Squabbling baby boars!

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Emibee

New Born Pup
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Hello! I've had my two 8-week old baby boars for 10 days. Both are beautiful, and are, in the main, settling in quite well. One is very inquisitive and confident, enjoys interacting with people, and loves a cuddle already, whilst the other is far shyer, but already willing to take veg from my hand. They have a 6 ft by 2 ft hutch, with two of absolutely everything, but they squabble over food, with the dominant piggy chasing and nibbling the other until he drops his food, or even taking veg out of his mouth. They don't seem to be seriously falling out, and they snuggle up together to sleep, but I wondered if there's anything I can do to make meal times a bit calmer and less stressful for my more timid piggy?

Many thanks in advance!
 
They will still be trying to sort out their dominance issues as it takes them a while to settle into a new home. With regards to the food you could always scatter the food and not have bowls as it saves some stress.
 
It takes around two weeks for them sort out their hierarchy. When they hit their teens you will see an increase in dominance behaviours, particularly as they are both at the same age, they will both be hormonal at the same time.

Taking food from each other’s mouths is entirely normal.

I would also recommend scatter feeding. I don’t use bowls for pellets or veg for my two boys.
 
Another vote for scatter feeding here. We very quickly realised bowls were not going to work for our boys and far less squabbling if they can eat separately (although they do play nice and eat together more often recently).
 
Young piggies learn what is safe to eat from their elders and mates by sniffing and snatching it from their mouths. Like all rodents, guinea pigs don't have a vomit reflex so any poison has to go through the body. In compension they have about double the amount of taste buds of us humans and about 5 times that of cats. You will find that adults are very tolerant with this behaviour from babies and youngsters in the formative school weeks between weaning and teenage during the time when they learn to explore and master their environment.

I do scatter feed my piggies, too. Much less squabbling!
 
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