and you’ve said a few things which would be raising alarm bells for me.

Let us know how things go

Wiebke

Thread 'Bonds In Trouble'

Overview
1 Causes for bonds to fall apart
2 Bonds in Crisis
- What are the signs of a dysfunctional bond?
- Bullying
- How can I test whether a bond is no longer working?
3 Failed bonds and what next?
- What to do if my piggies have had a major fight?
- When rebonding doesn't work out


1 Causes for bonds to fall apart

Every fall-out has of course its...
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Wiebke

Thread 'Bonding and Interaction: Illustrated social behaviours and bonding dynamics'

1 Introduction
2 Pre-bonding
- Quarantine and sexing
- The need for a plan B
- The rule-breaker: Youngsters under 4 months (sub-teenage)
3 Setting up an introduction
- Getting to know each other
- ‘Buddy baths’ – why not
- Setting up a neutral bonding area
- How to start the bonding
4 Acceptance phase: Do we like each other?
- Friendly getting to know...
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Wiebke

Thread 'Boars: Teenage, Bullying, Fighting, Fall-outs And What Next?'

Overview
1 The hormonal teenage months
- What are the most difficult times?
- What are your boars' chances of making it together?
- What can help to boost your boys' chances?
- What does NOT work?
2 Fighting, bullying and when to separate
- What are the signs of a dysfunctional bond?
- How can I test whether a bond is no longer working?
- What to do if your boars had a bloody fight?
3 Life after...
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boureki

Thread 'Dominance Behaviours In Guinea Pigs'

Overview
1 List of dominance behaviours in ascending order of aggression
2 What may cause this type of behaviour in boars?
3 When do you see these behaviours in sows?
4 What can trigger fall-outs?
5 Further helpful guide links


I thought it may be handy to have a sticky on typical dominance behaviours for a reference - hopefully it may help humans understand guinea pigs and their behaviour a bit more and hopefully prevent some avoidable problems!


1 List of dominance behaviours in ascending order of...
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Thanks for the advice. It does seem to sadly be the end of the road for their bond, so will put a divider down the new cage once the additional c&c panels arrive tomorrow, and keep one pig in the old cage for now.

We put them in a neutral space last week just to clean their cage (the neutral space being the grids from their new pen, we just didn't have the base yet), and that had a fresh fleece down and clean hides and their dominance displays started immediately in there with some serious rearing up at each other, so we won't put them through that again.

They seem pretty subdued this morning, with non of the usual chirping that usually welcomes us when they know it must be breakfast time. So seem to be feeling a bit sorry for themselves. And one, hasn't really come out of his hide.

A quick practical question on dividing the cage. Should we also split the correx to form two separate bases? Just wondering if having a raised edge of the base along the cage dividing panels means they can't see each other as well, as they'll need to stand up on the edge of the base to interac, or if that's ok. It's down to the practicalities of making sure the panels are sturdy enough along the divide.

It's a shame we'll have to split them, but their happiness and safety is the main thing.
 
I'm sorry to hear that.

Regarding the Correx, the choice is yours really but if you are going to have separate correx bases, I would cut the divide much lower so they can easily see over - an inch would be plenty. As you are using fleece then technically there isn’t really a need for an upstand in terms of keeping bedding in, it’s just for floor protection along that edge.
Equally if you put something underneath the Correx on the divide to protect the floor, you could just cut the correx in half and then the dividing grids will fit perfectly as they are supposed to.
I would always recommend you cable tie dividing grids though.

I don’t have correx in my cages and I use disposable bedding but mine live in my shed so bedding coming out isn’t an issue! I just have large oilcloth tablecloths on the shed floor and the cages are on top of that so they can fully see an interact along dividers with no obstruction

Each piggy needs a minimum of a 3x2 c&c
 
I am sorry your boys have decided they don't want to live together. I prefer not to have sides along the divider, I think it's better for interaction.
 
Piggies&buns said:
I'm sorry to hear that.

Regarding the Correx, the choice is yours really but if you are going to have separate correx bases, I would cut the divide much lower so they can easily see over - an inch would be plenty. As you are using fleece then technically there isn’t really a need for an upstand in terms of keeping bedding in, it’s just for floor protection along that edge.
Equally if you put something underneath the Correx on the divide to protect the floor, you could just cut the correx in half and then the dividing grids will fit perfectly as they are supposed to.
I would always recommend you cable tie dividing grids though.

I don’t have correx in my cages and I use disposable bedding but mine live in my shed so bedding coming out isn’t an issue! I just have large oilcloth tablecloths on the shed floor and the cages are on top of that so they can fully see an interact along dividers with no obstruction

Each piggy needs a minimum of a 3x2 c&c
Click to expand...
Thanks for your help and advice. The new cage was a 4x3 layout, so splitting it straight down the middle will create a 3x2 for each of them.

Will also consider putting a loft in for each of them at some point too.
 
Welcome to the forum, I'm sorry about your boys. I have a pair of recently separated neighboars but mine lived together for a year. I did cut the correx but my boys have an odd set up as it is a double level 5x2. They have a 3x2 and a 2x2 each. I was gutted when they had a spat but they seem happy. Oddly, it's my dominant boy, Dignified Sir George, who is much happier and more relaxed. Possibly because he was being frequently challenged.
 
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