My males are fighting now - Help

[conbon65]

Hi all,
I am a new piggie owner. I have two beautiful males, about 5 months old.
I have built the C&C gage (2 x 3). I know I need to upgrade it to a 4 or 5 X 2 (depending on the room I have. )

Chip and Spike have been together for 2 months. We had the normal sniffing and showing of dominance in the beginning, but all was well, until this week.

When I put them in the pen for floor time Spike started pushing Chip around. Teeth chattering, huffing and hissing, raised on hind legs and lunged at him. Poor Chip ran for cover. I watched for a few minutes to see thier interaction would calm down. Spike continued to dominate Chip. I had to seperate them. I put them back into thier cage and watched for a while. Spike chased Chip around the cage, even bullied him out of the houses. I have two of everything, house, water bottles, 4 dishes. When Spike would go into one place, Chip would chase him away. I dug out the old store bought cage and put Chip in there for the night.

We did floor time this morning and the same thing happened.

Is there anything I can do to get them to stop fighting or will I have to keep them spearated for ever? I am just so upset about this.
Thank you for any help.

[Nebbi&Tása]

mabe they fight couse of the size of the cage
But i dont reallly know
(my spelling is not good, im icelandic so please try to understand)

[Ziggy&Herald]

They are at their puberty stage so some fighting is to be expected. I do agree, it probably has to do with the size of the cage as well. Boars need lots of room to be able to live peacefully. You could try to bathe them together. That works many times when introducing new pigs together. Maybe a bath for the two of them would strengthen the bond that they are losing.

[Nebbi&Tása]

Originally Posted by Ziggy&Herald

They are at their puberty stage so some fighting is to be expected. I do agree, it probably has to do with the size of the cage as well. Boars need lots of room to be able to live peacefully. You could try to bathe them together. That works many times when introducing new pigs together. Maybe a bath for the two of them would strengthen the bond that they are losing.

But watch out! The water HAS to be warm,guinea pigs can get many issues, (am i spelling this right?) at least here in iceland (;
Iceland is not made of ice (;
(many people thinks that)
it's summer now so its pretty warm outside now, so im not saying that because there is so cold here that my pigs are getting sick (;
Just wanted to tell you

[paula.m.moore]

5 months is the most difficult time to have boy pigs. It's puberty and they have to establish dominance.

A bigger cage should help them. They need space. For boys (based on my experience) I would recommend at least a 2x5, but a 2x4 would be much, much better than the 2x3.

I would also separate them with cage grids so they are sharing the same cage and are able to see/smell/hear each other. Otherwise I think it's like introducing them all over again every time you try and get them together.

[clotho]

Everything you have described sounds like perfectly normal dominance behaviour to me. You only separate if they injure each other badly (draw blood). Teeth chattering, occasional lunging, bullying - it's all normal for males. If you keep taking them apart and putting them back together they have to keep starting all over again trying to figure out who is dominant.

I agree your cage is too small. I think the buddy bath is a great idea and then put them into a newly built larger cage together with a big pile of hay/veggies. Hopefully that will help them get along better.

I personally have found that with young, active males, they get along much better in a cage that is 3x4 (or bigger) rather than a 2x4 because it gives them a lot more space to get away from each other. I know sometimes it's not possible to fit in a cage that big, but if you can I bet it would help. Otherwise, just go as big as you can.

Good luck and let us know how it goes.

[conbon65]

Quick update. I washed everything in hot water and vinegar, I rebuilt their cage to a 2 x 4 (tried to squeeze in the 5, but I don't have the room). I let them stay in their large floor pen (it is about 5' x 10') all day with thier houses and food. I kept thier food and water separated. They seem to be getting along now. Thank you to everyone for your help.