Do I need to permanently separate my 2 boars?

[Kat :3]

Hi, new to the forum but had a lot of read about, and was hoping for some advice.

Me and my partner have had a couple of boars for about 2 weeks now, and we are still very new to guinea pig parenting. They are about 4-6 months old. We know that this is their early teenage years that are hormonal and difficult.

In those 2 weeks there has been a lot of dominance behaviours (chasing, teeth chattering, rumble strutting). At best they ignored each other. Pisco is the dominant one but Khuno is not really backing down. At best they ignore each other.

They have gotten now in a number of fights, as in a ball of guinea pigs flailing about. No blood was drawn.

Today they got into a fight again and Pisco ripped out Khuno's fur. We separated them and after a few hours tried to reintroduce them. It happened again.

They have 2 of everything in the cage. We are currently in the process of building them a larger c&c cage (120x60) with a loft(60x90).

We are pretty stressed out by the situation at this point (with me being super stressed and upset).

Any advice on where to go from here? Should we keep them separated until we can reintroduce them in a larger cage (although am aware that will likely start with dominance behaviours over new territory) or should we split the c&c into two cages separating them but in a way they can still 'talk'? More pigs are not an option for us. Thanks!

 

[Siikibam]

I think given they’ve already had the rolling ball of fur that you will unfortunately have to separate them. For a bond to work, there can only be one top pig. If the other isn’t backing down and accepting his underpig position then it won’t work.

Even if you build them a larger cage I don’t think that will make a difference. They don’t get on. You’ll have to put them side by side and each need a 120x60cm. That way they can still interact through the bars.

As an aside (for future reference), boars need minimum 150x60cm on one level. But we recommend 180x60cm. Guinea pigs are ground roaming and so their space requirements need to be met on one level. Additional levels are a bonus but don’t count towards their minimum requirements.

 

[Deleted member 139433]

Unfortunately their relationship is only likely to get worse if they can’t establish a hierarchy.

 

[Kat :3]

Thank you both. This is very sad but in a way reasurring that we can at least have them living side by side and interacting that way without harming each other.