I wrote this a few months ago for a compilation of animal stories, and thought I'd share it here, split into two posts.
It started with Scamp; a bright-eyed blob of lustrous black fur. I was seven, and had blundered into my Nan's lounge following an afternoon of mucking about with my cousins in the long-jump pit of a nearby school, and the last thing I expected was my Mum's announcement that she'd got me a pet. 'You'd better look after him,' she warned.
I blinked. 'Who?'
She gestured at her lap, and it took me a moment to spot the month-old guinea pig against her black cord trousers. 'Him.'
At last, an animal of my very own! I named him "Scamp", and a whole new world opened up. I read everything about guinea pigs I could get my hands on, and soon became obsessed. I was an introverted child, with my nose in a book most of the time. I seldom spoke or made eye contact with anybody, especially teachers. Scamp brought me out of my shell, by giving me a small being to care about and talk to. I even made a replica of him from that same pair of cord trousers my Mum had worn. “Black†was stuffed with old tights, had buttons for eyes and soon became my favourite toy, carried everywhere.
My Dad regarded Scamp in disgust as “a gloried ratâ€, though it wasn't long before he developed his own cutesy guinea-piggy-voice when he thought nobody was listening. He'd set Scamp's hutch at the bottom of the garden every morning, prop the door open, then leg-it to the back door, with the guinea pig in hot pursuit. I can't recall who won these races most often, as they were pretty evenly matched. I do recall leaning out of the back door, cheering Scamp on.
Scamp taught me that guinea pigs have a sense of humour. He'd have the run of the garden all day and I'd put him back in his hutch each evening. On long summer days, he wasn't always ready to be cooped up, so he'd hide under bushes and watch me move around the garden, rustling foliage and pleading. While my attention was elsewhere, he'd dart out from his hiding place and stand just behind me, waiting for me to turn and spot him with an indignant shout. Then he'd be off, looping around me to hide under a different bush. Some evenings, he'd creep from bush to bush, concealing himself under ones I'd already checked. I'd imagine him chuckling to himself.
My sister and I were given sunflower seeds by our school with an instruction to see who could grow the tallest, so we tended our two flowers daily, securing them to stakes and fertilizing them with guinea pig droppings. Once they reached six feet and the massive heads bloomed, we posed beside them for photos, convinced we'd scoop the prize. During the next few days the flowers withered and we were baffled until we spotted that both stalks had been gnawed through a few inches from the ground, with only the stakes keeping them upright.
Scamp lost the fur on his belly aged four-and-a-half and suffered a compacted rectum; a condition common in elderly boars. After going downhill for a few weeks, he died one night and I cried for days. When I felt ready, I asked for a new guinea pig. Soon after my twelfth birthday, I got Charlotte, who was named after the spider in the book Charlotte's Web. She was an elegant pure-white Sheltie with sand-coloured facial patches. My sister got a brown Sheltie with black agouti markings that we named Chocky, after the friendly alien in the John Wyndham book. The lad next door acquired Magnum, who looked so much like Charlotte that I guessed they were siblings.
Mum had become very proud of her garden and made it clear there were to be no more chewed flowers, so we fenced off the corner behind the shed for the guinea pigs. Charlotte and Chocky got on peaceably enough, though we had to limit their contact with Magnum, who annoyed them with sexual advances. I called Charlotte a “divaâ€, as she had a haughty air and wouldn't tolerate being touched in certain places; she once attacked my Auntie's dog for getting too fresh with her nose. Chocky was more down-to-earth, with a rasping squeak and a cheeky, restless nature that reminded me of Scamp. We were later given a golden boar called Shandy, who was neutered and got on brilliantly with both girls. Shandy was accident-prone, with a habit of getting wedged between things. On one occasion his front teeth fell out and I had to hand-feed him grated vegetables and mashed breakfast cereal for weeks.
When fully grown, we decided to try breeding the guinea pigs. Chocky had twin boars, fathered by Magnum, that we named Max and Sandy. They were later re-homed with friends from school. Charlotte mated with Max and ballooned up to a ridiculous size; she gave birth to eight babies, four of which were still-born. Of the live four, one was a runt whom she rejected. I named him Barney and tried to hand-rear him, though to my great distress he died after a few days. I can't remember what we named the other three, though I do recall they weren't cared for very well by the people who took them. When I learned that Max had been brutally killed by a dog, and one of the others had frozen to death, I was shocked and realised that I had unwittingly caused this cruelty, by bringing animals into the world and passing the responsibility for their welfare and safety onto other people. I vowed never to do this again.
Charlotte and Chocky lived to be about five. Around the time they passed away, I got involved with an animal rights group and began to learn all about the horrors of the pet trade. I decided that buying and selling animals was a form of slavery and that I didn't want any part of it, by either breeding animals or purchasing them. I helped out at a couple of animal rescues, where every cage and hutch was occupied by unwanted pets. I learned that there simply weren't enough good homes to go around and that bringing new baby guinea pigs into the world was madness, when people could simply adopt those who needed homes.
A few years later, while living in Manchester, I took in a short-haired, multicoloured boar who was being bullied by a rabbit. I named him Roger, got him neutered and introduced him to Strudel, a spiky Abyssinian sow, who took charge and bossed him around. A while later, I took a call from an animal rights group who had a large number of ex-laboratory guinea pigs that needed homes. I sorted them by sex and took eleven home with me. The eight sows formed a herd with Roger and Strudel, while the three boars lived separately. Although all eleven new arrivals were white with pink eyes, I could tell them apart at a glance. One of my most enduring memories is of seeing the bafflement on those guinea pigs' faces as they touched grass for the first time. Having been kept since birth in cramped wire cages under artificial light, a hutch in an outdoor run was an alien place. Their fear gradually changed to joy as they realised that grass was edible and that running round was excellent fun. Some of the new arrivals died after a few months, perhaps due to their immune systems not developing properly in the sterile environment of the laboratory. I hope they enjoyed their few months of freedom.
It started with Scamp; a bright-eyed blob of lustrous black fur. I was seven, and had blundered into my Nan's lounge following an afternoon of mucking about with my cousins in the long-jump pit of a nearby school, and the last thing I expected was my Mum's announcement that she'd got me a pet. 'You'd better look after him,' she warned.
I blinked. 'Who?'
She gestured at her lap, and it took me a moment to spot the month-old guinea pig against her black cord trousers. 'Him.'
At last, an animal of my very own! I named him "Scamp", and a whole new world opened up. I read everything about guinea pigs I could get my hands on, and soon became obsessed. I was an introverted child, with my nose in a book most of the time. I seldom spoke or made eye contact with anybody, especially teachers. Scamp brought me out of my shell, by giving me a small being to care about and talk to. I even made a replica of him from that same pair of cord trousers my Mum had worn. “Black†was stuffed with old tights, had buttons for eyes and soon became my favourite toy, carried everywhere.
My Dad regarded Scamp in disgust as “a gloried ratâ€, though it wasn't long before he developed his own cutesy guinea-piggy-voice when he thought nobody was listening. He'd set Scamp's hutch at the bottom of the garden every morning, prop the door open, then leg-it to the back door, with the guinea pig in hot pursuit. I can't recall who won these races most often, as they were pretty evenly matched. I do recall leaning out of the back door, cheering Scamp on.
Scamp taught me that guinea pigs have a sense of humour. He'd have the run of the garden all day and I'd put him back in his hutch each evening. On long summer days, he wasn't always ready to be cooped up, so he'd hide under bushes and watch me move around the garden, rustling foliage and pleading. While my attention was elsewhere, he'd dart out from his hiding place and stand just behind me, waiting for me to turn and spot him with an indignant shout. Then he'd be off, looping around me to hide under a different bush. Some evenings, he'd creep from bush to bush, concealing himself under ones I'd already checked. I'd imagine him chuckling to himself.
My sister and I were given sunflower seeds by our school with an instruction to see who could grow the tallest, so we tended our two flowers daily, securing them to stakes and fertilizing them with guinea pig droppings. Once they reached six feet and the massive heads bloomed, we posed beside them for photos, convinced we'd scoop the prize. During the next few days the flowers withered and we were baffled until we spotted that both stalks had been gnawed through a few inches from the ground, with only the stakes keeping them upright.
Scamp lost the fur on his belly aged four-and-a-half and suffered a compacted rectum; a condition common in elderly boars. After going downhill for a few weeks, he died one night and I cried for days. When I felt ready, I asked for a new guinea pig. Soon after my twelfth birthday, I got Charlotte, who was named after the spider in the book Charlotte's Web. She was an elegant pure-white Sheltie with sand-coloured facial patches. My sister got a brown Sheltie with black agouti markings that we named Chocky, after the friendly alien in the John Wyndham book. The lad next door acquired Magnum, who looked so much like Charlotte that I guessed they were siblings.
Mum had become very proud of her garden and made it clear there were to be no more chewed flowers, so we fenced off the corner behind the shed for the guinea pigs. Charlotte and Chocky got on peaceably enough, though we had to limit their contact with Magnum, who annoyed them with sexual advances. I called Charlotte a “divaâ€, as she had a haughty air and wouldn't tolerate being touched in certain places; she once attacked my Auntie's dog for getting too fresh with her nose. Chocky was more down-to-earth, with a rasping squeak and a cheeky, restless nature that reminded me of Scamp. We were later given a golden boar called Shandy, who was neutered and got on brilliantly with both girls. Shandy was accident-prone, with a habit of getting wedged between things. On one occasion his front teeth fell out and I had to hand-feed him grated vegetables and mashed breakfast cereal for weeks.
When fully grown, we decided to try breeding the guinea pigs. Chocky had twin boars, fathered by Magnum, that we named Max and Sandy. They were later re-homed with friends from school. Charlotte mated with Max and ballooned up to a ridiculous size; she gave birth to eight babies, four of which were still-born. Of the live four, one was a runt whom she rejected. I named him Barney and tried to hand-rear him, though to my great distress he died after a few days. I can't remember what we named the other three, though I do recall they weren't cared for very well by the people who took them. When I learned that Max had been brutally killed by a dog, and one of the others had frozen to death, I was shocked and realised that I had unwittingly caused this cruelty, by bringing animals into the world and passing the responsibility for their welfare and safety onto other people. I vowed never to do this again.
Charlotte and Chocky lived to be about five. Around the time they passed away, I got involved with an animal rights group and began to learn all about the horrors of the pet trade. I decided that buying and selling animals was a form of slavery and that I didn't want any part of it, by either breeding animals or purchasing them. I helped out at a couple of animal rescues, where every cage and hutch was occupied by unwanted pets. I learned that there simply weren't enough good homes to go around and that bringing new baby guinea pigs into the world was madness, when people could simply adopt those who needed homes.
A few years later, while living in Manchester, I took in a short-haired, multicoloured boar who was being bullied by a rabbit. I named him Roger, got him neutered and introduced him to Strudel, a spiky Abyssinian sow, who took charge and bossed him around. A while later, I took a call from an animal rights group who had a large number of ex-laboratory guinea pigs that needed homes. I sorted them by sex and took eleven home with me. The eight sows formed a herd with Roger and Strudel, while the three boars lived separately. Although all eleven new arrivals were white with pink eyes, I could tell them apart at a glance. One of my most enduring memories is of seeing the bafflement on those guinea pigs' faces as they touched grass for the first time. Having been kept since birth in cramped wire cages under artificial light, a hutch in an outdoor run was an alien place. Their fear gradually changed to joy as they realised that grass was edible and that running round was excellent fun. Some of the new arrivals died after a few months, perhaps due to their immune systems not developing properly in the sterile environment of the laboratory. I hope they enjoyed their few months of freedom.
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