Female Aggression

[Dustin]

Hey forum!

We've had our Guinea pig, piggy stardust, who is an older pig, for about a month now. When payday rolled around, we bought all the things to build a C&C cage, along with another guinea pig, a younger, smaller female (we had heard aggression towards young guineas was seldom) we let the two hang out on the couch for a bit and they did fine, no rumble strutting or teeth chattering or anything! However, when we moved them both to the brand new C&C cage, piggy stardust started rumble strutting and chattering, which I didn't worry about until she started biting the baby. We don't ever separate them until piggy bites, and we have piggy stardust in a clear tub in the same cage, so they can see and hear each other. This has been going on f

 

[Dustin]

For about four days now, and I'm at a total loss as to what to do! Today, piggy stardust tore a big chunk of baby pigs hair out... My girlfriend is already attached to baby pig, so I'd like to keep her if at all possible.

(Sorry I hit send a bit too early, I'm on my phone)

 

[piggyfan]

Did you clean the cage before putting them both in? If not I would do that. You can also try giving them a bonding bath.

 

[Wiebke]

I am very sorry about the aggression, but is the biting just nipping and not actual bloody bites?

Nipping (just letting the underpiggy feel the teeth without doing any harm) is par for the course of dominance behaviour although taking out a big chunk of fur usually isn't. Single piggies who have never been around many piggies since they were small babies often struggle to adjust and can go overboard on the dominance. The underpiggy will scream loudly in submission, but usually NOT in pain, in a "I'm no rival of yours" preventative way, which is generally pretty effective. For the uninitiated, it is easy to think that they are being mauled.

Please make sure that both piggies have only hideys with two exits (most of the aggression/damage happens when a piggy is locked into a corner and can't escape or get out of the way quickly enough), at least one per piggy. Also make sure that there are no corners where the underpiggy can be caught in.
Feed them with separate bowls, spaced a good body length apart, so the dominant girl can't hog it all.

The rest is mainly sitting it out; it can last a few weeks, but hopefully they will settle down together eventually and even become good friends once your older girl is feeling safe in her position.
http://www.theguineapigforum.co.uk/threads/sow-behaviour.38561/
http://www.theguineapigforum.co.uk/threads/dominance-behaviours-in-guinea-pigs.28949/

 

[Dustin]

The cage that we put them in together was brand new, and we have two huts for them. The huts only have one entrance, so I'll pick up some with two exits. I wasn't very worried, because my previous females had very similar behavior, but piggy stardust actually latched onto baby pig and started like rolling around and trying to drag her around. I read on a couple websites that when it goes that far, it could actually be serious. I guess I need to stop worrying so much, but I was totally not prepared based on my previous piggie experience.

 

[Wiebke]

Sorry, if they have actually ended up in a real scuffle, then it IS serious and frankly the bonding is not likely to succeed. Once piggies have made up their minds somepig is "not us" (even if it is a one-piggy-group) then they are not liekly to change their mind!

You can only work on it as long as your piggies are in the "perhaps us" stage of bonding and no serious aggression has happened. Sadly, sometimes the chemistry is just not there!

Which country are you in? here in Britain, we've got good rescues that offer dating single piggies at the rescue under expert supervision in order to bond them with a rescue piggy of their choice. This is sadly rarely an option in other countries.