Guinea Pigs

[shay]

This is our little man of the house. We have two other female guinea pigs as well, obviously housed in separate cages and in separate rooms. They have made great small pets for the kids. The male is mom and dad's.

We have to be very careful not to hold and handle the females and then immediately pick up and handle Mr. Pig as he gets very exciteable if he can smell the others on our clothing. :D

We have heard that if you do not breed a female before the get to a certain age that they can have particular medical problems. Anyone know about this?

http://www.mustangsacrossamerica.com/nws/pig1.jpg

[Doc]

Hey Sam!

Cute piggy you have there. Now, I will be the first to confess I usually pawn most GP questions off on of my technicians. She has had many and knows way more about GP husbandry than me. She usually refers people to a couple of different sites but I can't recall the URL right now. I did manage a good list of sites with this Google Search (http://www.google.com/search?client=safari&rls=en&q=guinea+pig+breeding&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8). I suspect Becky will be joining this discussion soon enough (although I don't require employees to participate).

In nutshell, spaying and neutering will prevent unwanted pregnancies. It usually won't change their behavior or level of aggressiveness. There are definate health benefits to spaying the female and probably a few for the male too.

Good question though! I will get back to you on the specifics.

Doc

[Doc]

We have heard that if you do not breed a female before the get to a certain age that they can have particular medical problems. Anyone know about this?


The medical problems you speak of are related to maturation of the female GPs pelvis. If they are not bred for the first time early in life prior to pelvic fusion, they will have severe dystocia and probable death when bred for the first time later in life.

So, my advice is to have your male neutered just to prevent successful breeding. Or, you could have your female spayed. Meantime, it is very important to keep them separated.

Sorry for the long delay in response. Guess I've been distracted. :o

Doc

[MysticCobraGirl]

He is soooo cute!!!!

[D ROUSH]

Simply amazing how pets can look like their owners :D

[Doc]

Well D - since I've never met Sam personally, I'll have to pass on commenting on that one. :D