Fighting, seperated, depressed!

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Georgeous

Post   » Thu Jul 18, 2019 2:51 pm


Hello

After a turbulent 3 months living together my guineapigs have been seperated. They lived free in our living room with plenty of food, space, hideys and games.
George is two, Charlie is just five or six months - very much in his teenage years. Charlie's been constantly pestering George for a while now, they had a few scuffles, but this week had a full pelt fight and we felt we can no longer risk them living in a shared space.

We have split our living room up, Charlie has most of the room as he moves the most, George has a smaller space which isn't their favourite place.

Neither seem happy now. George is wanting to assert his dominance still, Charlie is just looking lonely and bored.

They were only seperated on Tuesday, it's now Thursday. In that time I have given George some time in their outdoor hutch which he seemed to like, but I don't want to deprive either of company.

What does everyone do post seperation? It seems almost more upsetting than the fighting!



bpatters
And got the T-shirt

Post   » Thu Jul 18, 2019 3:14 pm


How large a cage did they have? And what kind of furniture arrangement? Male guinea pigs need a LOT of room, more so when one is going through puberty. Two males need at least 13 square feet on one level,and more is better.
And while the cage needs plenty of room for them to run, you also need to break up the lines of sight so the pig's aren't always out in the open. Fleece forests, or draped fleece, works well for that.

Assuming the cage is large enough, you could always try a buddy bath with a teeny drop of vanilla on each nose when you put them back together.

Georgeous

Post   » Thu Jul 18, 2019 5:05 pm


Thanks patters,
They don't have a cage, they have the whole room so space isn't a problem - they have oodles.
We really didn't want to split them up but we have tried things like baths, pheromone plugins, ummm giving them more things to do, more hideys, less hideys, more food literally all the things suggested on the site. They had plenty of seperate spaces but Charlie just couldn't leave George alone so we are pretty adamant on their seperation. The fights were real, and escalating in severity.

Anyhow, it's what to do now they are seperated. They still both have plenty of room (the living room split into two), but they just seem glum chums.

Is there any do's and don'ts post seperation that makes it easier for them?

Thank you xxxx

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