Pumpkin almost eats a bit of poop, as guinea pigs do and should!

Guinea pigs eat a grass based diet that is hard for such a small animal to digest. They aren't able to chew their cud like a cow, so they do the next best thing and eat their food twice! They don't eat all their poops though, just special ones called cecotropes that they bend over and, um, eat directly from the source. So don't worry about cleaning poops out of the cage. And don't be surprised if your guinea pigs always seem to find snacks while grooming...

The technical term for eating poops is coprophagia, and it's also practiced by rabbits in a very similar way.


WHAT’S PIGS?

We publish daily highlights of the adorable antics of our guinea pig herd. Subscribe to see what they do tomorrow!

In June 2019 we adopted five pigs from our local guinea pig rescue. They are cute herbivorous pets with funny social interactions. We film all their behaviors, from cute guinea pig noises to eating sounds, playing with their food to sleeping with their eyes open, and occasional fighting.

MEET THE PIG FAMILY

Spaghett is the boar of the herd. The rest of the pigs are females, but he’s a neutered male so they won’t be breeding. Sorry, no pregnant or baby guinea pigs! Spaghett has orange-brown fur with a white crest on his head and red eyes that are actually pretty cute. He goes on morning romps with entertaining popcorning and zoomies. He purrs and does a hilarious rumblestrut dance for the ladies. When other pigs argue he trots over to comfort them. He burrows through hay and stands on his back feet like a goofy dinosaur. He’s a very good pig.

Acorn is the youngest so we call her little Acorn. She has white, black, and gold fur with a cute mousy face. She’s inquisitive, always wants food, and talks to herself while exploring hay piles. She’s always the last one eating while the others nap. Little Acorn’s special talent is jumping on houses to go on rooftop adventures.

Butternut appears either confused or deep in thought, but we speculate she is just a very philosophical pig. She has white and gold fur. She’s the lowest ranking pig so she stares into space while waiting for other pigs to move. Her hobbies include sleeping and yawning while flopped over with her feet sprawled out. She continues wheeking and squeaking at us after we have already given her food.

Pumpkin has black fur except for white back toes. She looks like a cow, a non-guinea pig, and a rabbit. She has noisy standoffs with little Acorn when Acorn gets too feisty. Pumpkin seems receptive to Spaghett’s rumblestrutting and occasionally she chases him around instead.

Zucchin is the oldest and grumpiest. She has white and gray fur with red eyes that are also surprisingly cute. At first Zucchin fought with Spaghett. There were teeth chattering, nose raising, and hair puffing battles. Now they get along, but Zucchin is still a grouch to the others. Her main hobby is being an eel and lunging at anyone who comes near. She likes to chase other pigs out of their homes, then follow them to another home and chase them out of that one too. But she looks like a cute rat!

THEIR HOME

The pigs live in a semi-custom 4 by 6 foot cage we made by merging 3 MidWest Guinea Habitat cages. We cut the seams of the cage bottoms and joined them into one large cage liner with duct tape and super glue. Now we have a MidWest cage of triple the size! The pigs first lived in the same 3 cages connected by ramps with DIY ramp covers we made by sewing blankets.

Their bedding is fleece blankets with towels underneath and newspaper on the bottom. Each day we change one third of the bedding and spot clean several times. Their cage is on cheap folding tables so we can easily clean and watch the pigs.

The pigs prefer free stuff to actual guinea pig toys. They love to hide under packing paper. A DIY guinea pig house made from a cardboard box is a favorite hidey. They are not interested in most chew toys but will chew the bark off small willow sticks.

THEIR FOOD

Their favorite hay is 3rd cutting timothy hay from Small Pet Select. They also nibble timothy hay cubes.

They eat guinea pig pellets but we’d like to feed them more vegetables instead if we can get them to eat more hay.

Their water bottle is a 26 ounce Living World Eco+ glass bottle. They drink most of it in a day.

They eat nearly any vegetable. The only thing rejected so far was zucchini. Their favorites are parsley, kale, collard greens, kohlrabi, carrot tops and roots, beets, bell peppers, corn with the husk, and cucumbers. They go nuts for homemade wheatgrass sprouts.

FOLLOW THE PIGS!!!

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