Dominance Will two dominant guinea pigs do well together.

[miss.lyonice]

I've been looking into getting another guinea pig for about 2-months now. I had no idea I'd like guinea pigs as much as I do, and everything has been great. So, since I have the room (I have a 2 x 6 c&c cage) I was looking into adopting another. Well, I found a lady who is giving away an adult female guinea pig because it's very dominant and isn't doing well with her current ones. My question is, is there any way I can integrate a very dominant guinea pig with my two current guinea pigs, one of which is pretty dominate herself? When Mars was chasing Poppy around and bullying her, I made the cage bigger and now they mind their own business. I was wondering if that would help. I'm not sure. I just don't want to jump in and get a guinea pig that's not going to do well with my current ones without any knowledge of how to prevent or handle the situation. If you could help that would be great. Thanks

 

[bpatters]

There's no way to know. They may hate each other at first sight, or they may be best buddies.

Since the woman is giving the pig away, will she let you do a meet-and-greet? Get the pigs together and see how they get along? It's not a 100% guarantee that it would work when they're all in the same cage, but it should tell you if they're going to attack each other immediately.

 

[CavyTV]

You could try expanding the cage even more if they start to fight. I'd suggest going wider - 3 or 4 grids wide. 2 of everything as well. Having multiple hay racks at different locations in the cage could help.

Definitely ask if your pigs can meet the other piggie, as bpatters suggested. And if not, then you call the shots. You can take a risk, or you can play it safe. You may end up with expensive vet bills because of injuries or drawn blood. You may end up with 4 pigs, you may end up with 3 single pigs, or you may end up having only 2 again.

 

[eternalpnk]

There's a chance they will get along, but I wouldn't bet on it just because it did not work well with my piggies. I have two dominant guinea pigs and the first time I put them together, it escalated to flying at each other within 30 minutes. I ended up separating them because neither one was backing down or showing signs of backing down so I just ended up having to get a baby guinea pig for one of the dominate guinea pigs that did not have a buddy.