OK. Here goes!
To put you in the picture, Thistle Cavies is a privately run Scottish rescue, run by a wonderful woman, Wendi, and her husband Martyn. The rescue is their home, including the kitchen, hallway and sitting room. In all, they are
down to about 75 guinea pigs, 25 or so in the house. They also have
fantastic piggy quarters, housing around 50 pigs. It was our task to clean out the cages, giving Wendi and Martyn a well deserved break!
After a cup of tea and a lot of chat, Lorna, my son Ronan and I embarked on our mission! It wasn't long before Lorna found a ginormous poop - and the competition was on! (sorry - too daunted by the task ahead at this stage for picture proof!)
Ronan and I started at one side of the custom built piggy room, and Lorna started at the other. There was only a little friendly rivalry as we raced to meet in the middle. It has to be said that while Ronan and I
did beat Lorna hands down, and met her in the far corner instead of the middle - she was trimming nails and cleaning anal sacs as she went, so really it was declared a draw!
Lunch time! After a hearty bowl of carrot and coriander soup, seconds of organic veg. soup, more tea and chin wagging, it was down to 'the big one'! Wendi has along one wall of the room, a large pen, housing (I think) 14 special guinea pigs at present. These are Wendi's pigs who will live forever at Thistle.
First, we had to decide who was who - some could be more happily kept in close contact whilst we cleaned out their pen than others. Here is Lorna trying to decide if this was the neutered boar who could be put in the box with the others...
...I think we actually got it wrong - but everyone got along fine, so it wasn't a problem!
After seperating the piggies, we spent a few moments contemplating how
on earth we were going to start tackling this one!
