Our Quirky Companions!

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Lynx
Celebrate!!!

Post   » Thu May 11, 2023 10:52 am


So unique is each of our pets!

One of her favorite ways to "hide" is to lie down directly below the hay bag, where she is still extremely visible.
I wonder if this still does hide her from the House Eagles, flying overhead...

Annapox

Post   » Thu May 11, 2023 11:37 am


Excellent point. Penny is longer than the hay bag is wide, so she isn't completely covered. But as we all know, if the piggy can't see the House Eagles, then the House Eagles can't see the piggy. After all, a piggy with their front half in a hidey and their back half out in the open is just as well hidden as a piggy who's all the way inside the hidey. So I think as long as her head is directly under the hay bag, she must be safe from House Eagles.

I love guinea pig logic.

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Lynx
Celebrate!!!

Post   » Thu May 11, 2023 3:47 pm


:-)

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Renonvsparky

Post   » Fri May 12, 2023 12:17 am


All of my guinea pigs arrange their cage the way they like it. I put their hideys in a way that allows me to put their hay in the center, but they like things their own way. Dean, my only remaining single pig has a hut that he moves around regularly. He poops a lot when he lays in it and when it builds up, he moves the hut to a clean spot. The other 8 are in pairs of two and they have tunnels made from 6" PVC pipe.

There are two in each cage except for Kahlua and Jack. They're litter mates and are very close so they lay in the tunnel together. A second one would only take up space. I cut a section out of the tunnel so that when the pigs lay in them, they're on the bedding. Being guinea pigs, they like to roll their tunnels around, but because of the piece I cut out, they don't roll very well and end up being upside down. That doesn't really deter them from laying in them.

I have to set them upright several times a day and I always try to put them back where the piggies had them. That doesn't do much good though. Part of bedding change is washing the tunnels because they make a mess of them. I don't mind that because the guinea pigs are happy and enjoy their tunnels. I think it's entertaining to them to rearrange their cages. Plus it's another form of exercise for them.

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Renonvsparky

Post   » Tue May 23, 2023 1:50 am


I've been giving my guinea pigs handfed treats ever since I've had them and I never paid much attention to how they take them from me and how they eat it. I thought it would be cool to share how our piggies take their food. I'll go first.

Dean is very laid back, so he just takes the treat from me and eats it right there. Gilligan grabs his, shakes it a couple of times and then goes to the back of his cage to eat it. Skipper takes his into the tunnel to eat it. Wilber and Grady both take theirs and run around with it to find a good place away from each other before eating. Kahlua and Jack take theirs behind the tunnel and eat in privacy. Buttercup and Muffin are the cutest and most interesting ones of all. Muffin comes right up to the front and takes hers. She trots to the back of the cage with her head held high. It's completely adorable. Buttercup is still a bit skiddish, so she takes her time sneaking up and taking her treats slowly. Once she has it, she scurries to the back corner and eats it.

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ItsaZoo
Supporter in 2023

Post   » Tue May 23, 2023 2:37 am


I only have 2 to compare. Gidget had a short attention span. She’d start eating one treat, drop it and look for another, then get excited and run around a bit while chattering, then find a half-eaten treat and finish it. She would chew the edges of a vitamin C or any other commercial wafer treats and then leave them lay. She liked all lettuces in the spring mix except arugula. Carrots were her favorite treat.

Lacey, on the other hand, would rip the vitamin C out of our hands and run to the back of the cage eating as fast as she could. There wouldn’t be a crumb left. Lacey liked all lettuces but corn husks were her favorite treat.

Annapox

Post   » Tue May 23, 2023 11:05 am


Willow would snatch the vitamin C out of my hand and sprint off to the other end of the cage. I could almost hear her shouting, "No takebacks!"

Penny takes her vitamin C very politely and eats it right there. She's also a very fast eater and will absolutely steal food out of other pigs' mouths when she's finished hers, which is why I divide the cage when the pigs have food other than hay available.

Rosie took her vitamin C politely and ate it immediately, like Penny. But if she dropped it before she had a chance to start eating it, instead of looking on the floor for the biscuit she'd beg for a new one. Sometimes I thought she had issues with object permanence or something.

Lily runs up to me excitedly to get her vitamin C like the others, but half the time she sniffs it, gives it a test nibble or two, runs away, and then comes back to see if I have something better to offer. If Penny is eating her biscuit close to the fence, Lily will sometimes sniff the one I'm offering her and then try to stick her face through the fence to take Penny's. When she does finally accept the biscuit I'm offering her, she runs into her hidey to eat it.

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Renonvsparky

Post   » Tue May 23, 2023 12:14 pm


Way cute! I only mentioned the ones I still have alive. Mr Bubbles was a total gentleman about it. He'd take the treat, set it down right there in front of him and look up at me for a second or two as if to say thanks before eating it. He, like Dean didn't feel the need to run and hide with it. Scruffy was a snatch and devour kind of guy. I think that's because he was usually wound up at the very idea of a treat. Sammy was a grabber too and since he always ate his twice as fast as Dean, he usually tried to steal Dean's, but was rarely successful. Treats are the one thing that Dean will defend. Oreo just took his and ate it wherever. He didn't have a specific spot. Ruffles was the only girl who trusted me from the get go. She took food and went on the opposite side of where her mother and sister were to eat it. BJ was reluctant to take treats from my hand for a while, but once he decided to trust me, he usually just ate it right there.

That leaves Zachary Binks. When it came to taking food from my hand, here was never a guinea pig who was meant to be mine as much as he was; aside from Mr Bubbles of course. He was a grabber and shaker. Day one, he had no fear or apprehension about trusting me. He would take his treat to the back corner, shaking it the entire time before eating it.

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Lynx
Celebrate!!!

Post   » Tue May 23, 2023 12:26 pm


Okay. This is not a guinea pig story/description but a chicken one!

Ella will find a delicious, tasty bug, pick it up, drop it on the ground, pick it up, drop it again, clucking the whole time in an excited manner - "look what I found! delicious bug! best in the universe! look, look, look! " Another chicken will run over and she will gobble it down.

I am unsure what chicken smiles might look like but if they could smile, that's what Ella would be doing :-)

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ItsaZoo
Supporter in 2023

Post   » Tue May 23, 2023 4:56 pm


I do that with cookies!

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Lynx
Celebrate!!!

Post   » Tue May 23, 2023 9:16 pm


:-)

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Renonvsparky

Post   » Wed May 24, 2023 7:16 pm


It turns into a free for all among my chickens when one of them finds a delicious big or worm. They steal it back and forth amongst them until one of the ducks ends up grabbing it and gobbling it up. Speaking of ducks gobbling things up, did you know that they eat mice? One of the roosters killed a small mouse and a bunch of the other chickens played keep away with it until the Blue Swedish got it from them and ate it. I knew that ducks would eat frogs, small lizards and even small snakes, but I never knew they'd eat a mouse.

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