Pat and Dumbledore...they seem bored

[Nandu]

Hey everyone!
After absolutely AGES, I'm finally back here. The guinea pigs are doing really well and they're both about a year old.
Recently, I've been observing them and I realised that they look bored. They don't play around as much as they used to and sleep most of the day. Though I know that guinea pigs sleep a lot, their activity has gone down significantly since we got them at a month old.

Any advice?

 

[Siikibam]

Have a read of the enrichment guide which I’ve linked to below. But please also be aware that guinea pigs don’t ‘play’. They may popcorn and zoom but it can sometimes lessen as they get older.

Enrichment Ideas for Guinea Pigs

 

[Piggies&buns]

If they have enrichment - and foraging is one of the best forms of enrichment ie searching through big piles of hay (not using hay racks) - then their apparent boredom may in fact just be that they are older and don’t feel the need to run about so much anymore

 

[Bill & Ted]

try putting in a clean cardboard box with some doorways cut out and add some hay inside, bet that will wake them up

 

[Wiebke]

Hi

Welcome to adulthood! Your piggies are no longer youngsters and have come to enjoy a more settled life. Use our enrichment guide to think about ideas how you can use dinner time as enrichment time but keep in mind that otherwise any interest is generally just fleeting.

Food and the freedom to destroy something like a carrot cottage or their veg wrapped in smon brown paper etc. are the best way of drawing interest. But you have to essentially get used to living with couch potatoes from now on.

 

[Nandu]

Thanks everyone for your respones! I will definitely try all this!

 

[Freela]

Guinea pigs don't really 'play' the way some other pets, like dogs or cats, might. Once they are adults, they may feel less need to zoom around and be super active. The best kind of enrichment you can really give them is an activity that stimulate their natural behaviors, like spreading around food treats and encouraging them to forage for it, packing hay into a bag or toilet paper roll that takes some work to get it out, etc. Most guinea pig enrichment revolves around food and having another guinea pig to interact with.