Welcome Maple Syrup Downey :D Really, we just call her Maple :)
Judah and I had discussed getting a hamster, because it gets boring during the day when he is working and I won't be able to work until we know what/where his next job will be. When I read about hamsters online though, they are primarily nocturnal creatures. However, guinea pigs are awake during the day and also crave lots of attention, so we felt that a guinea pig might be a better fit for us.
We went to Pet Supplies Plus on Wednesday since Judah rained out around 11 am and they had five different pigs in their cage. This little girl was hiding in her house, and I liked her the most. The worker told us that she thought their two female pigs were pregnant. Uh oh! But Judah and I held her and she was too cute to pass up. The woman explained that if she does have babies, we can bring them back to the store once they are 6 weeks old if we don't want to keep them.
I'm really hoping she isn't pregnant, since if you read online, pregnancy is not easy on guinea pigs. They have a rather high mortality rate :( So although babies would be so cool, I don't want Maple to have any complications. I've had three guinea pigs before and she doesn't seem any larger than any of those ones, but I'm going to keep a close eye on her to be sure. They say she won't really start to "show" until six weeks, but their gestation is only about nine weeks. This could be interesting!
Maple is settling in nicely. She finally started to eat yesterday. I'm not sure that she has eaten any of her food pellets or drank any water, but she has been munching on her hay and I've fed her lettuce leafs, and she's eaten those. I'm hoping today she will finally start to eat more. Today I am going to try to get her out of the cage. I've already spent twenty minutes petting her and trying to make her grow accustomed to me. I didn't want to take her out right away, because I don't want her to get scared every time I move her house. Side note - fail on our part, Judah and I got a cage that doesn't open from the top! It only has a large front door, so hopefully Maple won't give us too tough of a time getting out of her cage. I also wish her cage was bigger, but we can always upgrade in the future.
I'll keep you all updated as our Maple saga progresses :D
Readers: Have you ever owned a guinea pig? What's your favorite small pet?
Hey Shelby, where have you disappeared to? I was enjoying your blog and now your gone! Nana
ReplyDeleteI've still been updating! Just make sure you are going to the home page. I also have the new posts on my Facebook page :)
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