Hi!
I have two male guinea pigs who live indoors together. They're about 8 months old and I've had them for 6 months. Usually they are very friendly with each other, lots of nose touching, playing together and snuggling up. Over the past couple of days they've been behaving a bit differently towards each other. First it started with a bit of pushing and shoving over the food bowl. Then one of them head butted the other out of the way and this morning they kept pushing each other out of their shared hidey hole. I put a cosy in their cage so they each had a place to hide away from each other. All today whenever I have seen them , one has been in the hidey hole and the other in the cosy. Is this anything to worry about it is it normal growing up piggie behauviour? Thanks
Hi!
Your boys are currently both at tricky ages of the teenage months. Make sure that you have got two different huts and that all hideys have two exits so no boar can be trapped in a hut - that is a prime flashpoint for problems.
If possible, please remove any bowls unless you serve a small portion of veg that can be eaten in one go and the 1 tablespoon of pellets that guinea pigs should eat in a day in two bowls, spaced well apart to avoid food bullying (which is a normal part of dominance behaviour, the same as chucking the underpiggy out of a hidey). alternatively you can sprinkle feed around the cage to encourage foraging behaviour.
In between meals, remove the bowls in order to encourage your boys to eat as much hay as possible - it should make over 80% of the daily food intake and is the mainstay of the diet that is responsible for long term health (via the gut and dental health) and can add 1-2 years to the average life span.
More information and tips on how to stabilise a teenage bond, dominance behaviours and a list of dos and don'ts with boars in these links here:
A Comprehensive Guide to Guinea Pig Boars (see chapters on ages and what boars need)
Boars: Teenage, Bullying, Fighting, Fall-outs And What Next?
Bonding and Interaction: Illustrated social behaviours and bonding dynamics (see chapter on the dominance phase for relevant behaviours)
The good news is that the behaviour so far is on the mild side.
All the best!