Please help! Accidental Pregnancy/Birth

[pcstclair]

Hi there. My family and I came home tonight, after being out of town Christmas Day, to find that Surprise! our two female guinea pigs are NOT both females! Our guinea pig Mercedes has had four adorable little babies! Let me give you a little background history about our guineas. Hershey, our male(that we thought was a female!) was purchased the day after Labor Day. Hershey was approximately 6 weeks old when we got her(him). I repeatedly asked the lady at the petstore(yep, I now know that I should have NEVER bought guineas from a pet store) to make sure that Hershey was a girl. Before buying Hershey I read up on cavies and knew that I did NOT want to have babies, and that I would get two guineas, one for each of my daughters(ages 4 and 10). The pet store that I bought Hershey from only had one female, so we drove an hour away to another store to buy Mercedes. I bought a large cage and the pair have been living happily together since June 1st.
I awoke during the night on Christmas Eve/Christmas morning to one of the guinea pigs "sqeaking", but this is actually quite normal for them, so I went back to sleep. Christmas morning I put food, water, and timothy hay into their cage. Hershey came out to eat(like always), but Mercedes stayed in her hut. She is more timid and generally stays in the hut unless my oldest daughter is the one doing the feeding. We went out of town over night and got home late this evening. My girls went in to check on them and started screaming that the guineas had babies!
I'm guessing that the squeaking that I heard during the night was actually Mercedes giving birth and now I feel so guilty b/c I didnt' know what was going on. I seperated the adults as soon as I found out about the babies and I am just praying that Mercedes is not already pregnant. I called an emergencey exotic animal vet to talk about care for the pups tonight, and will be calling back tomorrow to set up an appt for him to see the whole cavie family. I do have quite a few questions if you all can help me!
1. There doesn't appear to be any residue of afterbirth, blood, etc. But we clean our cage every 3 days and the cage needs to be clean. Is it safe to do this with the little ones?
2. Since Mercedes is a nursing Mother, shouldn't she be recieving additional supplements for herself and the pups? If so, what do I buy?
3. I've seen the pups nursing, but when do they begin to eat guinea food and timothy hay? Do the pups need anything other than the pellets?
4. How large of a cage should they be in? Right now, they are in a pet store cage that is approx 2ft by 3ft.
5. When is it safe to handle the pups?
6. When the pups are sexed and seperated, is it safe to leave the girls with mom and put the boys with dad? Will dad eat or harm the boys since there will obviously be such a huge size difference?

I'm sure that there are a million other things that I am not thinking to ask at this late hour. If any of you can offer any advice about the care of the pups and mom, then PLEASE tell me anything! Again, this was an accidental pregnancy and I did NOT expect it to happen. I was told that these were two female cavies.
Also, I am very interested in building better cages for them. I do not have a ton of money to spend, but I want to do whatever is best for our little pets. I want the family to be safe and happy. Thanks again for your time and help.

[idramaxx0]

I have no experience with babies but I'm pretty certain the babies need to be kept with the mom for the first few weeks. I would separate the dad from the group and keep all the babies with the mom, but again I'm not the expert. I hope everything works out! And just my two cents but I would get the father neutered asap!

[pcstclair]

I typed that Hershey was brought home the day after Labor Day. We actually got Hershey the day after MEMORIAL day. Can you tell that I'm all excited about these babies?

[Deb's4Pigs]

What pellets are you feeding them? A timothy based? Get them an alfalfa based. Oxbow Cavy Performance is good or Kleenmama's.

Keep feeding them veggies and hay they should start nibbling on them. They start eating right away. I'm not sure about cleaning the cage, but I would think it should be OK. It's been a couple of days.

Can't wait to see pictures.

[sarahczspots]

Congrats on the cuties! As for caring for them, I'd make sure that your current cage (and your future one, in case she did rebreed) are baby proofed so that you don't find a little one wandering outside of the cage and to prevent them from getting stuck between bars.

There's a lot of info on this section of the Medical & Veterinary portion of the forum. I'd browse through here for answers to your questions.
Pregnancy and Babies - Guinea Pig Cages, Care, Store, Photos of Guinea Pigs and More Forum!

Sorry, I don't know too much about babies, but I hope you find some answers in the older threads. Welcome and good luck with your pups!

[sarahczspots]

Oh! And here's the url for Guinea Lynx's reproduction page!

http://www.guinealynx.info/reproduction.html

[Ly&Pigs]

1. There doesn't appear to be any residue of afterbirth, blood, etc. But we clean our cage every 3 days and the cage needs to be clean. Is it safe to do this with the little ones? The mom will clean everything up. You can clean the cage with no worries.

2. Since Mercedes is a nursing Mother, shouldn't she be recieving additional supplements for herself and the pups? If so, what do I buy? You can either get alfalfa based pellets or alfalfa hay in addition to grass hay or give higher calcium veggies more often.

3. I've seen the pups nursing, but when do they begin to eat guinea food and timothy hay? Do the pups need anything other than the pellets? Within 1-3 days.

4. How large of a cage should they be in? Right now, they are in a pet store cage that is approx 2ft by 3ft. Your cage is a bit small for even 2 pigs. You will need to separate any male pups at 21 days exactly. The cage size will depend on how many pigs you put in it. See Guinea Pig Cages, Your Cavy At Home for info on proper size for the amount of pigs.

5. When is it safe to handle the pups? At any time.

6. When the pups are sexed and seperated, is it safe to leave the girls with mom and put the boys with dad? Will dad eat or harm the boys since there will obviously be such a huge size difference? Dad will not hurt the pups. He will just show his dominance over them.

[foggycreekcavy]

Since Dad was in with Mom and babies so long after birth, I would just assume Mom is pregnant again. Make sure she gets enough nutrition. Extra fruit/veggies and some alfalfa wouldn't hurt.

Are you intending to keep them all? Definitely make them appropriate sized cages asap. Start holding the babies now and get used to checking their genitalia to find out what gender they are. Here's a guide to help you--

http://www.guinealynx.info/sexing_pups.html

[pcstclair]

I finally held our little babies today!! They are SO beautiful and I am totally in love! That being said, I know that I have to find good, loving homes for at least two, if not three of them. I am pretty positive that our little white one with the black right eye and brown left eye is a girl. I'm thinking that our other little white one with the brown and black markings might be a girl and I'm pretty positive that our little black one with the brown spots is a boy. The only one that I am not sure at all about is the little black one with the brown nose. The genatalia is so dark that I can't tell anything at all. Maybe I could post some pictures and get you all to help. Our vet wants to see them between 10-14 days so I am hoping that he can help me decide what their sexes are. Their piggie motel is almost done, and I can't wait to move them in to their large new digs!

On another note...Hershey(Dad) seems lonely since he is all by himself. Is there anything I can do for him to make hiim happy? I've given him lots of extra lap time, plenty of veggies, hay and treats, and an orange slice which he LOVES. He has also had a lot of free range time. I just don't want him to be depressed. I am thinking of keeping one little girl(if we do have a girl) to keep in with Mercedes(mom), and keeping a little boy to keep in with Hershey. Still trying to think up Christmas type names since they were born Christmas day. So far we have a "Jingle"! LOL

[Sirene]

Congratulations! I'm really glad it's all going well so far. Can't wait to see pics!

Christmas name suggestions: Holly, Rudolph, Snowflake, Gingerbread, Noel... Jingle is great! :-)