Guinea pigs are one of the most common pets that parents get for their children. They are considerably less demanding to take care of than cats or dogs. They stand out among rodents because of their sociable nature, willingness to snuggle and they are hassle-free. The great advantage is also that unlike other rodents, the guinea-pigs sleep at night and do not make any noise by its spree.
Guinea pigs are one of the most common pets that parents get for their children. They are considerably less demanding to take care of than cats or dogs. They stand out among rodents because of their sociable nature, willingness to snuggle and they are hassle-free. The great advantage is also that unlike other rodents, the guinea-pigs sleep at night and do not make any noise by its spree.
There are printed manuals where you can learn a lot of useful and necessary information that a good keeper should know before buying a new guinea pig. This article will inform you about the most important rules that will make a guinea pig feel good at your home.
The size matters
When choosing a cage for the guinea pig, get one that provides a lot of space. After all, this is a larger rodent which is highly sociable, so I warmly recommend getting two instead of one new member of your household. Trust me, they will be much happier like this!
The perfect size for one guinea pig is approximately 100 x 55 x 45 cm, for two it is 120 x 56 x 50 cm. But when you get a larger cage, your guinea pigs will certainly thank you! The animal needs physical activity and space, it spends most of its life in the cage so there should be enough space to move.
Pay attention to a proper diet
In addition to granules designed specifically for guinea pigs (avoid those with a high proportion of cereals), give your pet enough hay. It should be a large part of his diet. Another part of the diet is vegetables, give it to your pet regularly. Instead of treats bought in the pet shot, you can dry dandelions and carrots for your guinea pig. It will be certainly happy for it.
Instead of one larger bowl for all the food, get two smaller ones. Put granules in the first one and vegetable in the second one. Put hay on a separate place, too. For more, there also has to be a drinking spout with water.
What you need for the bedding
Wood shavings are better for the bedding of a guinea pig than sawdust. If you care about the environment, there is also ecological bedding called Asan on the market and you can choose from more types. And by the way, you can get these beddings for cats, too.
An extra thing you may appreciate when cleaning the cage are plastic toilets for rodents. They are usually placed in the corner of the cage. Some even have "coverage” so they provide the animal more privacy. This special toilet is perfect in the corner where the guinea pig started doing that itself. In the beginning, you can try to reward it for going to the toilet with a treat. But expect that even though the guinea will go to its toilet in most cases, it can sometimes happen that you find faeces in other places.
How did you arrange the cage for your guinea pig? How big is it?
If your cat is going to pee or defecate outside its toilette, it is only seldom just an issue of training or hygiene. Cats are clever animals and they have no trouble to understand, where to go to toilette. Therefore, if they don’t abide the rules of...
We hear about the war in Syria almost every day. But have you ever thought about how does a war affect local animals and that the self-sacrifice must not always be made by an animal for humans, but it can also be the other way around? The person that...
Acupuncture wants to harmonise the body and the mind. Some of you may have tried it, it was a great help to me personally with issues with my back and breathing. Precisely owing to my positive personal experience, the possibility to indulge dogs and...
In the life of any dog, a situation might come up, when it is necessary to put on a muzzle. And if the dog is not used to wearing it, it might mean a stressful situation. I will advise you on how to avoid stress and how to get your dog used to wearing...
Same as in people, also our pets should go to regular check-ups to a doctor. We might neglect this quite often, but it is still something else in animals. A dog or a cat won’t come up to you to tell you, that they’re not feeling well. That’s why an...
You probably have someone among your friends, who has diabetes. However, do you know, that cats and dogs also suffer from this disease quite often?
The name distemper might be familiar to you, but do you know more precise characteristics of this treacherous viral disease? Let’s take it one by one from the historic roots up to the present day
Do you know, what dreams our pets have? Besides myself, also a number of scientists were interested in this question and they came up with various hypotheses. Would you guess what our four-legged friends dream about?
Maybe even you have a small four-legged stressed-out dog at home. In such case, read carefully, maybe you will find something here, what you haven’t tried yet, while trying to get your pet rid of stress.
You have probably encountered the opinion, that much more important than what you’re saying to your dog is how you’re saying it (the tone). But it shows, that dogs are able to understand the human language much better, than we generally credit them for.
p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 13.3px 'Times New Roman'; -webkit-text-stroke: #000000} span.s1 {font-kerning: none} All of us surely likes to take pictures of our pets. However, the photographs don’t always turn out according to our...
It could seem that the smaller the animal, the less care it would require. However, don’t let yourself be fooled. Even if you have a small mouse at home, a rabbit or maybe a guinea pig, you should adapt the care for them to the season and to situations...
