• PLEASE NOTE - the TEAS facebook page has been hacked, take extreme care when visiting the page, for further information visit here

Our new C&C, a work in progress -- opinions please!

Autonerd

Junior Guinea Pig
Joined
Oct 30, 2020
Messages
61
Reaction score
129
Points
250
Location
Los Angeles
Okay, we just moved our guys into the 4x2 (14" panel) C&C this evening. They seem to be settling in.

CCgp.jpeg

My "feeding balcony" at the back was a bust... it's 6" too short (bad measurements when I was cutting the coroplast) and the "ladder" is a little too steep. (I put veggies on the steps to get them used to climbing up there.) I was going to put the feeder on that wall, but for now that's a no-go. They are content to climb up my little ladder with front paws and grab the hay off the balcony. I might make a box structure with my leftover coroplast that they can climb, and attach that to the wall where the ladder is -- they seem to really like climbing, and often Twinkie goes into that cardboard hidey in the foreground while Oreo sits on top of it.

Right now the substrate is a mix of fresh stuff and some old hay/substrate from the cage. The food bowl, cardboard box and toys are from the old cage, dual water bottles are new, and the hideys are new but have been in the old cage. Clearly we're going to need a LOT more substrate but I want to give them a chance to spread this out a bit.

Still thinking about another balcony (made with C&C for the near end or sides, something a little lower they can climb on to. I'd hinge it with zip ties and suspend it with wire from the edges to the side of the cage.

So far they seem happy. Would love suggestions, comments, criticisms, etc.

Yes, I know we're a bit shy on space for two boys but it's the best we can do in our apartment. :)

Aaron
 
You need to cover the base entirely with bedding. I don’t know if you hadn’t quite finished when you posted the photo, but if that’s how it is they will step in their urine. They also need a lot more hay. But I think this was taken shortly after your transferred them.

Could you expand the cage sideways to form an L? They will really need space once they reach their teens.
 
Looks good
id make sure all hideys have two exits.
id also put something down on the correx before the bedding - some puppy pads or newspaper for example. it can just help to stop the slipping. When using a disposable substrate directly on the correx, the correx is going to get stained (not too much of an issue as you can clean it with vinegar) but all the bedding will slip around whenever they move and leave gaps which could mean you get pools of urine with nothing to soak into.
id also either add another food bowl or scatter feed food and not use bowls at all.
I’d also add a lot more hay
 
Hey, thanks. Yes, we are adding more hay and bedding (trying to let them spread it themselves, they seem to like that). Padding on the coroplast is a great idea that we hadn't thought of, and newspaper would be easy. (We have to work around the velcro that holds the wall of the house down.) Working on food bowls, I need to find a couple that are weighted and harder to turn over.

Unfortunately we can't allocate more space... that was the biggest cage we could squeeze into the one available corner in our apartment. But they seem very happy with the bigger digs! The old cage had only one exit for the hidey, and they seem to really dig having two doors... they each sit in one doorway and watch the world go by.

Aaron
 
Id use fleece or potty pads. Its a lot cleaner. Every time I used bedding for my piggies they kick it all put where they sleep and got themselves covered in urine
 
I don’t use food bowls at all. All veg and pellets gets spread around their cage. It means there is no food hogging but best of all it encourages natural foraging behaviour and they spend ages looking for their food amongst hay. It keeps them occupied for a long time!
 
Great start! And cute piggies, I’m sure they’ll love their C&c cage once it’s all set up properly.
As others have said you definitely need to cover the whole base with bedding. Otherwise you’ll ruin the coroplast and create health problems with their tootsies.
I lay newspaper on the base and then put fleece on top. If you aren’t keen on washing fleece in your washing machine perhaps woodchip would be a better option for you as the ‘paper cat litter’ you are using will become expensive to cover the whole cage :)
Buy a cat litter tray, lay newspaper on the bottom and fill it with hay to put in their cage. They’ll love and appreciate all the hay.
Personally I wouldn’t worry about the balcony you’re trying to make them, I’d do without. give them cardboard boxes to chew and use as hideys.
Take a look at the C&c thread on the forum for more ideas.
Here is my cage so you can see what I mean :)

E91F1E8A-5A8D-4507-9B9F-38D55E0659C3.jpeg

It is now off the floor like this:
20CD1FD8-692D-4E34-A8B6-7A50C18AECD6.jpeg
 
I don’t use food bowls at all. All veg and pellets gets spread around their cage. It means there is no food hogging but best of all it encourages natural foraging behaviour and they spend ages looking for their food amongst hay. It keeps them occupied for a long time!

I had worried about the food getting mixed in with droppings and urine -- should I not be concerned, then?
 
Great start! And cute piggies, I’m sure they’ll love their C&c cage once it’s all set up properly.

They love it now and it's not set up properly! I'm starting to think they are pretty easy to please...

If you aren’t keen on washing fleece in your washing machine perhaps woodchip would be a better option for you

I didn't realize they were an option... can we use wood shavings? We get these for the horses so we have them in abundance... same stuff? Boy, that sure would smell nice.

Washing the fleece doesn't bother us, we just need a bit of an engineering solution since the far wall of the cage is velcro'd to the floor. Probably just cutting up two pieces would work. I read about a recommendation to use UHaul moving blankets, which sounds like a pretty easy solution.

We've been rotating bags and cardboard boxes to keep things interesting, though they do seem to have favorites...

Great cage, btw!

Aaron
 
Great cage, I would never have thought of making a hidey from the corroplast!
You can use wood shavings but they need to be dust free and kiln dried. I think some people use uhaul blankets under fleece but I understand it's quite heavy and hard to dry. Most of the members of the forum are in the uk so we have different products available for use than you do. We don't have uhaul blankets here! I use puppy pads then newspaper under fleece as I find newspaper print stains the corroplast, the newspaper saves me changing the puppy pads very often saving money and the plastic waste going in the bin.
 
Thanks. Yes, I was quite proud of my Coroplast folded hidey, it was quite the operation to cut it... but I screwed up and made the balcony a little shorter than I intended. Oh well, the guinea pigs love the hidey space. They either guard both doors, or Oreo takes the big room while Twinkie hangs out in one of the other external hideys.

Come to think of it I think we have a bunch of fleece blankets in storage -- we bought them for a trip in an RV and used them once. They might be good to cut up and fit to the cage.
 
Back
Top