mark birenbaum
New Born Pup
Hi.
I'm planning to get some guinea pigs soon (first time, although I had a rabbit long ago) because I have a 3 y/o who I think would like like them. I figure I'll pass my plan by folks here for suggestions.
My plan is:
Other questions:
I'm planning to get some guinea pigs soon (first time, although I had a rabbit long ago) because I have a 3 y/o who I think would like like them. I figure I'll pass my plan by folks here for suggestions.
My plan is:
- Get two or three, and get them spayed.
- Keep them in a 50sqft room in my basement, and just put a little gate of some kind up in front of the door.
- The room is windowless, and the basement itself pretty dark, so they wouldn't get much natural light.
- To avoid me forgetting to turn on/off the lights at night, I intend to not use the light in the room but instead hang a lamp on a timer. The lamp would be plugged in at the usual 18 inch high. If I make sure the cord goes straight up, do I need to give it any other protection?
- The floor is currently a laminate floor, I plan to put cardboard down, with guinea pig fleece blankets on top.
- Start with an initial three or so simple hidey holes and add more as the mood suits me.
- Feeding them timothy hay and guinea pig pellets primarily.
- Use a water bowl rather bottle (although I'd get a bottle as well as a backup for when I'm gone for a couple days)
- I'm considering growing a few herbs in the room too and maybe wintering some plants. This might push up the humidity a bit, and if I do so, then most of the lighting would end up being grow lamps (i.e. fuschia)
Other questions:
- In a situation like this, how long can I leave them unattended, i.e. can I go for a weekend without getting someone to check on them (I'm assuming yes). With my rabbit, I could get away with a week, as long as I left some extra water bottles, would guinea pigs be the same?
- I work from home sometimes (lately, all the time) So letting them run around while I'm working would be nice, but it would be on a different floor.
- How much do I need to worry about them chewing the furniture?
- Is there a way to keep them from comfortable when I move them to the other floor (e.g. if I had some sort of sheltered travel cage teft both in their room and brought up stairs
- Can I litter train them well enough that I could bring them to the main floor without them peeing on everything?
- The basement (aside from their room) is carpeted, How practical/valuable would it be to let them run around that room while I'm down there (I might set up an office down there).