guinea pig eating the others hair?

[slfboy34]

i have 2 boar guinea pigs that are 16 months old the black and white is a short haired, the brown and white has longer hair. i have recently noticed that the black/white has started to pull the hair out of the brown/white in chunks from its rear end and eat it? they seem to get on fine and dont seem to fight. any ideas?

[Pumpkin_RIP]

I have read that they usually do this to the "underdog" of a group. It isn't very common, and I'm not sure what you can really do to stop it.

I would check with someone else though, because I'm not completely sure that where I read that info is a reliable source. I just thought I would put that idea out there as a likely possibilty.

EDIT: since Pigsforlife says they do it from bordeum or jealously, maybe you could give them new toys to play with and spend more time with them? Just a suggestion.

[pigsforlife]

Not harmful at all. This is called 'barbering'. Jealous or bored pigs often do it to other pigs. Guinea Lynx :: Hair Loss

[lynn's Cavies]

My shorthair female, Edna, does this from time to time with my sheltie, Bette, and I found it was happening more when I hadn't put enough hay in the cage to last until morning. Now that I really stock that hay up (cause they should have hay 24/7) it isn't happening as much. Edna is definitley the more dominant pig. I heard it can also be from boredom.

[Dodge]

I would not worry, its barbering like the previous posters said. Pig and Pinnypig ripped Charlie's long hair out at the roots and he was bald for a few weeks, I thought it was the mites that they had doing it but I realized it was only them pulling out his hair.