Older Pig getting bullied after reintroduction to herd.

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Teatimelois

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Hi,
Here is my situation ... 😭

I have a 6 year old piggle named Silver. I aquired her and her sister Aura when she was 2 months old. Aura had a daughter named Nox and the three lived perfectly together up until I lost Aura in 2023. Devastated, I got a baby pig named Moony who right from the get go had a huge personnality. She would eat Silver's fur and was very dominant, but she respected Silver as if she was her mom so they got along fine. Two months later I lost Nox to a kidney stone, the opperation was a success but Nox didn't handle the anaesthesia well at all and she passed three days later. Thinking that Silver thrived better in a herd of three i got another little baby pig called Maple who seemed quite sweet.
So for context, now we have Silver (6), Moony (2) and Maple (1 1/2).

To make a long story short, I moved in with my boyfriend and his three pigs 6 months ago, one of his pigs was special needs and needed a very calm pig to live with, Silver ended up being the perfect solution. Even though she lived separate with special needs pig Wheeky, I tried to maintain her bond with the herd ( moony & maple who at this point now lived my BF's two pigs so a herd of 4 ) during floortime but obviously them being separated for longer lengths ended in Silver falling out of bonding with my two pigs. I stoped putting them together for floortime.

In the herd of 4, Moony is top dog. The bonding with the two new pigs was difficult since Moony is a pretty vicious female and she is quite violent when making sure you know she is the leader. Maple, having now grown up, is a real little sh*t. She is also very dominant and her and Moony can get quite standoff-ish from time to time but all in all the herd now works together.

Here is the problem:
Wheeky passed away this week after a 6 month battle with multiple issues, leaving my poor Silver on her own. Yesterday I took all day to reintroduce her into the herd. Floor time (whole room) on washed neutral bedding, two sets of bowls, food and I had Silver separated from the others for an hour just so they could see each other and sniff each other.
Once I opened up the whole floor and they all mingled, Moony and Maple had a right dominance squeak contest, teeth chattereing and the whole spectacle. Silvy got chased and nipped a bit but no blood, just fur pulled out (Silver is a long angora type pig).

Since there was no crazy violence I put the whole herd back in the cage that evening, but obviously, she is still getting chased around by Moony, Maple and one of the other two pigs if they walk by her. When someone approaches, she kind of just stops and doesn't move, she tries to become invisible and just waits. But because she seems so worried and just hides, she is not getting out to eat.
If i put her infront of the hay she will eat, but as soon as a pig walks by, or comes to eat too ( even if she gets on with that pig) she just freezes.

Her being 6 and my absolute life-line, I can not bear her loosing weight or being stressed, but I physically cannot handle having two cages again nor can I take having poor Silvs live on her own.

What can I do to make this easier on her ? 😭

( They live in a cavy-cage about 4m long with a second story, so they have alot of space with multiple hay and food hubs)
 
Please be aware that separate floors do not count when considering total floor space for the piggies.

With bonding a group you have to ensure that the full hierarchy has been established. The bonding hierarchy starts at the top with the first two piggies deciding who is going to be top pig. it then has to follow down pair by pair until you get to the bottom ranked pig. Did you see that full dominance and hierarchy established from top pig to bottom pig?

You have said that there was fur pulling, chasing and nipping and that your elderly lady was on the receiving end of this. This is not the mildest form of dominance and something that could indicate future problems in store.

If she had never lived in a large group before this whole bonding experience would be exceptionally stressful for her. You have also said that you previously allowed groups to mix during floor time before this bonding attempt and that this had not gone well – please do bear in mind that sows can have a very long memories and bear grudges over past behaviours.

Had all the chasing, nipping and fur pulling ceased before you put all the piggies into the one cage together? It is not clear from your post.

Even if the whole hierarchy had been established in the bonding pen the dominance phase continues for about two weeks after the introduction. So what I’m saying is things are unlikely to suddenly go smoothly as there is still some way to go in that process. What you have to bear in mind is that as I understand it you now have an elderly (and therefore more vulnerable) sow in a group of boisterous youngsters with whom she has not previously got on and has had to be separated.

If a pig is unable or unwilling to eat, then this is a major issue. Pigs needs to eat huge amounts of hay throughout the day (and night) as well as having access to the pellets and veggies. If you are absolutely insistent that you do not wish to separate her and have her living side-by-side with her neighbours then you will need to weigh her very regularly to ensure that she is able to eat, drink and maintain her weight. If she is unable to do so then, clearly you will have a problem and will need to separate her.

You may also, once you have reread the bonding guides that I am going to link below, decide that it would be best to return all the piggies to the neutral bonding area and see out the whole group hierarchy bonding process from starts to finish to see if it is successful. Alternatively, if you are satisfied that the hierarchy was established in the dominance pen & consider that this is purely the dominance phase then you will need to keep a very close eye on the behaviours and monitor her ability to access hay, pellets, veggies and water and ensure that she is not losing weight or being bullied.

sport_billy

Thread 'Behaviour, Bonding & Bereavement Guides'

Guinea pig constellations
Boars, sows or mixed pairs; babies or adults?
Single Guinea Pigs - Challenges and Responsibilities
A Closer Look At Pairs (Boars - Sows - Mixed)
Adding More Guinea Pigs Or Merging Pairs – What Works And What Not?

Bonding and social behaviours
A- Z of Guinea Pig Behaviours
Bonding and Interaction: Illustrated social behaviours and bonding dynamics
'Popcorning' and 'zooming' - joy and exuberance (videos)
Dominance Behaviours In Guinea Pigs
Bonds...
  • Like
 
VickiA said:
Please be aware that separate floors do not count when considering total floor space for the piggies.

With bonding a group you have to ensure that the full hierarchy has been established. The bonding hierarchy starts at the top with the first two piggies deciding who is going to be top pig. it then has to follow down pair by pair until you get to the bottom ranked pig. Did you see that full dominance and hierarchy established from top pig to bottom pig?

You have said that there was fur pulling, chasing and nipping and that your elderly lady was on the receiving end of this. This is not the mildest form of dominance and something that could indicate future problems in store.

If she had never lived in a large group before this whole bonding experience would be exceptionally stressful for her. You have also said that you previously allowed groups to mix during floor time before this bonding attempt and that this had not gone well – please do bear in mind that sows can have a very long memories and bear grudges over past behaviours.

Had all the chasing, nipping and fur pulling ceased before you put all the piggies into the one cage together? It is not clear from your post.

Even if the whole hierarchy had been established in the bonding pen the dominance phase continues for about two weeks after the introduction. So what I’m saying is things are unlikely to suddenly go smoothly as there is still some way to go in that process. What you have to bear in mind is that as I understand it you now have an elderly (and therefore more vulnerable) sow in a group of boisterous youngsters with whom she has not previously got on and has had to be separated.

If a pig is unable or unwilling to eat, then this is a major issue. Pigs needs to eat huge amounts of hay throughout the day (and night) as well as having access to the pellets and veggies. If you are absolutely insistent that you do not wish to separate her and have her living side-by-side with her neighbours then you will need to weigh her very regularly to ensure that she is able to eat, drink and maintain her weight. If she is unable to do so then, clearly you will have a problem and will need to separate her.

You may also, once you have reread the bonding guides that I am going to link below, decide that it would be best to return all the piggies to the neutral bonding area and see out the whole group hierarchy bonding process from starts to finish to see if it is successful. Alternatively, if you are satisfied that the hierarchy was established in the dominance pen & consider that this is purely the dominance phase then you will need to keep a very close eye on the behaviours and monitor her ability to access hay, pellets, veggies and water and ensure that she is not losing weight or being bullied.

sport_billy

Thread 'Behaviour, Bonding & Bereavement Guides'

Guinea pig constellations
Boars, sows or mixed pairs; babies or adults?
Single Guinea Pigs - Challenges and Responsibilities
A Closer Look At Pairs (Boars - Sows - Mixed)
Adding More Guinea Pigs Or Merging Pairs – What Works And What Not?

Bonding and social behaviours
A- Z of Guinea Pig Behaviours
Bonding and Interaction: Illustrated social behaviours and bonding dynamics
'Popcorning' and 'zooming' - joy and exuberance (videos)
Dominance Behaviours In Guinea Pigs
Bonds...
  • Like
Click to expand...

Hello, thank you for the response.
Just to clarify, Silver used to live with the two young pigs and they all got on fine.
When I moved in with me boyfriend we merged his pigs (3) and my pigs (3) and the herd of 6 worked perfectly for about 2 months. Then Wheeky was diagnosed with her issues and became quite weak so she would eat less because of the others. So we separated her from the herd and ended up putting Silvy in with her so she wouldn't be depressed on her own.

I tried to maintain Silver's bond with the herd during floortimes during the week but it wasn't enough and that was that. Now that Wheeks is gone I wanted to put Silvs back in with the herd but Moony and Maple are showing very dominant behavior towards Silver.
Hope that clarifies.

To answer your question, during the neutral floortime session two days ago, Moony and Mapple sorted out their dominance status between each other for about 15mins once Silver was with them, after that they were fine with each other and the other pigs. However both of them would go up to Silver, teeth chatter very loudly and nip her. Silver doesn't try to escape them, she freezes instead so the girls get even more agressive with her since she doesn't give them space, she just freezes.

When I put them all back in the cage that evening, they had all been on floortime for about 6 hours at that point, 2 hours with access to houses again. Everybody was eating and being normal between themselves except Silver who just stayed in her house and didn't come out much.

In the cage since, Moony and Mapple will chase and teeth chatter at Silver whenever they walk by her.

As of last night I have separated Silver from the others as to not stress her, she can still see them and sniff them but not be with them.

So with all of this information, would you conclude that them all living together is not possible ? Is it worth trying another neutral floortime and giving them more time?
 
This update post makes things much clearer.

I would conclude that bonding silver in with them has failed and that she needs to live separately but side by side with them.
 
Thank you so much for the extra information. It really helps make it much clearer. Sadly I would also class this as a failed bonding. Silver can live separately from them but have interaction safely through the bars. Sometimes that’s the best scenario you can achieve. I’ve had similar with older sow groups, too.
 
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