please help!

[brookeh2662]

I’m new to this site and thought I’d come on here for some much needed advice. I have a 4 month old guinea pig (Poppy) and I’ve recently tried adding another (Gracie) who is a little over a year old. Gracie was surrendered by a family and has always lived alone in her cage. They’ve been in the cage together for about 4 weeks now (After bonding them in a neutral environment). I’ve seen (and I’m still seeing) rumble strutting frequently and occasional nipping but no blood has been drawn and I have not found any fur anywhere in the cage. Since introducing them, Poppy has come out of her shell and her personality has turned around quite a bit (she used to be so timid and scared when she was alone). Gracie is getting there but is still scared when I walk into the room. I’ve noticed within the last few days that Gracie has been extra moody/rumbly. She’s also been going at Poppy (not lunging, more like getting in her face when poppy gets close to a toy she’s playing with or food/hay, but this has not prevented Poppy from eating/playing) and I can’t tell if she’s physically biting Poppy or just nudging. But now she’s doing it with her mouth open. Poppy does the occasional squeal and sometimes just runs away when she does this, but tonight after this happened she went into a corner of the cage & just laid down and looked so sad. I need advice. Is this normal behavior to still be seeing all of this after this many weeks? I’ve tried putting a divider in my cage (I have a C&C 2x4 so I just added 2 of the grids as a divider) and when I did that both of them tried to get to the others’ side and were biting the divider. I thought this meant that they wanted to be back together so I just took it out tonight and that’s when this all happened again with Poppy in the corner after gracie nipped. I’ve read every article and I truly need help. I have hides in the cage with more than one entrance/exit as well as 2 of everything (hay piles, food bowls, water bottles, so many toys). Poppy in general is more outgoing and gracie is very reserved and as I stated above has only ever known to live by herself. Do you think that the bonding for them is just going to take more time or is this not a great match? I know it’s normal to see dominance behaviors for 2-3 weeks, but this hasn’t died down at all and I’m about to be at the 5 week mark. Thank you guys so much in advance for any advice/help!

 

[Piggies&buns]

It is normal to see some dominance beyond two week bonding period. Dominance is how piggies reinforce their hierarchy so it is something you will see lifelong, but it can ramp up when a sow is in season.
Nipping and squealing are dominance and submission behaviours which is normal.

It’s a bit difficult for us to say either way given we can’t see them. Instead you need to make a call as to whether she is just adjusting to piggy social structures or whether she is genuinely struggling to share a territory.

When piggies are separated, biting bars etc doesn’t always mean it’s because they want to get back to each other.

What I can say is if you decide they can’t live together then your cage cannot be divided in half as it is too small. Each piggy will need their own 2x4 cage ideally (a 2x3 at the smallest though), and they must be side by side.

Bonds In Trouble