How noisy are guinea pigs? Are they suitable to be placed in a home office/study?

O

onlychildandhamster

Junior Guinea Pig
Joined
Jan 7, 2021
Messages
54
Reaction score
28
Points
195
Location
London
Just that really. The only viable place in my home for pets is my home office. I would probably be returning to the office but would work out of my home office sporadically (esp as home working is becoming more common), and I have constant Teams Calls. I currently have a Syrian hamster in my home office but it is perfectly quiet!

Do any of you have guinea pigs in your home offices?
 
Our piggies live in the living room where I'm currently working and will be moving into my 'office' when I do.

First thing in the morning I love the happy greetings I get, then it's generally quiet until the lunchtime rumble that they have, then dinner time wheeks.

They're not silent, but I certainly don't find they interrupt. You will also learn their trigger sounds. For my boys, it's the fridge door and anything that sounds remotely like a food bag/container! They are great company and a good excuse to turn away from the screen intermittently.
 
Truffle and Coco said:
I work in my dining room where our boys live. They are no problems at all, in fact I really enjoy their company and their presence is always a delight. I would go as far as saying that it has made working from home much easier. They do make noises, but they are always welcome interruptions.
Click to expand...
Does it interrupt zoom calls? I wouldn't like that lol! :)
 
It depends on the pigs! Our boys are mostly quiet throughout the day and just chill and come alive at night time! I used to work in the same room as the pigs and it didn’t cause any issues, just maybe don’t give them loud things to chew on during the day like carrot cottages as that can get pretty noisy!
 
Thanks for the responses. They need a deep clean weekly and a spot clean daily right? How long does cleaning take on a weekly basis?
 
I've had guinea pigs in my bedroom and guinea pigs in my living room. I can sleep in the bedroom with them there, but - I've been on Skype calls, and on phonecalls, where a couple of my boars have tried to join in the conversation. "Oooh you're talking, hi! I said hi! I SAID HI!" and you're never going to be certain of having a pig like that til they start doing it.
 
I clean my 3 old gals out once a week, they live in a 6' x 2' hutch and it takes around 20-30 minutes a week to clean it all out properly and put the clean stuff back in. It only takes a couple of minutes to poop pick. Some members poop pick with a small silicone dustpan and brush, some have a hand held vacuum cleaner, mine are on fleece so I just pick up the fleece and pop the poop in a black sack or shake in onto the garden.
 
I've been mostly working from home in my sitting room since March 2020 with the piggies beside me, and never had a meeting interrupted by them. Bit jealous of people having cats and pups coming up on the meetings 😄
It takes me forever cleaning out the pigs, so I'm not a good person to give tips on that.
 
Also another question about guinea pigs- if they are a long term pet, you would have to introduce a new guinea pig at some point? Assuming you get a new piggie from a good rescue, can you introduce them straight away and have them live in the same cage. Unfortunately i don't have the space for multiple cages, one reason why i wrote off rats because with rats, you really do need to house them in separate cages before bonding (due to quarantine) and also you need lots of cages for the bonding process!
 
Timmy has never wheeked. Jenny has a rather tragic hoarse wheek that she tries out when she decides it is dinner time. Otherwise they chuff and rumble but that’s not going to disturb a call.
 
onlychildandhamster said:
Also another question about guinea pigs- if they are a long term pet, you would have to introduce a new guinea pig at some point? Assuming you get a new piggie from a good rescue, can you introduce them straight away and have them live in the same cage. Unfortunately i don't have the space for multiple cages, one reason why i wrote off rats because with rats, you really do need to house them in separate cages before bonding (due to quarantine) and also you need lots of cages for the bonding process!
Click to expand...

If you get a piggy from a rescue then you don’t need to quarantine.
Bonding is done via a neutral territory space. You will only need separate cages if the bonding fails and they cannot live together. So, a rescue would allow you to return a piggy if a bonding failed, but there would likely be a short period where they would not be able to be in the same cage but you could not yet return the rescued piggy
 
Oh and this might sound like a silly question but if you have an outdoor run for guinea pigs, can it be left outside all year round or do you need to store it? Of course guinea pigs would only go out in summer? It's supposed to be weatherproof but does that mean it can just sit outside like a hutch? If not, I am not sure there is sufficient storage for a large folding run
 
Depends on the run. If it's left outside all year it'll need regular maintenance, checking for holes or rot in wood, that kind of thing.
 
If you're using a wooden framed one, making sure the wood is treated properly, that there's no rot, that the wood isn't splitting. Maintained like you would a fence or a wooden shed, really. Then generally making sure there's no holes a pig could slip out of, or another animal like rats or mice could get in.
 
Mine do some low level and regular chuffing "whut whut whut" noises but it's not something that would disturb a call.
They will automatically wheep loudly whenever they hear (1) a knife chopping vegetables on a wooden board, or (2) their food bowls being clinked, which my wife does on purpose just prior to serving up treats. If you just avoid those type of trigger noises on your calls you should be fine.
 
My piggies love to take part in online work meetings but I'm lucky enough to be a zoologist so it adds authenticity! At the start of lockdown they wheeked every time I came in the room but now 18 months later they are a bit bored of me... a hungry excited guinea pig can be very loud! And it is lovely when they are so excited to see their pet human, it would be mean to discourage the outpouring of wheeky bar biting water bottle rattling appreciation when they see you. They really are often not a quiet pet... mine arent anyway and I love it, especially mad Tallulah who sounds like a fire alarm and wheeks on cue, if I just say the word "wheek" it sets her off, great way to get people off the phone- talk to you next week, "wheek wheek wheek!" sorry I simply must go feed the guinea pigs now!
 
It really depends on the pigs. Some are wheekers, others are very quiet. My pigs are in my 'office' (i.e. the family room... I wish I had a proper office!) and they really don't bother me at work. Right now we do have an excitable baby who wheeks when anything crinkles, but most of my pigs have gotten quieter and less excitable as they got older, so I'm thinking this is probably a fairly temporary thing.
 
Thanks for all the answers. Was just reading about guinea pigs peeing all over their owners...I guess this happens a lot. Do all guinea pig owners have to use towels for cuddle time/floor time?
 
Our two sows live in the home office and I’ve never had any problems with noises during Zoom calls. They wheek really loudly when it’s veggie time in the morning and evening anytime I move around but the rest of the time and when I’m sat at the computer, they don’t make a noise.
 
onlychildandhamster said:
Thanks for all the answers. Was just reading about guinea pigs peeing all over their owners...I guess this happens a lot. Do all guinea pig owners have to use towels for cuddle time/floor time?
Click to expand...
Piggies are very clever, , , if you have a towel under there bottys then no they won't pee, , soon as don't use a towel then its peeeeeeeee time, bless um 😐
 
onlychildandhamster said:
Thanks for all the answers. Was just reading about guinea pigs peeing all over their owners...I guess this happens a lot. Do all guinea pig owners have to use towels for cuddle time/floor time?
Click to expand...
We have never been pee’d on by our boys just the odd poop!
 
onlychildandhamster said:
Thanks for all the answers. Was just reading about guinea pigs peeing all over their owners...I guess this happens a lot. Do all guinea pig owners have to use towels for cuddle time/floor time?
Click to expand...
My boys let on no warnings at all and just pee when they need to (most often when they seem nice and happy and snoozy on my lap and then they let it all out!
:doh:
)
 
onlychildandhamster said:
Thanks for all the answers. Was just reading about guinea pigs peeing all over their owners...I guess this happens a lot. Do all guinea pig owners have to use towels for cuddle time/floor time?
Click to expand...
Again, it really depends on the pig. I have been peed on by pigs, but mostly young ones or ones where I ignored the signs that they wanted to be returned to the cage (i.e. getting squirmy.) Generally my pigs (once they were no longer babies) have been really good about not peeing on the humans. I do have blankets when they sit on my lap, but mostly to keep hair off my clothes, for all the good it does!
 
My girls live in the front room and my office is also there.. although I don't have zoom calls i do make some calls and my piggies have never been an issue.. they usually only make a noise if I go to the fridge lol.....
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top