Chirping

R

Rumblestiltskin

Junior Guinea Pig
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Good Evening

I adopted a neutered boar and sow just over 2 weeks ago and am new to guinea pigs.

He is clearly the dominant pig and much more confident. She's very sweet and smart but clearly the underpig, I do hear squeals from her at times (they are indoors). Ive provided 2 of everything and hideys with 2 holes.

I kind of thought Id heard the odd chirp but wondered if it was actually a bird. But this evening I went and closed the blind in their room and turned the light off and she went into a full on chirp. She only stopped when I went in to check on her, at which point she dashed into the other hidey with her friend (they dont generally share hideys as he enjoys rumbling about).

A web browse seems to suggest this is a rare sound that is little understood? I think I have a chirper...Maybe it was a change to her environment? (lights off). Truthfully I do worry a bit about her but am observing her closely....I'm not familiar with guinea pig social hierarchies and want to be sure she has a good bond with her cage mate and isnt overly dominated.
 
Sequinn said:
Good Evening

I adopted a neutered boar and sow just over 2 weeks ago and am new to guinea pigs.

He is clearly the dominant pig and much more confident. She's very sweet and smart but clearly the underpig, I do hear squeals from her at times (they are indoors). Ive provided 2 of everything and hideys with 2 holes.

I kind of thought Id heard the odd chirp but wondered if it was actually a bird. But this evening I went and closed the blind in their room and turned the light off and she went into a full on chirp. She only stopped when I went in to check on her, at which point she dashed into the other hidey with her friend (they dont generally share hideys as he enjoys rumbling about).

A web browse seems to suggest this is a rare sound that is little understood? I think I have a chirper...Maybe it was a change to her environment? (lights off). Truthfully I do worry a bit about her but am observing her closely....I'm not familiar with guinea pig social hierarchies and want to be sure she has a good bond with her cage mate and isnt overly dominated.
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Hi and welcome

We still don't know what chirping is about exactly. Many of us go through an entire ownership without every hearing it but once you have a chirper, you are more likely to hear more. My first one-off chip was in 2006. In my piggy room the task of being a chirper has kind of been passed on between my piggies down the years for the past 15 years since my chirping queen Heulwen gave regular concerts.

With the rise of social media, chirping has been found to be somewhat more common than expected but its interpretation has undergone several mutations over the years.

Here is more about chirping:
Chirping - Taking Stock of a Mystery Behaviour

Here is more of what I personally think of chirping, where it could come from and what its role could have been.
Chirping - Taking Stock of a Mystery Behaviour (see chapter 10)
 
Welcome to the piggie crew!

I feel like there's many reasons why they do it so it's difficult to pinpoint why exactly they are doing it in the moment. My boy Gizmo started doing it a few days after his cagemate passed I think it was his way of grieving but I don't know. I've never heard it until then even with having 3 before him.
 
A few of my pigs have chirped. Most recently one of my sows was chirping after I moved a bereaved pig to live next door to her. She has very poor eyesight (even for a guinea pig) and I thought that perhaps the sound/movement of another pig close by threw her a bit and she was chirping so loudly I could hear her across the hall! Others have chirped if I forgot to close the blind in their room on an evening - possibly shadows scaring them? It’s difficult to know. What I do know is that all the other pigs are generally very quiet and still when one of them is chirping, which makes me think it’s some sort of alarm call, but that’s just a guess.
 
Thank you for your kind responses and the links. It’s just a little alarming at this very new and inexperienced stage of guinea pig ownership, as I don’t know them well enough to fully understand their dynamic or if they are both happy. My Guinea pig owning friends were like oh we don’t know we’ve never heard chirping!

I guess I’m just going to have to see as we go along and note when she chirps, although I’m unlikely to solve such a mystery. As long as it’s not definitely a negative sound and I don’t have an unhappy pig, which is my worry. She’s definitely a nervous /shy girl but I’m rather taken with her.
 
Sequinn said:
Thank you for your kind responses and the links. It’s just a little alarming at this very new and inexperienced stage of guinea pig ownership, as I don’t know them well enough to fully understand their dynamic or if they are both happy. My Guinea pig owning friends were like oh we don’t know we’ve never heard chirping!

I guess I’m just going to have to see as we go along and note when she chirps, although I’m unlikely to solve such a mystery. As long as it’s not definitely a negative sound and I don’t have an unhappy pig, which is my worry. She’s definitely a nervous /shy girl but I’m rather taken with her.
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Concentrate on settling her in and be patient. Trust and confidence are both plants that need to make deep roots first before they can grow up, make leaves and bear fruit.
But there is nothing like the first realisation that your nervous piggy is implicitly trusting you. These special moments are something you cannot buy, you can only earn them when the situation and time is right. ;)

Most owners underestimate what being brought a complex home with all its smells, noises and human giants means for a guinea pig that comes from comparatively sterile and rather minimal commercial mass breeding surroundings with a stressed mother and no loving human contact; the same also applies to for-sale breeders.
Arrival in a home from the perspective of pet shop guinea pigs

We generally forget that guinea pigs have a higher hearing range and especially a much finer sense of smell compared to humans, so they can react to stimuli we are not aware off.
 
Thank you. These are older Guinea pigs that have come from a rescue to be rehomed (about 2 &3 years old). I’ve kind of been leaving them to it but chatting to them, offering hand feeding - the boy is coming around. I’m not sure how far she will come around but she has grown in confidence since I brought them home. Unfortunately I had to take them to the vets on day 3 because I noted a lot of scratching. The poor things have mites so hopefully they will feel even brighter once they are gone.
 
Sequinn said:
Thank you. These are older Guinea pigs that have come from a rescue to be rehomed (about 2 &3 years old). I’ve kind of been leaving them to it but chatting to them, offering hand feeding - the boy is coming around. I’m not sure how far she will come around but she has grown in confidence since I brought them home. Unfortunately I had to take them to the vets on day 3 because I noted a lot of scratching. The poor things have mites so hopefully they will feel even brighter once they are gone.
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Please be aware that either variety of mites (hay or mange) need three rounds of vet grade treatment and not just one. Not all vets are aware of that.
But the relief that your treatment brings will help to slowly grow trust. With some rescue piggies it can take some months rather than weeks to bring them round but it is always worth it.
New Guinea Pig Problems: Sexing & Pregnancy; URI, Ringworm & Parasites; Vet Checks & Customer Rights

For bookmarking:
New Owners' Essential Information and Practical Tips Starter Collection

Owners' Comprehensive Helpful and Supportive Information Collection
 
Truffle was a chirper when we first got him. He would chirp away early evening every day! As he is young (now 6 months old), I wasn't sure if it was a sound they make to locate / re-connect to their Mum and/or herd. Bubble, his friend, would look a bit wide-eyed at the time, making it seem like an alarm type call, but once he saw where Bubble was in the cage he would settle down. Truffle would also chirp and go around in circles and pace up and down when there was food on the way, but now instead, he does the loudest wheeking I think I have ever heard!
 
Welcome to the forum.
I’ve never had a chirper.
Phoebe chirped once and surprised herself so much she never did it again 😊

Lots of fun and information here.
We love photos too.
 
I have a chirper :) The first time I heard her I was in another room and thought a bird had somehow got into the house. I have 2 videos of her when she has a full-on chirping session and my other piggies just look at her and carry on munching.
 
Merab said:
Welcome to the forum.
I’ve never had a chirper.
Phoebe chirped once and surprised herself so much she never did it again 😊

Lots of fun and information here.
We love photos too.
Click to expand...
Thank you for the welcome. It sounds like Phoebe wasnt quite sure why she was chirping, in which case us humans have no hope! 😂
 
Wiebke said:
Please be aware that either variety of mites (hay or mange) need three rounds of vet grade treatment and not just one. Not all vets are aware of that.
But the relief that your treatment brings will help to slowly grow trust. With some rescue piggies it can take some months rather than weeks to bring them round but it is always worth it.
New Guinea Pig Problems: Sexing & Pregnancy; URI, Ringworm & Parasites; Vet Checks & Customer Rights

For bookmarking:
New Owners' Essential Information and Practical Tips Starter Collection

Owners' Comprehensive Helpful and Supportive Information Collection
Click to expand...
Ive found what I believe is a cavvy savvy vet - regular vet with special interest in rabbits and pigs. Theyre booked in for more mite treatment (the girl Daphne is under 1kg she needs careful measuring of the treatment).

Time will tell!
 
Sequinn said:
Ive found what I believe is a cavvy savvy vet - regular vet with special interest in rabbits and pigs. Theyre booked in for more mite treatment (the girl Daphne is under 1kg she needs careful measuring of the treatment).

Time will tell!
Click to expand...

Thank you for clarifying. We have to check and make sure with new members in order to save them problems down the line. ;)
 
We've heard many of our pigs chirp occasionally and some of them were habitual chirpers at least for a period of time. Our past pig Tomie chirped a lot... I actually don't think I've heard it since she passed away. No idea what brought it on but it was cute when it happened!
 
Freela said:
We've heard many of our pigs chirp occasionally and some of them were habitual chirpers at least for a period of time. Our past pig Tomie chirped a lot... I actually don't think I've heard it since she passed away. No idea what brought it on but it was cute when it happened!
Click to expand...
I'm happy to hear experienced guinea pig owners experience's of chirping as it doesnt seem to be anything worrying in its own right! They seem to be fascinating little critters
 
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