Guinea pigs and hamsters together - yes or no?

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Hi everyone,

I've had the chance to adopt some guinea pigs come up, and wanted to get more opinions. I have kept guinea pigs before, but never kept them side-by-side with another animal.

I have some hamsters that are kept by other family members, and they suggested that it may be easier to keep all the pets in one place i.e. like a free-run enclosure in a room.

I've read that guinea pigs and hamsters shouldn't be kept together (source: Can You Keep A Guinea Pig And A Hamster In The Same Cage? | Rodent As Pet ), but haven't really found many other good articles that talk about these 2 specific rodents.

Have you kept guinea pigs and hamsters together before? If so, did that work out? What did you do? Any tips and suggestions would be really helpful in me making a decision to adopt these cute little cavies!
 
Hi and welcome
That doesn't sound like a good idea to me. They are not meant to be together, and would not come into contact with each other in the wild. They may, and most likely will, hurt each other. Please do not do this.
Not only this, but they have completely different needs in terms of food, housing and enrichment.
Guinea pigs are herbivores and eat mainly hay (should make up 80% of their diet), along with a tablespoon of pellets and a cup of veggies each day. Guinea pigs need a large, one-level cage. Hamsters are omnivores, on the other hand, do not eat hay (and probably shouldn't eat it), and you wouldn't want them eating each others food as this could cause health issues. Hamsters need to have a wheel in their enclosure, and benefit from crowded cages with lots of things to do. Guinea pigs need enough unbroken space to run and popcorn, and could seriously hurt themselves if they tried to use a wheel.
I'm glad you decided to research first 👍 🙂
 
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In addition to what everyone has said above, there is no potential benefit from keeping them together. They cannot communicate and will not form a “herd” because they do not see each other as the same (and hamsters have no interest in herds, anyway). I imagine it would cause both species tremendous stress to be kept with something they do not understand.
 
I had several hamsters as a child and seem to remember getting properly bitten quite a bit. This could have been me unwittingly annoying them, but I never got bitten by my childhood guinea pigs or rabbit. I think hamsters like peace and quiet, and would hate piggies zooming around.
 
Hamsters, rabbits and guinea pigs (or any other small rodents like gerbils, degus or chinchillas) do not mix and have very different species and very different dietary needs.
They should not be kept together; also in view that they can transmit illnesses that can be fatal for another species.

Hamsters are mainly a solitary night active species while guinea pigs are a social species that is active in the mornings and evenings (crepuscular) and that needs round the clock interaction and stimulation from others of their own kind. The food that hamsters need is not at all good for guinea pigs and can be life shortening if they eat too much of it (as too fatty and rich for them). A hamster would starve on a guinea pig diet, which needs to be mainly grass and hay based.
 
I took in a friend's hamster while they went on holiday just for a few days. I put the hamster cage near the guinea pig run thinking they might be interested to look at each other. It was apparent straight away that each was hostile - frozen in position and staring the other out. It was also apparent, even to me, that 'Fluffy' (the hamster) was quite prepared to fight tooth and claw should the need arise so we moved the cage that night and took Fluffy home the next day - choosing to make the daily trek to his house to see to his needs rather than risk him escaping and shredding my precious piggies!
 
I have both hamsters and guinea pigs and they both make wonderful and entertaining pets.
However I can not even begin to imagine how one would possibly keep them in the same area or enclosure.
Hamsters need to be kept alone in a hamster specific set up and guinea pigs need to be kept in pairs/groups in a gun pig specific set up.
I can't imagine Ruby the guinea pig would enjoy living in a tank with 40cms of deep bedding, and I can't imagine Perrie the hamlet would appreciate fleece bedding and hay trays.
 
Free Ranger said:
I took in a friend's hamster while they went on holiday just for a few days. I put the hamster cage near the guinea pig run thinking they might be interested to look at each other. It was apparent straight away that each was hostile - frozen in position and staring the other out. It was also apparent, even to me, that 'Fluffy' (the hamster) was quite prepared to fight tooth and claw should the need arise so we moved the cage that night and took Fluffy home the next day - choosing to make the daily trek to his house to see to his needs rather than risk him escaping and shredding my precious piggies!
Click to expand...
Shredding the piggies 😳 I confess that's exactly what went through my mind! (sorry hammies 😂)
 
I keep both hamsters and guinea pigs and they both live in the same room. Mania (hamster) doesn't really like any other creature. She ignores the dog when she's in the room and carries on with her day, well, evening.

I have correx blocking the view between hamster and pig even though hamsters can only see about 2" Infront of them anyway.

I wouldn't dare put them together. There's lot ls of videos/pictures online of people allowing hamsters/rats/dogs/cats loose with guinea pigs and while it appears like nothing went wrong, it plants ideas in other people's minds and then they try it and it ends in tragedy.

I have owned (in my lifetime) 6 hamsters, 7 rats, a cat, 7 dogs and 1 rabbit. I can say say that if I was to let any of these individuals loose with guinea pigs, the guinea pigs would end up dead or severally injured. In regards to the hamsters, i wouldn't know who'd come out worst.

Basically what I'm trying to say is, don't.
 
Do you mean share the same space like having cages in the same room or actually physically being able to interact with each other? They can share the same room in separate cages... we have the pigs and two hamsters on the same floor, in a big, open-concept finished basement rec room which is also our TV room. That said, we don't let them interact with each other at all. The one time one of my kids let a pig come up to a hamster and investigate it, the pig ended up getting nipped on the nose (thankfully just a warning bite and no skin was broken.) They just are really different animals in temperament- guinea pigs are group animals and seem to want to make friends, whereas hamsters are territorial and willing to defend against intruders. We've had some really docile hamsters and it was actually one of those that nipped Leela on the nose... we've also had some real assertive hamsters and I have no doubt that they could have delivered some really nasty bites before the pigs even knew they were coming.
 
Black piggies said:
Shredding the piggies 😳 I confess that's exactly what went through my mind! (sorry hammies 😂)
Click to expand...
Yep... I have no doubt in my mind that my pigs would come out very badly the loser in any fight with my hammies. We've had a couple hammies over the years where I'm not even sure I would come out ahead in a fight! LOL!
 
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