Newly Rumbling Girls

[DuckysDoll]

We have had Minni & Mabel for 3 weeks on Saturday. The first week Mabel rumbled strutted a bit. Minni just took it. The following week Minni rumbled around the cage and Mabel took it. NOW, they are BOTH doing it. Often. Never harming one another but the only time they stop is when I put veg down. The cage is a home-made pine hutch, 2 level, 2 feet by 4 feet. They have plenty of hay that I top up twice a day and their 1/4 cup (x2) of pellets once a day. They get 1 cup of veg in the morning and 1 cup at night. There is a tunnel, 3 hideout houses and I use all fleece on the top level and a combo of fleece and shavings on the bottom. We can reach in and let them smell us, random pets when they want it and they squeak when the fridge opens, but the increase in rumbling is concerning. They are sisters, about a year old and we were told they were spayed when we picked them up. ANY ideas on how to help control this?

 

[Wiebke]

We have had Minni & Mabel for 3 weeks on Saturday. The first week Mabel rumbled strutted a bit. Minni just took it. The following week Minni rumbled around the cage and Mabel took it. NOW, they are BOTH doing it. Often. Never harming one another but the only time they stop is when I put veg down. The cage is a home-made pine hutch, 2 level, 2 feet by 4 feet. They have plenty of hay that I top up twice a day and their 1/4 cup (x2) of pellets once a day. They get 1 cup of veg in the morning and 1 cup at night. There is a tunnel, 3 hideout houses and I use all fleece on the top level and a combo of fleece and shavings on the bottom. We can reach in and let them smell us, random pets when they want it and they squeak when the fridge opens, but the increase in rumbling is concerning. They are sisters, about a year old and we were told they were spayed when we picked them up. ANY ideas on how to help control this?

Just stop worrying and let them!

I have a pair of rumbly sows who are best of friends (and, yes, one of them is neutered, too). It is just their way of reaffirming their relationship, the same way some closely bonded boars hump each other casually as "hey I am here with you, bro!" several times a day.

Rumbling is a very mild form of dominance behaviour. Unspayed sows tend to bond more closely by going through the emotional excess of a shared season with mutual humping and rumblestrutting; spayed sows don't have that option. Maybe that is why they rumble more in some cases?