Why do guinea pigs have grease glands?

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LittleEskimo

LittleEskimo

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my boyfriend noticed the tub of swarfega on my shelf and asked what it was for. I said it was for McMacs grease gland and he just went "Urrghhh what is a grease gland and why would they have it?!" and so I was wondering why they have it too lol

He isn't much of a piggy person and he has to put up with me going on about them all the time :)) bless him
 
I also believe it is for scent marking, which is why boys have such an active one compared to girls.
 
Yes its a scent marker and boars get much more messy ones than sows. I have to clean some of my more hormonal ones quite often
 
I have two boys and cleaning their bums isnt the best job out!

Mine are coming up to a year and one very rarely has a dirty grease gland, the other one I have to clean regularly because it can get very mucky and very pongy. I had thought it was because he is the more dominant one but he gets pushed out the way if there is food about :{

Just out of interest how often do you clean your boys bums with swarfega and is it just a bum wash you do?
 
What is swarfega? It might be a UK thing since I've never heard of it. I use coconut oil on my boys.
 
I usually clean McMac once a month and that seems to keep it nice and clean for a couple of weeks. I use swarfega (which is a industrial hand cleaner) just on his gland. Then I use small animal shampoo on the lower half of his body incase he is a bit dirty and that is it :)
 
I use ecover washing up liquid on grease glands, and it seems to work well.
 
Washing up liquid is just as good as I discovered, gets all the knots out of my long haired greasy boys butts rolleyes
Massage really well and any gunk literally just dissolves and makes bathing much easier ;)
I have the Swarfega but prefer a small amount of wash up liquid now :)
 
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