Fighting 2 Male Guinea Pigs 1 year old and 8 months old fighting

[giuseppepig]

I have 2 wonderful hairless piggies and I love them both, but they fight a lot when around eachother. I mean like full on fighting, resulting in multiple wounds (2 of which became pustules and resulted in multiple vet visits). Wondering if there's something I can do to help, tried seperating them but they get incredibly sad and lonely, so I put them in the same cage with a seperator in the middle, but then they refused to eat and just kinda stared and wheeked at the other one through the holes

 

[bpatters]

They're in the big middle of puberty, so it may be a while before they'll peacefully live with each other.

But for starters, you need a very large cage for two young males. You need something to block the sight lines in the cage so they're not always in view of each other. And a buddy bath might help -- the shared terror may make them fonder of each other. If you do try the bath, put a teeny tiny drop of vanilla on each nose and butt after you're done.

But you say they fight when they're around each other. Does that mean you only put them together sometimes, and separate them the rest of the time? If so, that won't work. Guinea pigs are wired to establish dominance over another pig every time they meet one, so every new meeting kicks off a new dominance struggle. If you want them to live together, you'll have to do a successful introduction and then leave them together. If it doesn't work, wait six months and try again.

 

[giuseppepig]

They're almost always around eachother, but they fight a lot, so I have to seperate so I can care for both of them and look for wounds just in case. But I will try giving them a shared bath with the drop of vanilla thing. As for the cage size, I made sure it was the right size for 2 of them. Thank you for the advice, I will update you if anything comes up!

 

[4boipigs]

What is the cage size?

 

[bpatters]

Ditto @4boipigs. If you've got a commercial cage, it's almost certainly too small for two boars. They need at least 11 or 12 square feet, and more is definitely better.