Hello, George!

It's been a while since we posted last, but we have some exciting news to share with everyone. About a month ago, a friend of the humans moved from California with their Abyssinian piggie, George, a 3-year-old boar. The new apartment they moved to didn't allow pigs, so they asked if he could live with Lola. Plus, since George's former owner now lives nearby, she could watch him and Lola when the humans go out of town!

George, like Lola, had also recently lost his cagemate. Could two lonely widows find love in this crazy world?

The humans introduced George into the divided cage. George is a very shy pig. He would run when the humans came too close, and when they put fresh veggies in the cage, he would wait until they left the room to begin munching on them. He didn't understand Oxbow Simple Rewards, and wouldn't eat them at first.

Slowly, he began to open up. After about a month, he started eating the treats, and trying new foods. He stopped running for cover whenever the humans entered the room.

But the biggest breakthrough came by accident. When the humans were cleaning out the cage one day, George and Lola were in the divided temporary cage. They left the room and came back to find that George had snuck into Lola's section! Bewilderingly, they were actually getting along. When Lola lived with Broccoli, she would aggressively harass him and the vet declared that she might have to be a single pig forever, due to her hormonal issue. So it was really shocking to see them getting along.

Now Lola and George live together in an undivided cage. They have no flare ups and seem to enjoy each other's company. George even tolerates being held and pet by the humans for short periods of time, and shares his hut and toys with Lola.

Truly the best outcome anyone could have hoped for!

Goodbye, Broccoli

Yesterday, we had to say goodbye to Broccoli. At nearly 8 years old, Broccoli was the oldest guinea pig the humans ever had. He was rescued by a friend of the humans who found him wandering outside. It seemed that somebody had abandoned him, because the friend knocked on doors looking for his owner, but couldn't find one. She lured him into a box with a piece of broccoli, and the rest is history.

The humans are so glad that they got a chance to adopt him and ensure he lived a long and healthy life. He got to have many cage mates over the years, go on pignics, try dozens of different fruits and vegetables, meet other pigs and people, and see the humans go through many life transitions over the years.

Broccoli recently got to try wild strawberries that they humans found growing in their backyard.

Broccoli started out as a very friendly pig, often rumble-strutting in front of his lady cage mates and burring seductively, despite having been neutered. He never once tried to bite anyone or any pig, and was always more of a lover than a fighter. As he grew into adulthood, he settled down and enjoyed being held and fed his favorite treats: Belgian endives, vitamin C, and carrots.

We nearly lost him 2 years ago when he started to have dental issues, and almost underwent a risky surgery. He somehow managed to get well enough that he didn't need the surgery, which earned him his nickname, "the miracle pig."

He recently began having more than just dental issues, and we given a "comfort care" treatment plan in April 2019, which consisted of pain medication and 3-4 daily feedings of Critical Care. He enjoyed this bonding time with his humans, and seemed relaxed and peaceful.

In the last few weeks, he started having mobility issues and eating became harder. The humans were unsure at first if it was finally his time, because he was maintaining his weight and still eating, despite everything. But the vet, who cared for him over these past seven and a half years, almost immediately knew it was his time as soon as she saw him after he was brought in. He was in pain, and we had run out of treatment options. He was still eating, but it seemed he was doing so more for us than for himself.

Poor Broccoli...

And so the humans made the painful but merciful decision to help him pass over the rainbow bridge. Broccoli would have been 8 years old this fall, which is an extraordinarily long life for a guinea pig.

We hope that through this blog, he and his cage mates have brought happiness to his many readers over the years, and that these posts have been educational. With Lola as the last remaining pig who, due to health problems, must be an only pig at this point, we're not sure how frequently we will update this blog moving forward. We can be reached at cavysavvyaguineapigblog@gmail.com and are always happy to answer any questions, either in the comments or via email.

Thank you readers, for going on this journey with us over these past seven and a half years. You have meant the world to us, and have made guinea pig ownership even more of a joy.

How to Handle Guinea Pig and/or Hay Allergies

Hi readers! Today we're going to talk about what to do when your human is allergic to you or your hay. We gave an overview of this problem back in 2015, but since then the humans have learned a lot more about practical ways to live with guinea pigs when you have allergic reactions to us. Here are some tips on how to make life with allergies a little bit easier:

1. Take a daily antihistamine. If your allergies aren't too severe (in other words, if being in the same room as a guinea pig doesn't send you to the hospital for a neutralizer treatment), then taking an over-the-counter antihistamine can be a huge help in reducing symptoms.
2. Place the guinea pig cage as far from the sleeping area as possible. When the humans lived in the one floor apartment, their allergies were a lot worse. Now that they live in a three floor townhouse, we have our own floor and they have theirs, and the amount of hay dust tracked through the house is greatly reduced.
3. Be careful about how you approach floor time. The humans used to let us roam all over the big area rug back at the old apartment, but now we have a concrete floor with puppy pads that can be tossed when floor time is over.
4. Use a towel or blanket when handling guinea pigs. One of the humans has allergies that are so bad that her skin will develop welts after handing us directly. They're not sure if it's the residual hay dust on our paws or if it's us, but using a blanket or towel eliminates this problem for them.

With these four adjustments, the humans are able to live pretty much allergy-free. We hope that if you have guinea pig allergies, too, these tips can have you breathing easy!

Pictures of a Young Guinea Pig

Hi there, Cavy Savvy readers. It's hard to believe it, but I'll be turning 8 later this year. I first appeared on this blog on November 9, 2011 on a post entitled "Agents Of the Month AND A New Pig!", although tragically, the images have disappeared! Doesn't Blogger know that these pictures are an important part of history? To fix this regrettable situation, I dug deep into the digital archives and managed to find these images of a young me from around November 2011, when I was first brought in:

I haven't aged a day since 2011, have I?

Guinea Pig Cage Cleaning Routine

Hi humans! It is Sunday, which is cage cleaning day here in the Cavy Savvy household. There are many ways to manage the cleaning of a guinea pig cage, and depending on your set up, you may find that a different works for you, but we thought we would share our process in case you want to try it at your house!

Time for cage cleaning!

1. First, the type of cage you have affects how cleaning is done. If your cage has multiple levels, you may have to dismantle them and clean them piece by piece. When we were together in the same cage, we were in a MidWest Guinea Pig Habitat, which has the advantage of being inexpensive and made of soft, flexible nylon which is easy to clean. We would line this with fleece (bought and cut to size from a fabric store) and then place CareFresh bedding on top of that. Then, once a week, we would sweep up all the dirty CareFresh, and wash the fleece in the washing machine.
2. Now that we are in the same cage but the cage is divided, we need a bigger cage so that we still have lots of individual space. We are fans of the Guinea Pig Cage Store because they also sell fleece cage liners that are the exact size of the cage, and are extra plush so they absorb better. We still place a layer of CareFresh on top but can use less since the fleece does a good job. The CareFresh makes a big difference with odor control. 
3. When Sunday rolls around, the humans set up a temporary cage in the laundry room which consists of a few puppy training pads on the concrete floor and a cage placed around it. The humans place us and our housing and food in the cage, where we spend about an hour or two waiting for the laundry to be done.
   

   

   Our home away from home!

4. The humans sweep up the old CareFresh and throw the dirty fleece pad in the laundry. They use a Free and Clear detergent without dyes or fragrances, since our paws can be sensitive to them. Then they wipe down the now empty cage with mild cleaning spray and paper towels. Once clean and dry, they place everything back in the cage and discard the used puppy pads. Good as new!

Can Guinea Pigs Eat Aloha Peppers?

Aloha, readers! We found a review we had started on but never finished (around May 2018, when things started getting really crazy and we moved to a new place, and then took an extended break from blogging). You'll notice that Lola is able to be near me without being super-hostile (AKA the good old days!), and that we're still in our old cage. After this, we should be all caught up to the present day. :-)

Aloha peppers (AKA Enjoya peppers, Striped Holland bell peppers) come from a company called SUNSET, who describes them as follows: " As pleasing to the eye as it is to the palate, the Aloha pepper has beautiful red and yellow stripes and a sweet flavor unlike any other pepper on the market today."  Is that true? Our piggy palates were happy to test this claim out!

Look at it! That is an awesome-looking pepper! Can't wait to bite into it!

As mentioned in the past, most bell peppers start out as green, turn yellow and orange, and then eventually end up turning red. Aloha peppers, however, "are a fairly new variety that was discovered as a surprise variation in a garden in the Netherlands and have been developed over time to showcase the bi-colored traits. The vertical striping is not passed on through normal plant reproduction, so Striped Holland bell peppers are reproduced using cuttings and hand harvesting, making all the plants genetically identical." So it sounds like it's a lot of work for humans to make these striped peppers for our enjoyment!

Lola, do you think this tastes more like yellow peppers or red peppers?

Hey. I had my eye on that one!

As usual, we've never met a bell pepper we didn't like! 5/5 stars!

Guinea Pigs and Moving into a New House

Hi humans! Long time, no wheek. We missed you. It has been a long time since we updated, so we apologize for the months-long delay. Let us give you an update about what's been happening since we last posted:

• The big news: the humans moved into a new house! It was so exciting but a bit scary because we were moved to an entirely different space. Being the creatures of habit that we are, disruptions to our routine are always unnerving, but especially so this time since we have always lived in the old house, in our old cage. 
• Speaking of which, we got a new cage! The layout of the new house is so different, and the humans decided to gives us our own floor. The finished basement is all ours, and the humans even bought us a bigger cage.
• Lola recovered well from her cancer, thanks to the great work of the vet crew at SEAVS. She still technically has cancer but has no symptoms, is no longer on any meds, and is not in pain. The only difference is that she now attacks me and seems to want to be in her own space. While guinea pigs normally should be paired with a buddy, in Lola's case she's given the signal that she's prefer to be an only pig moving forward, so with the vet's blessing, the humans complied. As a compromise, the humans placed a grid divider between my side and her side of the cage, so that we can still sniff, see, hear, and in Lola's case try to bite the other pig.

• As for me, I'm over seven years old now! The vet mentioned that I am one of the oldest pigs she's treated. I'm a little slower than I used to be, but I still love snuggling with my humans, eating my favorite snack of Belgian endives, and napping in my pigloo. Given my dental issues, I need molar trims every 6 weeks, and I need to be hand fed Critical Care three times a day, plus I take Meloxicam once daily. I look forward to my daily feedings and I like the taste of the medicine. It's my chance to get some one-on-one time with the humans!

Thanks for following our adventure! More posts to come soon.

Lola update: Guinea pig recovery from surgery

Hi, everyone. I suppose I'm overdue for a blog update after my recent ordeal, and I hope I wasn't keeping you all in suspense. I survived the surgery just fine, and have been doing a pretty fine job of recovering if I do say so myself. Of course, it helps to have some fine humans to help my recovering by keeping track of my medication regimen. After getting back from surgery, I was on 6 different medications/supplements:

1. Meloxicam (for pain and inflammation)
2. Cisapride (for gastrointestinal tract motility)
3. Enrofloxacin (for controlling gas in the GI tract)
4. Trimethoprim Sulfa (to treat bacterial infection)
5. Tramadol (to control pain)
6. Critical Care (if not eating well, or to help weight loss)

That's a lot of medicine!

Now I'm done with most of those medicines, which means a lot less plastic syringes being shoved in my mouth. My weight has been down a little lately, and the humans need to check with the vet to find out what my "new normal" should be after the spay surgery that removed the uterine cancer.

Thanks for the nice comments, readers!

Guinea pigs, cancer, and surgery: Lola's very rough week

The humans went out of town for a week last week, and boarded us at the vet. Near the end of our visit, the vet noticed a bit of sludgy, pink-tinged urine (likely from blood) in the cage. As our readers know, I've been having a few issues lately, so their first thought is that it came from me. They examined me and found nothing that would explain the blood--although they did find I was due for another molar trim, had a weepy eye, and some nasal discharge, and prescribed some medicine for each condition. They then moved on to checking Lola, and noticed that she had a bloated belly.

Lola, is your belly bloated because you take so much of my food?

They took some x-rays of her, and noticed a large mass that was pushing on her other organs. The "primary concerns" on her discharge statement said:

1. "Abdominal Mass: Possible uterine cancer, bladder cancer, or other cancer
2. Lytic (moth-eaten) Pelvis: Possible bone cancer, bone infection, degenerative changes, other"

The humans then had to schedule surgery for Friday, where her life hung in the balance. There wouldn't be much they could do if it was advanced bladder cancer, but if it was uterine cancer, they thought they could remove her reproductive tract to bring it under control.

Lola before being dropped off at the vet for surgery. Good luck!

The humans got good news from the vet on Friday: Lola made it out of surgery okay. She's in observation until Monday, which is common after a guinea pig surgery. The cancer was in her uterus but unfortunately it also did spread to her bladder. The vet thinks if she makes it to Monday, she will probably live many more months pain free. Since the cancer was made worse by hormones, they fact that they spayed her will keep it from growing fast.

Poor Lola! I can't wait to get my cage-mate back tomorrow. It's been so lonely in the cage all by myself. I hope she's able to continue keeping me company for a long time!

Guinea Pig Product Review: Small Pet Select Loofah rolls

While Valentine's Day is still a couple weeks away, there's never a wrong time to show love for your guinea pig! Whether it's a nice pet on our heads, or a new chew toy to sink our teeth into, gestures of affection are almost always appreciated.

Today, we're reviewing another toy from Small Pet Select to let you know if its a good way to show your piggy appreciation: the Loofah roll! They describe this toy as follows: "Loofah is nature's floss for rabbits and piggies!  Terrific for giving those teeth a great workout, loofah also provides a totally different and interesting chew texture for the buns and the guinea piggies."

Will we find it as interesting to chew on as they claim?

Bite!

Munch!

Sniff!

Nibble!

We got to say that this was a pretty cool texture, and it was in fact fun to chew on! But what exactly is a loofah (also spelled "luffa")? According to Wikipedia, it is the fruit of a vine plant which "may be allowed to mature and used as a bath or kitchen sponge after being processed to remove everything but the network of xylem fibers." The family of plants that it belongs to includes many foods that guinea pigs can eat, including squash, watermelon, and cucumber. In addition, no safety concerns were mentioned on the guinea pig forums that we saw, and we have a generally favorable view of Small Pet Select as a company. Therefore, we're pretty sure loofah (or "luffa") is safe.

We also looked at other reviews for this product, and wanted to note a couple things that others mentioned:

1. "I've used it to stuff healthy treats... into. This keeps him working to get to the treats, which he can smell through the loofah!"--Nice idea which could make this toy even more fun.
2. "This is a massive hair magnet! My bunnies like them, but I find I toss them out because they get all gross with bunny hair. I've yet to find a good way to remove bunny hair from a loofah!"--We haven't experienced this with ours, but wanted to note this as a possible problem anyway. (Maybe it's a long-hair vs. short-hair issue?)

We give Small Pet Select Loofah rolls 5/5 stars!

Cavy Savvy 2018 Guinea Pig Books Giveaway Lightning Round Winner Announcement!

Good news, readers! We now have enough entries in the lighting round of our book giveaway contest to select a winner using a random number generator. And the winner is...

Ryan!

Congrats, Ryan! You just won some cool guinea pig books:

Happy reading!

Please email us your current mailing address to cavysavvyaguineapigblog@gmail.com within 7 days and we will send mail you your prize. (If left unclaimed, we may choose another winner, so don't delay!)

Lightning Round for the Cavy Savvy 2018 Guinea Pig Books Giveaway!

We are excited to announce that we have extended our recent book giveaway! Comment on this post expressing your interest in winning two books about guinea pigs, below:



Imagine the fun you'll have reading to your guinea pigs about a topic they're sure to appreciate. good luck!

Guinea Pig Tooth, Jaw and Ear Issues

Hi there, Cavy Savvy folks. Before getting into the topic I'd like to discuss today, I'd just like to say again how saddened we are to hear about the passing of Arwen, one of our loyal piggy readers, a few weeks back.  Big hugs to Eowyn and their human.

With that sad news out of the way, I'd like to give everyone a health update on Broccoli. As you may recall, Broccoli broke a tooth in July 2016 from biting the bars of his cage, and then he needed a molar trim in January of this year due to malocclusion. Last month, the humans noticed that he would stop eating food after attempting to chew it a couple times, and the humans noticed his weight was down. This meant another immediate vet visit (you don't want to wait when you've got significant weight loss and/or other notable symptoms). This resulted in another molar trim, a prescription for Meloxicam, and some Oxbow Critical Care to get his weight back up. This time, they scheduled a follow-up in a month, which happened earlier this week. At that visit, they did another molar trim, but they also observed a thickening of the jaw.

The vet isn't exactly sure what's causing the tooth issues, but she noted that these kind of problems can be common in older pigs. Broccoli is over six years old now, so this seems to fit. The good news is that monthly molar trims do seem to be helping. The vet puts him under anesthesia and gently trims the back molars so that they don't grow over his tongue, which would make it hard for him to eat. After each visit, Broccoli is noticeably happier and hungrier, so he will continue on this path unless something changes.

In addition, Broccoli is currently on antibiotics after the humans recently noticed a head tilt, and the vet diagnosed him with an ear infection. It turns out ear infections are especially hard to treat (something to do with less blood flow to the ears than other body parts), so a very strong antibiotic was prescribed (Zithromax/Azithromycin) to do the job. His appetite has been reduced, so the humans started supplementing his diet with Critical Care again. It's hard to determine how much of the reduced appetite is due to the antibiotic and how much is due to his ongoing teeth and jaw issues. In addition, he's been more antisocial since going on it; he just wants to sit in the little cage and be left alone for most of the day. Fortunately, the 14 days he's supposed to take the antibiotic are almost up, which means hopefully he'll go back to normal soon!

It's been a rough time!

By the way, just a reminder, you can still enter our latest giveaway until January 20th, 2018.

Cavy Savvy 2018 Guinea Pig Books Giveaway

Happy 2018, Cavy Savvy readers! Now is the time when humans make all kind of  resolutions, like going to the gym more, or being more careful with that money stuff that humans love so much. If you haven't picked a resolution yet, how about a resolution to read more guinea pig book?

To encourage you to be successful, we're announcing our Cavy Savvy 2018 Read More Resolution Giveaway! We've got two books in our library we're prepared to give away to one lucky blog reader:

Here are the books you can win!

One of these books, Guinea Pig Pride and Prejudice, we've previously reviewed. The other one, Cavy Crusades by Paula York, a fantastic tale of nine guinea pigs who go on an epic journey to discover a new life through a forest.

Here are the 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 "Follow" button on the right.
• To enter, leave a comment on this blog post expressing your interest in participating in the contest.
• All entries must be received by January 20th, 2018 at 12:00 pm (US Eastern time) to be eligible.
• One winner will be chosen at random from all eligible entries and announced on this blog on January 20st, 2018 sometime after the giveaway closes.
• The winner will be instructed to email us to provide us with a mailing address to send the prize to. Winners must provide us with a mailing address within 5 days to receive their prize. If we do not receive a response in time, we will randomly select another winner from the eligible responses. 

Good luck!

Guinea Pig Product Review: Small Pet Select Meadow Ball

'Tis the season to buy cool stuff for your loved ones! And yes, that should include your guinea pigs. We are part of your family, after all, and if you get us the right gift, you'll see as much excitement on our faces as a human child when they rip open their gifts on whichever holiday you celebrate. But how will you know what the right gift is? Fear not, because we have guinea pig product reviews going back years now, and we're about to add yet another one!

Today, we're reviewing another toy from Small Pet Select's toy sampler: the Meadow Ball. Small Pet Select describes the Meadow Ball as: "Lucious meadow grass, all twisted and wrapped into a ball of fun goodness. What is better than a treat you can eat and play with too? Healthy high fiber, totally safe. This toy is great for chewing and tossing, and you might even see more than one cavy playing with it at a time." Sounds great from the description, but will this toy be a holiday-do or a holiday don't?

Do I want to chew on this?

I think I do want to chew on this.

And give it a little toss! Wow, the description was right.

Similar to the Honeysuckle Ring, I was interested in playing with this toy, but Lola wouldn't even come near it. (Come on, Lola. Live a little!) However, I didn't play with it as long as the ring. Something about the ring was just more fun to chew on, and your neck muscles get tired pretty quickly trying to toss this thing around.

So what's the verdict? We give it 3.5/5 stars--it's a holiday-maybe!

Guinea Pig Product Review: Small Pet Select Honeysuckle Ring

Hi loyal readers! We have to apologize for not filling your lives with tales from our cage lately. It's a mistake we're fixing right now, because we're finally back! Today, we're reviewing Small Pet Select's Honeysuckle Ring, which we got as part of their the toy sampler. We've often been underwhelmed by the guinea pig toys we've gotten in the past, but we think this one is a keeper! (At least, I do. Lola didn't seem too interested in it.)

This seems fun to chew on.

And fun to step on.

Look what I can do!

Lola missed out on all the fun. Too bad for her! I'll give the Honeysuckle Ring 4/5 stars; I think it's lots of fun, but apparently not every piggy thinks so (or will even give it a chance to see if it's fun!).

Our 2017 Halloween Costumes

Over the years, we've shared a few pictures of ourselves in costume, mostly for Halloween. We're generally not big fans of wearing costumes, but we tolerate it to make our humans happy. (The things we do for those big, silly mostly-hairless apes. Am I right?) And even though we always complain a little at the time, we have to admit that we do look adorable in our outfits. Our previous outfits have included Pokemon, dinosaurs and ladybugs, a tuxedo, and a bumblebee.

We know we're a little late in sharing our costumes this year, but better late than never, right? Who wants to see our Halloween costumes? Okay, here they are:

Lola does not look happy in her pumpkin outfit.

There's a new sheriff in town...

As you may notice, Lola's costume is not fully on. She made it very clear to the humans that she didn't want the strap on the hat connected under her chin, so the humans left it loose. (It's very important to respect your guinea pig's boundaries!)

Help California Guinea Pigs

Hi readers. We want to make you aware of a very serious, very urgent issue that is happening right now in Northern California. A large breeding/hording situation was uncovered this week, and there are nearly 600 guinea pigs who need your help.

The Los Angeles Guinea Pig Rescue was called in to help out and they drove all the way to Northern California and have spent the last few days sexing, medicating, feeding, and separating a massive herd of neglected pigs.

Here is their Facebook page where you can follow updates: https://www.facebook.com/laguineapigrescue

Here's the first video they posted:


And here is their Facebook live footage of the piggies being rescued:

We at Cavy Savvy have donated and encourage you all to help, too, if you are in a position to do so. They are a 501c3 Rescue and ALL donations are 100% tax deductible.

Want to help out? Here's how:

LA Guinea Pig Rescue's Amazon Wish List
https://www.amazon.com/gp/registry/wishlist/MRE8VDQV7URK

Direct Donation
https://www.laguineapigrescue.com

The good news is that these piggies will finally be getting the help they need and hopefully be adopted very soon. Hooray for the LA Guinea Pig Rescue!

Ask a Guinea Pig: Can Guinea Pigs Eat Lamium (dead-nettles)?

It's time for another installment of Ask A Guinea Pig! For today's question, Tavia R. asks: "Can my piggies eat Lamium (Dead Nettle)?"

Answer: According to Wikipedia, "Lamium (dead-nettles) is a genus of about 40–50 species of flowering plants in the family Lamiaceae, of which it is the type genus. They are all herbaceous plants native to Europe, Asia, and northern Africa, but several have become very successful weeds of crop fields and are now widely naturalised across much of the temperate world." Some of the species are noted as being edible (for humans), including:

• Lamium album (white nettle): "The young leaves are edible, and can be used in salads or cooked as a vegetable."
• Lamium amplexicaule (Henbit dead-nettle): "The leaves, stem, and flowers of the plant are edible and have a slightly sweet and peppery flavor, similar to celery. Henbit can be eaten raw or cooked."
• Lamium purpureum (red dead-nettle, purple dead-nettle): "Young plants have edible tops and leaves, used in salads or in stir-fry as a spring vegetable. If finely chopped it can also be used in sauces"

Purple dead-nettle. (source)

We've also heard of people feeding purple dead-nettle to rabbits (although that doesn't necessarily mean it's safe for them). But what about guinea pigs specifically? It seemed like a lot of people just did not know. However, we did find warnings about one Lamium species (Lamium amplexicaule) for alpacas and sheep. And, according to Toxic Plants of North America, "Because of the uncertainty regarding their intoxication potential, the other species of Lamium should be considered suspect as well." So it looks like there's just not enough evidence to say for sure, but what evidence does exist is cause for concern. I'd avoid feeding your piggies dead-nettles if I were you!

There are lots of things that you can safely feed your piggies instead of dead-nettles, such as these pink pearl apples!

Got a question for us? Just leave a comment!

Rent a Guinea Pig in Switzerland

In 2008, Switzerland passed some new animal rights laws, which established social rights for animals. This means that animals that are classified as "social species" need to be allowed to have social interactions with others of their own kind. Guinea pigs are one of these social species, and so Swiss pet shops will not sell just one at a time.

This creates a legal issue when one guinea pig outlives the other. As we've mentioned, guinea pigs live 5-7 years on average, and in our experience, serious health issues are much more likely to appear around age 5, such as Buffy's uterine mass. In the past, each time one of us in the Cavy Savvy cage has passed on, there were 3 piggies in the cage. We haven't been in a situation where there were only 2, and we were at risk of one piggy being left all alone. (Even though there's no social rights law for guinea pigs in the USA that we're aware of, it's still better for the mental well-being of the piggy not be solitary.)

Although it is a very unpleasant thought, it is something we might want to start planning for, given that there's currently only 2 of us, and Broccoli is about 6 years old now. Luckily, he still seems to be happy and healthy (apart from a broken tooth), so hopefully there's still plenty of time to figure that out.

Oh no, I don't think Broccoli likes me talking about this at all. Let's get back to talking about the Swiss...

But getting back to Switzerland, an animal-lover there named Priska Küng decided to start a "rent a guinea pig" service to help out humans and their lonely piggies in this unfortunate situation; as ABC News explains, "Without her rent-a-guinea pig service, the owner would have to purchase a new, probably younger guinea pig as a companion to the ageing survivor, whose eventual death would force the purchase of yet another guinea pig, locking the owner into an endless cycle of guinea pig purchases in order to adhere to Swiss law." (ABC News, we got some news for you: we're fuzzy and delightful, and any human would be lucky to be "locked" into an "endless cycle" with wonderful creatures such as us! But, I digress.) Küng would charge 50 Swiss francs for a male and 60 for a female as a deposit, and you get half of your deposit back when you return the piggy.

While this overall seems like a good thing since it ensures solitary guinea pigs don't spend their twilight years alone, there are some potential issues here. Küng is president of IG Meerschweinchen an organization of guinea pig breeders. As we've mentioned before, breeders often operate without the best interests of the piggies in mind, although in this case, it appears to be a labor of love for Küng, who has said: "It's a hobby that costs me more money than I earn from it." We'd still be comfortable with the idea if it were associated with guinea pig rescues rather than breeders, who may contribute to overpopulation. On the other hand, we've heard that overpopulation is less of an issue in that region, so perhaps there's less of a chance that people would be passing up an opportunity to take home a shelter piggy for a breeder piggy. (On the other hand, another person claimed Switzerland does have many piggies in shelters needing homes, so we don't know what to think.) Any Swiss readers out there who can weigh in?

Although some may also feel that the service sends a message that "guinea pigs are disposable," Küng also says: "It's important that none of the rental guinea pigs just keep getting passed on... If an animal has been hired out once, it either stays with me for the rest of its life or it moves somewhere else for good." This was good to read, since adjusting to a new home tends to be stressful, and we would hope that any similar services would also place guinea pig welfare over profits.

If you are in the unfortunate situation of having one guinea pig outlive the other, and don't live anywhere near the Rent A Guinea Pig service, what other options do you have? You could, of course, adopt another guinea pig. However, if for some reason you don't want to be "locked in" to an "endless cycle" of joy and cuteness for some unfathomable reason, there are other options besides letting your remaining piggy live in solitude. Rescues may take back your remaining piggy, although it's probably hard to give up your furry companion in their time of need. Some rescues may offer a "fostering" option, similar to the Rent A Guinea Pig service, where you can bring home a companion for your piggy and have the option to bring it back to the rescue after he or she passes. Of course, you may become attached to your foster piggy, and not want to give them back after all!