Guineas Fighting

[Emilymaexx]

Hi!
I’m looking for some help. My 2 boars have lived together for 3 years, they were brothers and are coming up to 4 years old in may. For this length of time we have had one of them more dominant than the other and this has been very prominent between them. All of a sudden the one that was the dominant one has become visibly scared of the other and we have had to stop them from fighting several times.
We are buying them a new cage that is much bigger than the one they’re in, but they’ve been in the same cage for 2 years with no issues.
This fighting isn’t too bad, they’re not drawing blood it is just clumps of hair they are pulling out. I have heard getting them neutered won’t help like it would with cats or dogs and we really don’t want to separate them. Does anybody have any ideas to help with this? We will be taking him to the vets.

 

[Piggies&buns]

if they are fighting, whether it’s bad or not, then something has gone wrong between them.
getting a bigger cage won’t solve a relationship problem. In fact changing territory for an unstable pair can make matters worse as piggies can have a dominance flare up when territory is changed.
if you could give us a bit more information about what is going on we can try to help further

do get them checked out by a vet as sometimes a medical issue can be an underlying reason for something like this

Bonds In Trouble

no, neutering won’t change any behaviour, it won’t make them like each other If their bond has failed

 

[Emilymaexx]

if they are fighting, whether it’s bad or not, then something has gone wrong between them.
getting a bigger cage won’t solve a relationship problem. In fact changing territory for an unstable pair can make matters worse as piggies can have a dominance flare up when territory is changed.
if you could give us a bit more information about what is going on we can try to help further

do get them checked out by a vet as sometimes a medical issue can be an underlying reason for something like this

Bonds In Trouble

no, neutering won’t change any behaviour, it won’t make them like each other If their bond has failed

hi!

There’s not a lot of information to give you. They have been absolutely fine for 3 years with no trouble whatsoever. Over night the less dominant of the two has started to go for the other pig. There was no change in their environment or food he has just completely changed. It is not all the time but we catch them roughly once or twice a day fighting, when for the past 3 years it was a rarity.

 

[Piggies&buns]

hi!

There’s not a lot of information to give you. They have been absolutely fine for 3 years with no trouble whatsoever. Over night the less dominant of the two has started to go for the other pig. There was no change in their environment or food he has just completely changed. It is not all the time but we catch them roughly once or twice a day fighting, when for the past 3 years it was a rarity.

ok. If the submissive has suddenly gone from being submissive to being aggressive and potentially trying to take over leadership, then going to the vet, which I know you are going to do, is your first step as there can be medical reasons behind a sudden change like this. Do let us know how you get on.

do read the guide I linked in as it may be if they are properly fighting that often, that they do need to be separated (each piggy needing a cage of 120cm x 60cm) and be side by side, even if it is just to give them a cool down time (you can’t do it often though without destabilising them further). if they appear happier when separate then I’m afraid that is likely your answer and something has gone wrong between them sadly.

 

[Emilymaexx]

ok. If the submissive has suddenly gone from being submissive to being aggressive and potentially trying to take over leadership, then going to the vet, which I know you are going to do, is your first step as there can be medical reasons behind a sudden change like this. Do let us know how you get on.

do read the guide I linked in as it may be if they are properly fighting that often, that they do need to be separated (each piggy needing a cage of 120cm x 60cm) and be side by side, even if it is just to give them a cool down time (you can’t do it often though without destabilising them further). if they appear happier when separate then I’m afraid that is likely your answer and something has gone wrong between them sadly.

Thank you for this, I’m getting them a c&c cage and I’ll look at separating them with a divider if there’s no luck with the vets!

 

[Piggies&buns]

Thank you for this, I’m getting them a c&c cage and I’ll look at separating them with a divider if there’s no luck with the vets!

lef us know how you get on.
as your getting a c&c, they are easier to divide but do note that each piggy (if they get separated) will need a cage measuring 2 grids by 4 grids

 

[Emilymaexx]

lef us know how you get on.
as your getting a c&c, they are easier to divide but do note that each piggy (if they get separated) will need a cage measuring 2 grids by 4 grids

Update to this! So we rang around all of our local vets and none were doing check ups due to lockdown. We got the new cage set up and they seemed to be fighting less maybe once a day, there was no big fight when we put them in their new cage together. The boar that was causing issues seemed calmer and when we picked him up (for the first time in a little while as every time we went near him he bit us) we checked him for any marks and we found he had a little knot on his belly that must have been sore for him but we had never noticed it before. We cut this out and for a day or two the situation was still the same but for the past few days everything has mellowed and back to normal with both pigs seeming happier and calmer and back to normal

 

[Free Ranger]

Well done on spotting this little thing! I hope it can calm down.
Sometimes there is some underlying problem with the dominant boar which the under-pig senses before we do... this happened with my first boars at a mature age but they were happy to live as neighbours in C&C.