Hello from GA

It is me again.

We just got our new computer. The one I posted with before was painfully slow.

I am glad I found this site. I used to be a foster mom for a local dog rescue. I searched on Petfinder for a guinea pig but sadly there were none in our area.

There was an individual looking to rehome two guinea pigs on our local Craigslist and I inquired about them but never heard back.

We ended up at a locally owned pet store. We got our bird there 5 years ago. Low turnover in staff and they are decently knowledgeable.

I did some research on guinea pigs prior to buying but it was mainly on cage size, etc. We got Pickles on Friday. I also purchased a guinea pig book. I read that we really needed to get 2 pigs. What little research I could do online (remember, my painfully slow, ancient computer) and tossed and turned all night. If we were going to give Pickles a home we wanted him to have the BEST home.

So the next day we went back and got his brother.

Our little guinea pigs have been here less than a week and they've been family from day one. I have a two year old daughter who loves them, supervised of course.

I am looking forward to making an indoor play area for them. Maybe down the line build one of your cages. I didn't see this site before we purchased a cage, but the one we got is pretty big.

Here are a few photos of our little guys.

Natalie and Pickles in the car on the way home. No he didn't ride like that..but I had my husband and friends and family whom I had promised a photo as soon as we picked out a guinea pig.


Gizmo on the left and Pickles on the right.


If you've read all this, then bless you. I hope to become an active part of this community. I am sure I have a lot to learn.

Thank you
Sarah

There were other avenues to obtaining guinea pigs than buying from a pet store/ breeding mill/ backyard breeders.

If they are both boys, be prepared to dominance issues in a few months. I hope you have at least a 2 by 4 C&C for them? What may seem big to you isn't big enough for them.

Books out there on guinea pigs are usually terribly wrong and out of date. You are better off reading up here and www.guinealynx.info

utsarah said:

Hello

After doing some reasearch we decided to add a guinea pig to our family. We read that they needed companionship so we went back the next day adn got our original pig's brother.

We have two guinea pigs who are around 8 weeks old. Their names are Pickles and Gizmo.

I registered an account here so I can learn tips about feeding, etc from experienced guinea pig owners.

My name is Sarah and I have a daughter who is 2 years old. I am married. We also have a male cockatiel.

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I used to have a female cockatiel, in a addition to my guinea pigs. I had her cage next to the pigs. They seemed to enjoy each others' company. When my cockatiel died from old age, I only kept guinea pigs.

rabbitsncavyluv said:

I don't get it - you rescue dogs but think it is okay to support those kinds of breeders that sell to pet stores?

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I guess the guinea pigs in stores don't deserve homes.

I really don't appreciate the attitude. We made the right decision for our family.

There were NO rescues near us. You may have good information to share with people but think about your approach, it may make people tune you out when you are so judgmental and harsh.

rabbitsncavyluv said:

If they are both boys, be prepared to dominance issues in a few months. I hope you have at least a 2 by 4 C&C for them? What may seem big to you isn't big enough for them.

Books out there on guinea pigs are usually terribly wrong and out of date. You are better off reading up here and www.guinealynx.info

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I have already read up on that website. I also have a very large cage for them. From what I've read there are not necessarily always issues between males.

pinky said:

I used to have a female cockatiel, in a addition to my guinea pigs. I had her cage next to the pigs. They seemed to enjoy each others' company. When my cockatiel died from old age, I only kept guinea pigs.

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So far they haven't seem to notice each other. Our cockatiel did give me the stink eye when I was cuddling the pigs the other day. Poor little guy may be a bit jealous.

Our cockatiel is extremely tame. I usually open his cage in the morning and he has a playstand on his cage that he plays on or a perch I made for him by our front windows he likes to survey his kingdom from.

He used to imitate our little dog (she died a couple of weeks ago, complications of diabetes). If anything we're looking forward to him imitating guinea pig sounds!

I guess the guinea pigs in stores don't deserve homes.

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Not at the expense of sows dying due to back breeding and poor care to produce them and not at the cost of homeless pigs not getting a home due to buying them in petstores. Wherever there are pet stores, there are pigs in need of homes via other sources.

There were NO rescues near us.

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Maybe not, but there are other sources such as craigslist, forum listings and your local newspaper. There are ways to find pigs without purchasing them in petstores.

This is getting absolutely ridiculous.

If the above poster would have READ my original posts I stated that I tried to get a pig through Craigslist.

I came here thinking I could maybe learn some information from some other guinea pig owners. This isn't a very nice "welcome" to a newbie.

This board seems to want to educate people about proper guinea pig care. I think that those who are in charge may want to rethink how new people are treated. If new people register an account, get treated like I (and others I've seen) have they will leave.

In the end who does that really hurt?

I am going to give it a few days and probably not come on here and post to give it some thought. I'm not going to let myself be treated like a piece of garbage by people on a messageboard because they don't like ONE decision I made.

The guinea pigs were purchased from a pet store. End of story. If people on here can't get past that then I think this isn't the place for me. I didn't create an account to be insulted, I came to learn about guinea pig care.

Hi Sarah, and welcome to the forum from a fellow newbie!
I hope you decide to stick around - this forum really does provide a ton of useful information for new-ish pig owners like us - just don't mention the war (pet store)! lol

I don't see any direct insults to you at all anywhere in this thread.

I'm sorry if you feel that you are being treated badly, but that is not our (the mods) intention. What we are trying to get you to understand is why it's so bad to buy pigs in petstores.

I do hope you will be willing to stick around and learn about proper care. Yes, you got your pigs from the petstore and there is nothing you can do now to change that but you can learn why we feel the way we do. That's all we ask.

Let's just drop the whole subject of where I got them.

I tried Craigslist and never got any replies.

The rescue closest to me states on their petfinder site that they do not adopt to people who live more than an hour away. We live more than 2 hours away. (we would have been willing to drive to pick the guinea pigs up by the way)

The rescue in Knoxville, TN has some nice guinea pigs, but they won't adopt if you have a child under the age of 6, and I have a two year old. I can understand the rescue's policy on this. My husband and I know our 2 year old, her behavior, etc. She's been with our pet bird since her birth. We've taught her to be gentle with him, etc. They are now great friends.

As for our guinea pigs she only holds them while supervised, obviously. We are reminding her to be gentle, etc. She already is very gentle, but she is also 2 so we know that we need to be with her.

We're very happy to have these two little sweet guinea pigs in our lives. We love them. Our family project this weekend is for all of us to make our indoor play area for them.

So if anyone would like to discuss ideas for a neat indoor play area with me that would be great. I am thinking of using the cubes like you all use for your cages. We gave carpeting in our living room but I figured we'd just put down newspaper when the pigs are out to play. My carpet is used to spells..I have a 2 year old. I have a steam cleaner and vacuum so I am not too worried about messes. I just want the guinea pigs to have a nice place to play inside.

Hello, and welcome. I love your gps names

Your little girl really knows how to treat a piggie gently. That is an adorable picture of her with Pickles. Did she name him that? I am wondering how anybody would ever think of Pickles for a guinea pig! Maybe it is a variant of Piggles?
And the other piggie is cute too; he has a darling little white face.

Cogni said:

I am wondering how anybody would ever think of Pickles for a guinea pig!

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Ha, when my sister was little she named a cat Broccoli. lol

Welcome to the site, Utsarah. Adorable piggies and I love the picture of your daughter holding Pickles, way too cute!

Welcome UT.. I got my cage online, and love it! Check out the pictures on the photo gallery they gave me TONS! of ideas.. I just moved my piggy to that cage after finding this site. I really had no clue a 30" x 12" wasnt big enough. ( how dumb was I??) Nor did my poor piggy get hay or veggy's! How sad to think for approx. 6 months he lived with crappy pellets and nothing else.!!
But anyways welcome again!
Also you can find some of the cutest hideys and cozys on ebay.. I have bought 3 there in the last two weeks!! ( jus an idea )

Cogni said:

Your little girl really knows how to treat a piggie gently. That is an adorable picture of her with Pickles. Did she name him that? I am wondering how anybody would ever think of Pickles for a guinea pig! Maybe it is a variant of Piggles?
And the other piggie is cute too; he has a darling little white face.

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She did think of the name..which is kind of weird because I don't know how she thought of it.

We are wanting some more hideys, etc. I am probably going to make them C&C cage when they get bigger. I think I read that young pigs can escape from them.

We are gong to get some cubes to make a fence for an indoor play area though. We were going to go today but my daughter got sick this morning! :sad: Poor kid has a sinus infection a couple of weeks ago, strep throat last week and now vomiting. Ugh

Youg pigs can escape- but that's not a reason to keep them in a storebought cage (which is STILL too small, even for a baby, and DEFINITELY for a pair!). Do a search for "babyproofing" and you'll find lots of tips on how to make a C&C safe for smaller/young pigs.

ferndalezoo said:

Youg pigs can escape- but that's not a reason to keep them in a storebought cage (which is STILL too small, even for a baby, and DEFINITELY for a pair!). Do a search for "babyproofing" and you'll find lots of tips on how to make a C&C safe for smaller/young pigs.

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Do you know the dimensions of the cage I purchased?

In that picture, your daughter did look like she was being gentle, but be cautious, guinea pigs can bite. Also, they can jump and fall very easily. My sister holds my pigs a lot. She is 33! And my pig has managed to jump off her bed, resulting in a broken tooth. And recently she rolled over to get her remote control off of the night stand, and the pig that was on her belly fell on the floor. But, welcome to the forums!

utsarah said:

Do you know the dimensions of the cage I purchased?

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All pet store cages are too small. If you read the main site, it says they are glorified litterboxes.

Unless you ordered the Midwest Guinea Habitat with expansion kit?

I have yet to have any young guinea pigs escape from a baby proofed and correctly built C&C.

Fern is right.

khptown said:

In that picture, your daughter did look like she was being gentle, but be cautious, guinea pigs can bite. Also, they can jump and fall very easily. My sister holds my pigs a lot. She is 33! And my pig has managed to jump off her bed, resulting in a broken tooth. And recently she rolled over to get her remote control off of the night stand, and the pig that was on her belly fell on the floor. But, welcome to the forums!

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Yeah that was for picture purposes.

Mainly the guinea pigs are "my" babies. Natalie will pet them or feed them veggies when they are on my lap. She is very gentle but at the same time our guys are very young. They could easily get away from her and get injured, hide, etc.

We are building their play area tonight as a family project. Although I am one primarily responsible for their care we view them as family pets. I think it will be good to let Natalie "help" us make the play area, add things, etc.