Handling and Taming Your Guinea Pig

When handling guinea pigs, you must remember that they are small animals and as such they are fragile! However, they can also be ‘wriggly’and you certainly don’t want to drop them. So, you need to apply a firm but gentle grip when holding. This is much easier for adults (as opposed to young children) to master, so please ALWAYS supervise children when handling small animals.

- Encourage the guinea pig to come towards you. (If they won’t, see our hints and tips below!)

- Slide one hand underneath the belly of the guinea pig and use your other hand to scoop up their bottom and back legs.

- Bring the guinea pig close to your chest (still supporting their bottom/back legs with one hand and move your other to their back below their head/neck), keeping a firm but gentle hold – they can decide to ‘bolt’ very suddenly if they feel scared, so be mindful of this.

- You can also cradle the guinea pig in your forearm held against your body, with one hand on top of it’s back, if you prefer.

Sounds easy doesn’t it? Well, sometimes it is, but most of the time you will have to work at getting your guinea pigs to feel comfortable with being picked up. They are, after all, prey animals by nature, so their natural response is to run away and hide. Don’t be offended! They just might not realise that you are the ‘bringer of hay’, ‘feeder of mouths’, ‘cleaner of poops’ yet!

The hints and tips above are a good start when trying to tame a new or nervous guinea pig. The key really is patience and perseverance!Whilst it might take months, or even years, for a timid piggy to open up and trust you, it is so wonderful when you get cuddles with a super relaxed guinea pig, lying down flat as a pancake with their little back feet kicked out!

If you want to take things a step further, once they have trust in you, you can even treat train your guinea pigs to do tricks! Think of some of the things you might see a dog doing as part of their trained behaviour or even in an agility competition…many of these can be done with guinea pigs too! As long as the equipment is appropriately sized, of course!

With the right approach, trick training can be great mental stimulation for guinea pigs, who are really smart little creatures. It will also help you to strengthen your bond with your small furries.

If you want to try trick training your guinea pigs, a lot of the same rules apply as for gaining their trust:

- Be patient and consistent.

- Use small treats of their favourite food as reward.

- Keep training sessions short.

- Never shout or get angry with your guinea pigs.

For some great examples of what can be done trick training your guinea pigs (and for loads more ideas on how to do it) check out this website run by our friend Jemma:

www.guineapigtricks.com