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to castrate or not to castrate

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lilmisscavy said:
Neutering a male and then pairing with a female makes no sense to me.

It's seemed to be the most 'natural' of set-ups to the lifestyle their wild cousins will have, a single boar or couple of boars with a handful of sows, but look at it this way, once he's been done, the natural instinct to be around sows to mate with them has completely gone, and the only reason their wild cousins stick in groups like this is to mate, well you're not going to be breeding them, so you'll be pointlessly risking his life for the sake of something he could have just as well with a young male. It's just a safer and kinder option to him to boar-date through a rescue, plus you'll be helping a rescue out at the same time :)
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I am sorry but if you spent an hour or so with my neutered boars, you would see the instinct to hump and mate with sows is not gone AT ALL!

Poor Cherry spends her life with sticky patches, Dodge is a rampant little monster :{

However as I said before I do think boar dating has it's place and had I felt it would work for us, I would have done it, but for various reasons I chose to have my lads 'done'.
 
Ok so Friday came and went without neutering and were off to a local rescue today to do some serious boar dating - I just couldn't do it! Iggle is very happy with the decision! However if all does not go well I will co sider a recommended vet x
 
Awrh yay, glad you made that decision! I did think about adopting a boar and having him done so he could join my heard but when I thought about it it seemed a bit unfair to do it, just because I wanted a boar again.

I hope your boar dating goes well! x
 
Best of luck with the boar dating!

Although I have a series of neutered boars living with my sows (always only one per group because their instincts and behaviour are definitely intact!), I would always strongly urge people to try boar dating first before considering neutering; boar dating comes at no risk and is much quicker to sort out!
 
New Addition to my Small Herd!

Hi guy's thankyou all sooooooo much for your help, this is a really friendly and useful forum!

so we took Iggle to our local rescue today and they were more than hospitable!

Iggle had his pick and was quite taken by a 10 week old baby with ginger rosetted hair!

They had a little 'speed date' on some neutral territory and the young male was fairly dominant, but lots of rumbling and mounting on both parts, things settled a little and they were more than happy in a small carry cage all the way home.

So far since we have been home the baby has followed Iggle
everywhere, with lots of rumbling/some mounting and now they have been
separate for a while (their own choice) staying firmly put in their individual houses with complete silence! - so... so far so good, I think!

Although I feel neutering is definitely an option, this so far has been a lovely experience! So fingers crossed they get to share their lovely BIG cage forever!

Thanks Again,

Becky.

iggleand.jpg
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Iggle's new friend is gorgeous! Does he have a name yet? x)

Fingers crossed they stay best of friends
 
to castrate or not...

Hi All.. I'm new on here.. but need help please... I have 3 male guinea pigs Ive had them since the beginning of July.. 2 are now 21 weeks old Fudge and Coco.. the other is 14 weeks old Button... Unfortunately Coco has decided that he doesnt like fudge any more and keeps attacking him.. so for a week we have had them separate.. I have tried to get them back together again. but Coco still tries to attack Fudge.. I just dont know what to do for the best.. I'm kinda upset.. Coco and Button get on fine.. Fudge and Button get on ok except that Fudge keeps trying to bonk Button... what should I do.. ? Would castration help, or would be best to rehome Fudge? HELP please :(
 
Smokie said:
Hi All.. I'm new on here.. but need help please... I have 3 male guinea pigs Ive had them since the beginning of July.. 2 are now 21 weeks old Fudge and Coco.. the other is 14 weeks old Button... Unfortunately Coco has decided that he doesnt like fudge any more and keeps attacking him.. so for a week we have had them separate.. I have tried to get them back together again. but Coco still tries to attack Fudge.. I just dont know what to do for the best.. I'm kinda upset.. Coco and Button get on fine.. Fudge and Button get on ok except that Fudge keeps trying to bonk Button... what should I do.. ? Would castration help, or would be best to rehome Fudge? HELP please :(
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Firstly, Trios of boars VERY rarely work. I'm sorry to tell you this, but part of the reason it rarely works is it goes against their instincts. In the wild there would be a heard of many sows, a top boar, then any other boars would hang back on the outskirts.

Unfortunatly, neutering piggies will NOT change their behaviour or personality in any way. It doesnt stop the hormones or desire to reproduce, on the ability to do so. So neutering wont solve your problems. It may be possible to take fudge "boar dating" to find him a friend, so you then have two pairs of males. :)

You will also get more responses if you post this as a new thread in the correct section. :)
 
hi smokie :-)

Hi Smokie,

really sad to hear about your troubles, I had three boys, all brothers - so together from birth but even they as they grew up weren't very nice to each other!

Most groups of boys don't work but on a positive note I can really recommend 'boar dating' or rather asking your local rescue if they have a space where you could introduce your norty boy to a younger boy, my local rescue don't advertise boar dating but when I asked if i could bring my piggie down they were great.

Good Luck xx
 
If you do not have the space for 2 2x4 ft cages, then possibly. But have you looked into C&C cages? Keeping fudge may be an option if you can find the space! :)

If you go into the section of the forum you want (this might be best in guinea pig chat) then right at the top of all the posts in that section, their will be a new thread button, Hope that makes sense. :)
 
Smokie said:
Thanks for this... so looks like I have no choice but to get a new home for Fudge... :(
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if you cant fit two cages and a new piggie then mayb :-( the other option may be to segregate the cage if its a big one (on section for him) or a smaller cage to the side - this way they can still 'socialise' and feel the benefits from it, but not hurt each other :-(
 
Thank you for updating your thread :) I'm so glad you have re-homed a gorgeous little boy to keep your little man company -
 
Thank you for the update - your little ginger aby boy is gorgeous! I really hope that they will continue to get on when the tiny rumbler hits the hormones!

Names: Rumble, Waggle, Pickle
 
after bedtime update

Just to let you know the first evening went well (once I managed to fall asleep!) and both piggies are happy and active this morning.

lots of happy squeaks and some rumbling from my original Piggie (Iggle), sharing of food and pigloo - although they do also seem to like their own separate sleeping spaces as well.

I could watch them all day! (and probably will!)
 
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