Will guinea pig run away?

[MammaHen]

Well I've come on in leaps and bounds in the guinea pig dept! From being too grossed out to even hold the pesky thing, I am now able to pick it up flip it over, find the 'nether regions' and sex it in a blink of an eye. I have purchased yet another piggy, cleaned out the cage, made new toys and jungle gyms etc, put vanilla essence on the old one's nose and put the new mates in together. I was planning on getting a baby male but the pet shop only had one left and it was a girl. She's not a baby but looks young er than ours. My son's delighted cause he wants them to have babies so he can sell them to his buddies and make $$$$$.
WELL THEY HAVE FALLEN HOPELESSLY IN LOVE!!! There's much rumblestrutting and purring going on (note the terminology please) Not one unhappy squeek out of either of them. I am so relieved and so delighted that it all went down so well. They were both rumbling when I left and apparently this means the female might be in season. What do you think O guru ? If there were no problems for the first hour does that mean we're in the clear?

 

[cutiepieacres]

I would do a lot of research. How old is your female? If she is too young(under 4 months) pregnancy can be harsh on her and she or the babies can be lost. Even at the correct age and everything I have heard that guinea pigs have a high mortality through pregnancy and birth of around 20%. I am not sure if it is that high but when breeding any animal there is always a chance you can loose mamma or babies.

Unfortunatley there are lots of piggies out there and you may find a pet store to sell the babies to but making money is a lost cause, the pigs will eat more than the babies are worth, most pet stores around here give me $5-$7 a baby, I refuse to sell to petstores knowing how they are cared for and that petstores dont care what type of home they get. I adopt them out myself and screen potential adopters but because I raise purebred Texels that are hard to find I am able to find really great homes fairly easily, once or twice I have had a piggie come back as I have an agreement that my babies come back to me if it doesnt work out.

You need to have two cages to be able to take the female out of the males cage before she gives birth because she will be in heat right after the babies are born and will be bred back leaving her body to deal with feeding a litter and growing a new litter in her belly which is very straining. The female will be out of the males cage for the whole time she is nursing and youll want to give her a good 4-6 month break be before breeding again so he will be alone for that time. Babies should be weaned at 3-4 weeks so that there is no chance for any babies to breed mom, doesnt happen often but it can. You will want to make sure they are on a good quality diet with proper amounts of vit. c and calcium and that mom isnt handled too much once she starts to show.

Not trying to sound harsh at all baby guinea pigs are adorable of course, but there is a lot that goes into them and I am not sure how many people realize that and I just want to make sure that your sow has the best chance possible to have a healthy litter and save the heartbreak. Just keep on researching http://www.guinealynx.info/ is a great resource with some of the most correct information out there.

 

[MammaHen]

Thank you SO much for all your wonderful advice and links. You're an absolute star!

Will keep you posted (and probably call on you for advice!) as time goes on. x