The Guinea Pigs!

I said I would write a blog about the guinea pigs that we adopted, so here it is!  We adopted these two male guinea pigs from the Moncton SPCA, along with Pippin the bunny.  They had been left on a downtown Moncton street in a cardboard box, where somebody found them and took them to the SPCA.  They had been named Rollo and Squishy.  We liked Rolo (with one L) because he looked like chocolate and caramel - like the Rolo candy.  We thought Squishy was a possibly bad omen of a name, so we decided to name him Toffee instead.

Since they were found abandoned, we don't know exactly how old they are, but they are not quite fully grown yet, so probably about 6 months or so.

We got a new cage for them that is on wheels, so it's easy to move them when we need to clean under the cage.  Marc made a super little hut for them out of pallet wood.

 This is Rolo - he is the more nervous one, and hides more often.  I think his fur is going to be quite long.  It is much longer than the average short-haired guinea pig.  I've looked up information on different varieties of guinea pigs and there is a breed called a "silkie" (like the chickens!) that has long hair that isn't curly or tufty, so I think he might be one of those.

Marc enjoys the guinea pigs as well - here he is holding Toffee.  Toffee's fur is whorled and always pointing in all directions, which is rather amusing.  I think he is an Abyssinian type of guinea pig.

Toffee likes exploring Marc's desk, and sometimes squeaks with apparent delight when he's up there!

Here I am with Rolo, trying to get him used to being handled.  They are both quite skittish.

We regularly let them run around in a larger box for play and exercise.

We have another smaller box within it that they use for "hiding" in, if they feel nervous.

Toffee likes to try to escape, and is sometimes successful!

He keeps whispering to Rolo his plans to take over the world, but Rolo is very quiet about it.  Look at that crazy fur!

Rolo is more interested in exploring paper tubes.

 But he might try escaping one day as well!

New Family Members

We recently added 3 new family members!  For many months...probably over a year...Marc and I had been discussing the possibility of acquiring a small animal pet.  We have one indoor cat (Mitten) and one outdoor cat (Izzy) and also Timber, Marc's dog.  We also have the 2 sheep and 2 goats, but they are outdoor pets too.  I missed having a dog of my own, but Timber doesn't like other dogs.  I also missed having a rabbit.  When we were still living in Marc's house, we couldn't get a small pet because there wasn't enough room, and we were trying to sell the house, so it wasn't the right time. We needed to spend time getting settled into the new house before making the decision about a new pet.  The Moncton SPCA had a recent influx of many small animals, and we had been watching them on the website, and finally decided it was time to take a look.

We had 3 lovely people who agreed to be our references so that the SPCA could be sure that the animal would go to a new home.  Once we passed the approval process, we were ready to check out the candidates.  We spent time in a "meeting room" with several different animals.  We visited with 2 different rabbits, a pair of bonded rats, and 2 guinea pigs.  In the end, we decided that we didn't just want 1 small animal - we wanted 3.  So, we came home with a new bunny and a pair of guinea pigs. We really liked the rats as well, but after much deliberation, we felt the guinea pigs were a better choice for us.

Today I'll write about the rabbit, and another day I'll write about the guinea pigs.

Our rabbit is named Pippin (formerly Tapper) and he is estimated to be between 1 and 2 years old.

I believe he is a cross breed that includes some "rex" rabbit genetics, due to the feel of his fur.  He is one of the softest rabbits I have ever touched, and has a similar feel to a rex breed.  He's a bit overweight, so right now he is on a lower calorie pellet diet with lots of fresh vegetables.

He gets to run around the living room on a regular basis.  We are really fortunate that he is already a regular user of the litter box, so doesn't need training on that.

He loves to rest on the top of the couch in the room where we watch movies and have a stereo.

He jumps right up on the back of it and relaxes.

He seems to enjoy interacting with us, so we believe he had a lot of handling as a young rabbit.  He was surrendered to the SPCA due to allergies, although we find it odd that someone would have him for more than a year before deciding they were allergic to him.

It's really difficult to take "action" pictures of a rabbit because they are SO fast!

He races around the room and leaps in the air and I never seem to get a good picture.

Marc was his usual creative self and made Pippin a hut from pallet wood.

He seems to like it and it's a good fit.  He kept tipping over the cardboard box we were initially using. He dumps out his food dish in front of the house.  I have to find a better feeder.

Pippin gets a lot of love, and we're really happy to have him!