Getting one too many guinea pigs

[Oleboleskole5]

Hello!

One of our guinea pigs died a couple months ago, so we decided to get a new boar for our lonely boy. When we got there, two guinea pigs cought our eyes - a couple of teddies. My mother and sister in law were immediately in love, and I grew fond of them as well. We went home with 2 piggies instead of one.

We were told that our cage would need an upgrade in a couple of weeks, which we have looked into today. It's about time that our three boys got a new cage to live in.
The issue is that my mother will not settle for anything larger than 140 cm long. The minimum for 3 is 160, the recommended is 180, according to Kavee and some articles. My mother has read multiple articles stating that 140 is enough. I want our little boys to have the best lives they can get, but this size won't do, considering 3 boars might be too much for such a cage.

My mother and sister in law have suggested putting the piggies in a play-pen during the day and back in a cage of 140 cm during the night. From what I've seen from our piggies, they become distressed when taken out for play time, even if they get treats. Given enough time, money or the right strategies, would this work in practice?

I really need advice here. ways to persuade my family, possible solutions to this - anything.
Do note that there is not a lot of guinea pig designed items here in Denmark, so our options are very limited - If I manage to persuade my mother, we'll probably buy something from an online store.

 

[WWDrew]

Boy trios rarely work out so I would say giving them the most space allows there not to be a three way fall out where you need three cages to keep them from fighting.

There’s a lot of people here that would be able to go into more detail.

Good Luck

 

[Piggies&buns]

I’m sorry for your loss.

How old are the piggies?

I’m so sorry to be the bearer of bad news but I’m afraid the advice is not going to be what you want to hear:

1. Boars do much better when kept in pairs. Boar trios (or more) generally don’t work. You will need to have a plan for them to split up.
2. The cage sizes you have seen as suitable for three piggies, of 160/180, only apply to sow trios (a 140 cage is only suitable for two sows (not suitable for boars at all)). These cage sizes are nowhere near big enough for a boar trio.
3. The plan of a playpen during the day and into a smaller cage at night will not work where the night time cage does not meet the required cage size

Boar trios are highly unstable and most don’t work long term, particularly where there are young boars involved. Anybody attempting a boar trio needs to have a huge space, an acceptance of the likelihood of failure along with the ability to split them up and put them into separate cages.
I’ve linked in the ‘Adding more piggies’ guide below which explains more about why boar trios are not recommended.

As I mentioned above, the minimum cage sizing you have seen of 160/180 only applies to sow trios (they don’t need as much room). You will not be able to follow these sizing rules with a boar trio - you have to go much bigger due to their more territorial nature and the instability a boar trio face.
For a boar trio, the recommended cage size is 300x100cm. That is so you provide at least one square metre of space per piggy so that they have enough territory.
Unfortunately we see a lot of people misadvised by shops etc about the long term ability to keep a boar trio and the cage sizes they require.

Two boars need a 180x60cm cage, so you can see that a 140x60cm is definitely not going to work for three boars in any way or at any time. (As I say, a 140 cage is actually only suitable for two sows).
By the normal cage sizing recommendations, you need to add 30x60cm per additional piggy to the cage size, so going by this alone the cage should be no smaller than 210x60cm but we know this sizing ratio doesn’t tend to work when attempting a boar trio hence the need for one square metre per piggy.

There are unfortunately no commercial cages which would be big enough for a boar trio (to be honest there aren’t any big enough for a pair really). This means you will need to make your own cage or use c&c grids (a 9x3 grid c&c would meet the size needed for a boar trio).

Any cage/playpen/space they are in at any time of day or night needs to meet the size requirements (with a playpen needing to be equal to or ideally larger than their cage). You can’t move them somewhere smaller and below requirements at night just because they have had space in a playpen during the day - piggies don’t sleep like we do so they can’t have less space at night.

You also need multiple resources so they need a lot of room in the cage to accommodate it - you need at least three double ended hides in the cage, plus three separate hay piles and water bottles with clear space between each for getting away from each other so that won’t all fit in a 140cm cage.

However, providing enough space does not guarantee long term success with a boar trio, but lack of space certainly would increase the risk of failure.
They may end up as a pair and a single (that means you need to prepare to need two cages - one of 120x60cm (3x2 c&c minimum) for the single; and a 180x60cm (5x2 c&c) for the pair - all must be side by side);
or
it can happen that all three fall out meaning you need three separate cages all of at least 120x60cm (all must be side by side).

Moving from space to space can further destabilise sensitive groupings and something as unstable as a boar trio would be particularly susceptible to going into a space which isn’t big enough.

It also needs to be noted that changing their cage size now will cause them to go into a two week period of reestablishing their hierarchy and territories. Being told to upgrade after a few weeks was unfortunately not the right advice - their cage really needed to be the right size before they moved into it particularly as you are dealing with what is already a difficult grouping.
While it’s not impossible to increase cage size afterwards, the fact they are in a notoriously unstable grouping and (if they are young) combined with the onset of hormones, this cage change can bring underlying issues to the surface and thus be the potential catalyst for issues to start to occur. (Being blunt though, issues are likely to occur even if they were already in the right cage size - it’s just due to the difficulties a boar trio faces).
However as you have no choice but to provide enough space, you will need to ride out the reestablishing period regardless of the risks associated with it in this situation. (Potentially meaning you increase the cage size and then if it does start issues off, you would then have to split them straight up).
I’ve added the reestablishing guide below for information and tips on how to go towards minimising the disruption.

I’m sorry this is a lot and is so negative but taking on a boar trio is a big challenge and anything but straightforward.

Once you can provide the right size space, have enough resources for them, and for a back up plan for separation in mind, then youve done all you can and it is then a case of hoping for the best that they can work out a functioning hierarchy between them.

Adding More Guinea Pigs Or Merging Pairs – What Works And What Not?
Reacting to group or territorial changes: Dominance and group establishment/re-establishment