Bonding females, second opinions needed

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Mystery+Co

Post   » Fri Nov 02, 2018 8:57 am


So about three months ago, I came into the possession of a female guinea pig who's a little over a year old. It started out as me petsitting for a month while her old owner moved into their new house, but after researching like crazy and rushing to fix all her previous owner's mistakes, (ie. making a giant 3x5 C&C that takes up about half my room, much to the chagrin of my mother) she ended up being surrendered to me and I love her very much.

Last week, our local shelter finally got in a single female so we went to introduce them. The other female -- Raven -- was about a year old as well and had been surrendered with a bonded pair who had supposedly been bullying her. The introduction seemed to be going really well: Mystery sniffed her, groomed/nibbled her ears and they munched on some hay together. Raven was a bit jumpy while Mystery was sniffing her, but they'd both groomed themselves during the initial introduction. Maybe 10 or 20 minutes into the introduction, Raven nipped at Mystery, though I'm not sure if any of the nips actually made contact. From that point on, Mystery would start to chatter if Raven approached and then Raven would nip at her again. For the most part, Mystery kept herself hunched on the opposite side of the pen. While she did approach Raven once from behind, she started to chatter again when Raven turned around. Despite this, Raven was apparently relaxed enough to groom herself. After about an hour, the shelter staff and I decided to break it off and agreed to come back the following Saturday and try again.

I'd researched beforehand and knew that introductions often looked scary (which is why my mom spent most of the intro outside) but that most of the time, females would work it out, even if it took hours or days. I reassured my mom that what we saw was perfectly normal guinea pig behavior and they just needed to sort out their hierarchy. My mom, who hates conflict of any kind, wasn't so sure. But after doing even more intensive research on bonding and dominance, I became determined to house them in a split cage for a while so they can get used to each other before introducing them again.

Except there's still this small part of me that's worried it's not going to work out, which is why I'm here. I'm under the assumption that as long as no blood is drawn, they should be fine. None of the nips drew blood and Mystery didn't squeal when Raven nipped her. There was also a surprising lack of humping and/or rumblestrutting. It's possible that Mystery hasn't been around another guinea pig since she was a baby, so I'm wondering whether she was chattering out of fear? I'm pretty confident in the split cage method, as I've been following Scotty's Animals and figured if he can somehow make it work for two hormonal teenage boars, then it should work for us too, right? I'm just worried about them getting into an actual fight when introducing them a second time and my mom putting her foot down about getting Raven before we can even try it out.

Am I just overreacting? Any thoughts/advice at all would be much appreciated.

Image
Raven & Mystery

bpatters
And got the T-shirt

Post   » Fri Nov 02, 2018 10:16 am


Short of actual bloodshed, I wouldn't worry about it. It will take time for any two pigs to get used to each other.

And here's the article we consider the bible on guinea pig introductions: http://guinea-pigs.livejournal.com/3002707.html. Introduce them at a time when you've got hours to give to it. Don't rush them at all. And when you do put the in the cage, break up the sight lines with some fleece forests or strategically draped fleece so they're not always in each other's sight. And no hideys with only one door.

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PooksiedAnimals
Supporting my GL Habit

Post   » Sat Nov 03, 2018 10:39 am


Sounded pretty normal, including the fact that the first 20 minutes or so is so quiet. I like to keep the introduction at least 30 minutes, because it takes that long just to acclimate to each other before they start being nasty. But screaming, humping, chattering, lunging is all par for the course.

Warning -- it can escalate again once you get home, but if you can make it at home the first 2-3 hours without bloodshed, it WILL start to calm down after that, even if it takes a day or two for the screaming and chasing to stop. I've had some pretty intense introductions that ended up being a good and happy bond.

rjespicer

Post   » Mon Nov 05, 2018 6:14 pm


We introduced our 3 together without any introductions, before we knew any better, and they seemed to get on alright. A few nips and squeaks but nothing serious. Oddly enough there doesn't really seem to be one of the 3 who is dominant. We thought it would be the biggest, Chunkita, but it seems not as little Siouxsie will swipe food from her without any repercussions. Siouxsie is the only one who rumble struts as well, I think it is her doing her version of the Yoda "Judge me by my size do you?" thing.
Reading up on other peoples experience though it seems we have been lucky that they all got on so well straight off.

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