Pat Shields
Adult Guinea Pig
- Joined
- Jun 27, 2011
- Messages
- 1,151
- Reaction score
- 50
- Points
- 425
- Location
- USA MO, Ft. Leonard Wood area
I have been trying different things with him this week, feeding him different things, moving the items around in his cage. He seems to like the variety of his habitat, but he is narrowing down what he will and won't eat. Right now he has stopped eating hay and most of the vegetables. He eats maybe his weight in grasses every day and looks forward to apples and corn. He will pick up cucumber slices, but he scatters them around the cage without eating them. He picks through the guinea pig pellets. (RE: The thread about the guinea pig who couldn't poop - you are not finding poops because they are all at my house behind the pigloo.)
He has (to me) a strange habit - at my first appearance, he hides. I leave, then I return, and then he chatters at me, popcorns like the bottom of the cage is on fire, and runs around like a mad pig. This morning I put my fingers through the cage bars, not only did he come over to sniff them, but he tasted them this time. No teeth, just mouth and tongue. There is a gap between the cage bottom and the cage on one end, so to prevent any mishaps I have the gap stuffed with a rolled bath towel. He steps up on the bath towel roll, travels to the cage bars where I am standing, and visits me that way. Then he skitters away to eat or hide.
He won't wheek while I am there, but if I am entering or leaving the area he does the mad pig act and makes a lot of noise. He still does not want me to pick him up, but when I get him into the little orange basket he will stay inside it until I put him back in the cage after cleaning it.
Not only does the cage have two door latches but at the top and bottom of the door I have it wired shut with several twists of a twist-tie. That will prevent any other animal from opening the cage by accident. The ties don't seem to bother Red in the least. He will go right past them to get a drink.
He has (to me) a strange habit - at my first appearance, he hides. I leave, then I return, and then he chatters at me, popcorns like the bottom of the cage is on fire, and runs around like a mad pig. This morning I put my fingers through the cage bars, not only did he come over to sniff them, but he tasted them this time. No teeth, just mouth and tongue. There is a gap between the cage bottom and the cage on one end, so to prevent any mishaps I have the gap stuffed with a rolled bath towel. He steps up on the bath towel roll, travels to the cage bars where I am standing, and visits me that way. Then he skitters away to eat or hide.
He won't wheek while I am there, but if I am entering or leaving the area he does the mad pig act and makes a lot of noise. He still does not want me to pick him up, but when I get him into the little orange basket he will stay inside it until I put him back in the cage after cleaning it.
Not only does the cage have two door latches but at the top and bottom of the door I have it wired shut with several twists of a twist-tie. That will prevent any other animal from opening the cage by accident. The ties don't seem to bother Red in the least. He will go right past them to get a drink.
