After Pookie passed away my daughter wanted 2 guinea pigs to take Pookie’s place. I read that they love company and are lonely when housed singly. So, I agreed that we would adopt two pigs to share our home this time.
I knew that we didn’t want to adopt a male and a female for obvious reasons. It was time to study the book to learn how to identify the males from the females. The book tells you that it was easy to tell the difference between the two sexes. In boars (males) to identify the sheathed penis, gently press on the lower abdomen and this will cause the penis to protrude from the sheath. Sounds easy! The females (sows) will have a skin fold in a Y-shape above the anus. OK! Study the pictures of the two sexes closely some more and I will be an expert at sexing guinea pig pups. The book says it is easy and not hard to tell the difference between the sexes. WRONG!
I feel I am prepared to pick out two females to share our house with us and we make the trip to the pet store. We immediately fall in love with a cute black and white American Short hair pig. There are two other Abyssinian black and white pigs that are adorable too. The Abyssinian breed has rosettes or whorls of tufted hair all over its body. We determine what we think is the cuter of the two Abyssinian pigs and check to make sure it’s a female. Yes! Then we check again the other American Short hair pig with the unusual markings that we immediately knew we wanted to take home with us. Yes, it looks like she is a female too. Perfect! We have our two female pigs that should be very compatible. Sometimes if two males are housed together they can be territorial or fight with each other, especially if there is a female housed with them. If the two males have been littermates and no females are present they can peacefully live together. However, we have two females so they definitely should be compatible and no chance of extra piggies running around in the future.
We eagerly arrive home with our two pigs and temporarily house them in Pookie’s old pet store cage, which is way too cramped for two pigs. However, until we can construct their new cage it will do for a few days. We decided the black and white American Short hair pig would be called Misty and the Abyssinian would be Pepper. It was strange but after a few days Misty started acting like she was a he. Misty started doing what some people call the male “rumble strut” to impress Pepper. Could Misty be a boy? I went on-line to look at more pictures to determine what female young pups look like compared to males. OOOPS! I think we have a male. A quick trip to the vets and we get the news Misty is a MALE. How can this be? The book said it was easy and I had studied the pictures for a very long time.
Well, Misty became Scooter after that and we had him neutered when he was 4 months old. After a long 30 days had gone by after Scooter was neutered, the “wall” came down that divided them and they were reunited again. And as the story goes they lived happily ever after!
To Happy and Healthy Pigs!
Nancy from BluestoneCommerce Cages and Guitars (Your Guinea Pig Cage eBay Store)
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
Tuesday, March 3, 2009
C&C (Cubes & Coroplast) Guinea Pig Cages - Tie Wraps or Plastic Press-On Connectors - A Comparison
Most other Cubes and Coroplast guinea pig cage sellers use plastic press-on connectors in their cage construction. This video will show you exactly why we here at BlueStoneCommerce disagree with this practice and exclusively use zip ties (tie-wraps, cable-ties) as fasteners in all of our cage designs.
POOKIE- The Beginning
Our very first guinea pig that we shared our home with was named Pookie.
My daughter had a mouse named Peek-a-Boo that a boy at school had given her but she was not a very friendly mouse. She was looking for another pet that wouldn’t bite her every time she tried to touch it. I found out that guinea pigs are cuddly, mild-mannered and are not likely to bite. When my daughter asked for a guinea pig, not being very responsible about cleaning Peek-a-Boo’s cage, we told her if she would clean the mouse’s cage for a month and showed us how responsible she was, then we would go looking for a guinea pig to share our home with. Well, she faithfully cleaned the cage for a month and that is how we came to adopt Pookie into our home.
Pookie was a cute little guy, with a pretty chestnut color and white streak down the center of his head. Our friends had a guinea pig cage that they were no longer using so we used that for Pookie’s home. It was the standard pet store cage 15 by 24 inches. We purchased a new wooden nest box, water bottle, hay rack and food dish. After we put all of the necessary things that guinea pigs need in the cage there was hardly any room for Pookie. There was definitely no room for running and playing and barely enough space to turn around in outside of his nest box. We would hold him in our laps and cuddle him and sometimes he get time to run around on the floor. Life is very busy though and it seemed that we did not have the time to let him out of his cage that often.
After Pookie was a year old we noticed that his left eye was closing and did not appear to be normal. We took him to the vets and she thought it might be an infection. He was given eye drops and antibiotics by syringe but the eye continued to look worse. While we were on vacation, my neighbor who was taking care of him had to rush Pookie to my vet because he had a stroke. He was just over a year old and had developed a brain tumor. It was very rare for guinea pigs to develop a tumor at such a young age. Although, we do not know for sure if the tumor was cancerous it did end up being the reason he passed away at a very early age. Guinea pigs are known to be resistant to cancer. The scientists think that the Kurloff cells-which are unique to cavies-and asparaginase found in their blood may be the reason for protecting them against cancer.
We will never know exactly what caused the brain tumor in Pookie. Genetics? Perhaps. What we do know, now that Pookie is gone, is that we have always regretted making him live out his entire short life in that tiny, cramped cage. And as caring and responsible pet owners, we have sworn that it will never happen again. Pookie has made us realize that our pets deserve better.
To Happy and Healthy Pigs!
Nancy from BluestoneCommerce Cages and Guitars (Your Guinea Pig Cage eBay Store)
My daughter had a mouse named Peek-a-Boo that a boy at school had given her but she was not a very friendly mouse. She was looking for another pet that wouldn’t bite her every time she tried to touch it. I found out that guinea pigs are cuddly, mild-mannered and are not likely to bite. When my daughter asked for a guinea pig, not being very responsible about cleaning Peek-a-Boo’s cage, we told her if she would clean the mouse’s cage for a month and showed us how responsible she was, then we would go looking for a guinea pig to share our home with. Well, she faithfully cleaned the cage for a month and that is how we came to adopt Pookie into our home.
Pookie was a cute little guy, with a pretty chestnut color and white streak down the center of his head. Our friends had a guinea pig cage that they were no longer using so we used that for Pookie’s home. It was the standard pet store cage 15 by 24 inches. We purchased a new wooden nest box, water bottle, hay rack and food dish. After we put all of the necessary things that guinea pigs need in the cage there was hardly any room for Pookie. There was definitely no room for running and playing and barely enough space to turn around in outside of his nest box. We would hold him in our laps and cuddle him and sometimes he get time to run around on the floor. Life is very busy though and it seemed that we did not have the time to let him out of his cage that often.
After Pookie was a year old we noticed that his left eye was closing and did not appear to be normal. We took him to the vets and she thought it might be an infection. He was given eye drops and antibiotics by syringe but the eye continued to look worse. While we were on vacation, my neighbor who was taking care of him had to rush Pookie to my vet because he had a stroke. He was just over a year old and had developed a brain tumor. It was very rare for guinea pigs to develop a tumor at such a young age. Although, we do not know for sure if the tumor was cancerous it did end up being the reason he passed away at a very early age. Guinea pigs are known to be resistant to cancer. The scientists think that the Kurloff cells-which are unique to cavies-and asparaginase found in their blood may be the reason for protecting them against cancer.
We will never know exactly what caused the brain tumor in Pookie. Genetics? Perhaps. What we do know, now that Pookie is gone, is that we have always regretted making him live out his entire short life in that tiny, cramped cage. And as caring and responsible pet owners, we have sworn that it will never happen again. Pookie has made us realize that our pets deserve better.
To Happy and Healthy Pigs!
Nancy from BluestoneCommerce Cages and Guitars (Your Guinea Pig Cage eBay Store)
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