Ask A Guinea Pig: Is Floor Time Necessary?

Katrina VanZandt asks: "How necessary is the floor time you mention? Every time we take Sugar and Cinnamon out they poo on the carpet."

Floor time fun! 

Answer: As we've mentioned before in our floor time post, floor time is lots of fun, although you need to keep an eye on us to make sure so we don't eat anything we shouldn't. Floor time provides mental stimulation and exercise for your piggies, so we'd say it's pretty important. If you have a small cage (less than 10.5 square feet), floor time is even more important. Even if you have a large cage, it's still better to give us regular opportunities to explore new environments and run around, and shouldn't be treated as optional.

If you are concerned about your piggies using your carpet as a bathroom, you can put down newspapers or bath mats for easy cleanup. If you have additional concerns about your piggies running loose in your home (pooping under furniture where it's difficult to clean, areas where your piggies could get stuck or hurt, etc.), you might consider getting the largest pet exercise pens you can find and use it for floor time. Alternatively, you might consider using a room of your house that does not have carpet, such as your kitchen or bathroom, for floor time.

Can Guinea Pigs Eat Romanesco Cauliflower?

Have you ever heard of fractals? They are these math things where humans use numbers to generate pretty pictures. (I know that's not a very good explanation, but I'm a guinea pig, not a mathematician.) The humans recently brought us back a type of food that looks like a fractal. So, in this post, we're going to eat the vegetable version of a fractal.

Romanesco cauliflower, also known as romanesco broccoli, is safe for guinea pigs to eat. It is a type of cauliflower, which should only be fed to us sparingly 1-2 times per week because it's a very gassy food.

Look at that thing! 

It's delicious!

Romanesco cauliflower is really good, and it gets 5/5 stars!

Can Guinea Pigs Eat Bok Choy?

Bok choy (AKA Chinese cabbage, bok choi, pak-choi, etc.) can be safely fed to guinea pigs. Bok choy can be fed to us 1-2 times a week, but should be fed sparingly because it's a gassy food.

Munch, munch, munch...

Broccoli, it looks like you've got a green beard! (I'm sure that won't last long.)

Leave me alone, Lola! Stop trying to steal the last piece of bok choy from my mouth!

Bok choy is delicious, although because it's such a gassy food, the portion sizes left a bit to be desired. We'll give bok choy 4/5 stars!

Guinea Pig Christmas

Merry Christmas, everyone! We're going to let our recent contest winner, Poko, be the main feature on this holiday post. We hope Santa was as kind to you this year as he was to Poko! 

Poko is one happy pig this Christmas!

How did you celebrate the holidays with your humans this year? Tell us in the comments section below :)

Ask A Guinea Pig: Portion Sizes

Katrina VanZandt asks: "How much is the 'small portion' you mention in some of your food reviews?"

How much more can you feed us? Hopefully, a lot more than this!

Answer: Our favorite food chart says that all foods that they list are in 100 gram portions unless otherwise noted. Examples of these exceptions to the rule include, but are not limited to: Basil (25 grams), Parsley (25 grams), and strawberries (5 small ones). Guinea pigs should get about a cup of veggies per day total, with their diet breaking down roughly into the following proportions: 50% hay, 40% veggies, 10% pellets. If your guinea pigs are eating more veggies than hay, then they are not having a balanced diet.

So what about those foods where we say "small portions" or "feed sparingly?" Obviously, you're going to want to give far less than the 100 gram portion, and probably even less than the 25 gram portion. For most fruits (which have a lot of sugar), you'll only want to feed about 1 cubic inch. For a food like banana that you have to be very careful with, you should only feed about a 1/4" inch cube to be on the safe side.

Cavy Savvy Wins An Award

We're proud to announce that we are the winners of the Carrot Decorating Contest, held on Muffin's human's blog! Guinea pig Muffin held a great contest that we entered by carving a carrot into the shape of a seahorse. We're delighted to hear that our seahorse-shaped carrot got FIRST PLACE!

You can see a list of all the entries and winners here: http://bonkersinbarnhart.com/winners-of-the-great-carrot-decorating-contest/

Can Guinea Pigs Eat Oakleaf Lettuce?

Oakleaf lettuce is safe for piggies to eat. While this specific type of lettuce is not on our favorite food chart, all other types of lettuce can be fed almost daily, so it's probably safe to assume this applies to oakleaf lettuce as well.

I think there's a subtle struggle for dominance between Broccoli and Lola. I'm trying to keep my distance.

Leave my food alone! I don't see you doing this to Broccoli! 

I'm going to eat facing this way from now on.

Oakleaf lettuce is delicious. You know you've got a good food when Lola tries to steal it from you. 5/5 stars!

December 2012's Cavy Savvy Winner Is...

We used a random number generator to choose today's winner, and the winner is ...Beth E.! Beth is Poko's human, who you may recall was the winner of a previous contest where they won a cape. That's one lucky pig!

Poko will receive:

• The guinea pig stocking from Cuddly Cavy Creations
• The guinea pig beanie baby ornament 
• A bag of Oxbow Simple Rewards Veggie Treats (our favorite treat!)

Thanks to everyone who entered! If you didn't win, remember that we will be having lots of new contests in 2013, so keep reading the blog for your next chance to win.

Guinea Pig Holiday Giveaway: Now Giving More Away!

There is still one more day to enter the Guinea Pig Holiday Giveaway, so go ahead and enter if you haven't already. If you haven't entered yet, here's another reason to: we're adding another prize!

Look at what you can win!

The new prize is this adorable guinea pig tree ornament! Your piggies will definitely get into the holiday spirit with the guinea pig stocking and tree ornament. In addition, we've decided that the bag of treats that we will give away will be Oxbow Simple Rewards Veggie Treats.

We draw the winning name sometime tomorrow evening. Good luck, and thanks for following the blog!

Ask A Guinea Pig

Guess what, humans? We're launching a brand new segment on our blog called "Ask A Guinea Pig"

Professor Pig is here to answer your questions

That's right, every week (or so), we're answering your questions about our guinea pig ways. Ever wonder...

• Why we wheek even after you give us food and attention?
• Why we like to sniff around during floor time?
• What's our opinion on the best type of cage toy?
• What do we think about the portrayal of guinea pigs in the media?
• Why do we like to pee in inappropriate places?

Here's your chance to ask us about anything you've ever wanted too know about what makes us tick. Just reply to this post with your question and we'll post our answer. 

Guinea Pig Holiday Giveaway

The holidays are just around the corner, so it's time for another giveaway to thank our loyal readers. (Quick review: loyal readers get 5/5 stars!) The prize is an incredibly cute stocking with a guinea pig on it, courtesy of Cuddly Cavy Creations.

How cute is this? Just leave a comment, and this could be yours!

We could just have this alone be the prize and it would be a pretty good giveaway, but we're going to do better than that and sweeten the prize with treats! If you win, we will throw in a bag of treats we'll purchase with the money we've made when you bought Small Pet Select hay through our link. How's that for a stocking-stuffer?


Contest Rules:

• You must be a resident of the continental United States.
• You have to be a follower of this blog. To follow us, just click the "join this site" button on the right.
• To enter, leave a comment on this blog post expressing your interest in participating in the contest. 
• One winner will be chosen at random and announced on this blog on December 17th. Good luck!

Can Guinea Pigs Eat Tatsoi?

Did you see how Broccoli defied me on our recent post on broccoli (the food)? He's really put on weight since the humans first brought him in. Now, he's about as big as me, and I'm starting to worry that he's going to challenge my dominance. I don't want him to know I'm worried, though, so I'm just going to act like it's no big deal for this review.

Today, we're reviewing tatsoi, which is another food the humans brought us back from the farmer's market. Guinea pigs can eat tatsoi, but we weren't able to find any information on how often, so you should probably feed it to us sparingly until better information is available.

Normally, I'd push you out of the way, but I'm feeling nice today. Go ahead and have a piece.

Am I acting strange? Maybe I'm just filled with the holiday spirit or something.

Mmm... This is good. What were we talking about?

Tatsoi is green, crunchy, and delicious. We're giving it 5/5 stars!

Can Guinea Pigs Eat Starfruit?

Star fruit, also known as carambola, can be fed to guinea pigs 1-2 times per week in moderation. Have your humans cut off any hard parts of the skin first.

Oh, now I see why it's called starfruit!

Which piece do I want?

Lola, you're such a hoarder! Look at how you eat one piece with your foot on another one!

Starfruit was tasty, but it was another food that we got bored of. We would eat a piece, get bored, wander off, munch on hay, and then eventually get back to it. With other foods like carrots, there are no long breaks in the middle. We'll give starfruit 3.5/5 stars.