Hello From Texas

[Chewie]

Hello, I have one two month old guinea pig named Chewie. He's a great little guy, and loves to be scratched. I live in Houston, TX, and I am 24 years old. This is my first Guinea pig. I just got him yesterday from a breeder in my area. He's in a store bought cage right now, but I plan to up grade it soon to one of the cube cages. I think those are really neat! Chewie is not my only pet, I have several others besides him, but he's the only one who gets a ton of play time.

[PiggieMom]

It's too late now, but the next time you are looking for a pig (or any animal) Please avoid breeding or supporting breeding.
http://cavyspirit.com/breeding.htm
http://cavyspirit.com/hollister.htm
http://cavyspirit.com/petstores.htm
http://www.guinealynx.com/breeding.html

There are over 2,000 recorded (there are a lot more that aren't reported) homeless cavies as of March 2006 in the US alone (according to petfinder.com). Breeding is also very dangerous, 1 in 5 sow dies giving birth. There are also genetic abnormalities that occur because of inbreeding or breeding the wrong breeds together resulting in lethals.http://www.cavycages.com/forum/showthread.php?t=4190

Adoption is worth the effort. Check out the adoption forum on this forum, on www.guinealynx.com, on www.pigloo.net, check out www.petfinder.com, you local humane society, your local newspaper, http://cavyrescue.com/, http://www.craigslist.org/. Be patient and you will be able to save a wonderful pig.

Welcome to the forum.

Please read over this thread it has a lot of good information on piggie care: http://www.cavycages.com/forum/showthread.php?t=17032

[fourbwabbys]

Right now on petfinder, there are over 100 homeless guinea pigs in Houston alone. Even more in the surrounding areas. Please adopt next time.

[Chewie]

Wow, that's a nice welcome. I don't think I'll be coming back to this forum.

[fourbwabbys]

Sorry, but we are very against breeding when there are so many homeless animals, escpecially in that area. It's all in the rules.


With that aside:

Welcome to the forum! Do you have any pigtures of Chewie?

[JennG]

Welcome to the forum Chewie but...this forum is against breeders/petstores/etc... There are many animals out there in shelters/rescues that are in need of a good home. I'm sure once you've been around you'll realize why we very strongly encourage people to rescue. I hope you consider getting your piggie a friend. They're herd animals and like to be with a peer. It's good to see that you're going to be building a C&C cage. They are awesome and fun to build plus the piggies really benefit from all that room.

[PiggieMom]

No one is getting down on you, we just want you to realize the overpopulation problem and how breeding and pet stores encourage it. I wanted to show you the possiblities and joys of adoptions. As it has been said, there are very many homeless pigs in your area.

Many have us had made the mistake of buying from a breeder or pet store before finding this site. But then we found this site and realized how important adoption is and how awful breeding is. Please read the links I provided and you will understand.

This is a wonderful forum filled with wonderful people and wonderful advice. I really hope you stick around.

[C&K]

There was nothing overtly rude said to you. The responses I read seemed to be very well thought out and assumed that you where not aware of the guinea pig over population problems in your area.

Sadly, Texas in particular is a hot spot for homeless guineas! There are always 100's of them in rescue throughout the state. I see nothing wrong in anyone pointing this out. They where not mean or rude; and did not say anything of the sort about your pig.

So, if you still think that buying from a breeder, while hundreds of pigs are euthed every year in your state alone is fine, then perhaps it is best that you don't come back. There are lots of other forums that welcome all sorts, but this is not one of them, we are very much anti breeding. If you don't like it, probably best to quietly leave!