Newborn Piggies - Help?!?

**911guy** · #1 08-23-06, 09:15 pm

Well here is the unfortunate story, we bought two piggies back in April (BOTH FEMALE), low and behold we have three newborn piggies. Apparently the pet store sold us one pregnant piggy unknown to us. We are positive we have two females. Two Questions please:

1. Should we separate the newborns from the two females (I hear they eat their young) and do we feed them regular food as we do our regular piggies?

2. How long is the normal gestation period?

At this point, we may try and find good homes for them. We really don't want 5 pigs (unknown sex) in one 5x2 cage. Thanks!

UGH!

**dextersmycutegp** · #2 08-23-06, 09:27 pm

Guinea pigs will not eat their young, hamsters might, but guinea pigs are not hamsters,

. They will eat solid food, the same as what you feed the mom very soon after they are born. Are you feeding Alfalfa based pellets?
The normal gestation period is 50 something days to 72 days.
How old are the babies? Because if the babies were just born their mom could not of been pregnant when you got her.....Have you gotten the two adult pig's sexes confirmed by a vet?
By the way, if any of the babies are male they could get the two adults pregnant at 3 weeks old.
Congratulations of your 3 healthy babies! Do you have any pictures yet?

**911guy** · #3 08-23-06, 09:45 pm

Quote:

Originally Posted by dextersmycutegp

Guinea pigs will not eat their young, hamsters might, but guinea pigs are not hamsters,

. They will eat solid food, the same as what you feed the mom very soon after they are born. Are you feeding Alfalfa based pellets?
The normal gestation period is 50 something days to 72 days.
How old are the babies? Because if the babies were just born their mom could not of been pregnant when you got her.....Have you gotten the two adult pig's sexes confirmed by a vet?
By the way, if any of the babies are male they could get the two adults pregnant at 3 weeks old.
Congratulations of your 3 healthy babies! Do you have any pictures yet?

You are right, in looking through some previous posts, we realized the other may be a male and no, we did not confirm it with a vet. So right now I've separated the alleged male from the apparent mom and babies. Without confirming with a vet, are there any surefire (or close to) signs to tell a male from a female?? We are feeding them regular daily food that has vegetables, Verdura, and Legumes (plus fresh veg's and timothy hay). ZNo pictures just yet..........I'm still crying. Should I continue to separate my dad from the rest??

**PiggieMom** · #4 08-23-06, 09:51 pm

http://cavyspirit.com/sexing.htm This gives some very good pictures.

**fairysari** · #5 08-23-06, 09:56 pm

Yes, definitely keep the male separate. He can get the female pregnant again almost immediately after the birth.

I am not sure what is in the food you are feeding, but it is best to feed a plain pellets with no seeds or coloured bits in it. The babies and mama should have some alafalfa hay for now. At three weeks old you should separate any male babies. Maybe have a vet or someone experienced help you sex them, as it can be difficult to sex babies. The boys can live with dad after this.

Good luck!

**dextersmycutegp** · #6 08-23-06, 10:00 pm

Keep them seperated until you know for sure what gender your male/female is.
When my Holly was pregnant (she was pregnant from the petstore for sure, she gave birth 2 weeks after I got her!) I was so worried but then it was so good to see the babies all healthy and happy. Did you find out she was pregnant before she had the babies?

**911guy** · #7 08-23-06, 10:10 pm

Quote:

Originally Posted by dextersmycutegp

Did you find out she was pregnant before she had the babies?

Nope. The wife cleaned out the cage just yesterday. Tonight she went to check up on our two cuties and found 5 cuties! I'll be getting a vet here to in two weeks to verify who is what sex. Until then, I'll keep Dad away. Thanks for advice everyone! We switch to the pellet version as well and keep feeding the alfafa hay and fresh veg's. Attached is a pic of Dad separated and chomping at the bit to get to mom. I'll also be working on putting a barrier in the grids so the little ones can't get through to Dad just yet. Who knows, maybe we will just get everything confirmed through the vet and keep them all.....back to the hardware store for a duel-bigger cage to build!

**VoodooJoint** · #8 08-23-06, 10:13 pm

I'm glad mom and babies are doing well.

I'm not pointing fingers at all here but I just have to use this as an example as why our anti-breeding stance will never cause GPs to die out. This sort of accident happens all the time.

**Ly&Pigs** · #9 08-23-06, 10:19 pm

Quote:

2. How long is the normal gestation period?

59-73 days.

**911guy** · #10 08-23-06, 11:41 pm

Quote:

Originally Posted by VoodooJoint

I'm glad mom and babies are doing well.

I'm not pointing fingers at all here but I just have to use this as an example as why our anti-breeding stance will never cause GPs to die out. This sort of accident happens all the time.

I agree with you. Obviously we didn't want this to happen and we just took the pet store's word that these were both females. That is a good lesson in itself.

**cavyinhawaii** · #11 08-24-06, 12:49 am

Our pet store sold us two boys.
I now have one boy and one pregnant female.

I have also learned my lesson about getting them from pet stores.

**fourbwabbys** · #12 08-24-06, 02:51 pm

Same story here. We were told two girls, but a few weeks later, we had 5 more.

**nonamian_girl** · #13 08-24-06, 05:45 pm

You might want to put a small lid on dad's part of the cage. Sometimes they get so eager to get to the female that they can climb over the cage.

**Buggie_00** · #14 08-24-06, 09:32 pm

When we got our two girls, one was already pregnant. We found the baby by suprise too. Congrats on the healthy babies, and new additions, just make sure you get the babies sexed before the 21 days when they can get Mom pregnant, or a sibling.

**bunnylover** · #15 08-25-06, 09:50 am

Quote:

Originally Posted by 911guy

You are right, in looking through some previous posts, we realized the other may be a male and no, we did not confirm it with a vet. So right now I've separated the alleged male from the apparent mom and babies. Without confirming with a vet, are there any surefire (or close to) signs to tell a male from a female?? We are feeding them regular daily food that has vegetables, Verdura, and Legumes (plus fresh veg's and timothy hay). ZNo pictures just yet..........I'm still crying. Should I continue to separate my dad from the rest??

when i got my guinea pig they held him up pushed on his tummy a bit and his lil boy part popped out..

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