If you’re a loyal follower, you may have noticed the absence of Smudge the neutered male.
Smudge was born to a rescue sow called Cleo. She was pregnant and had 6 pups. Two of those pups were male. We kept and neutered both males. Smudge is one of those males.
Since the very moment he was born I adored his unique coat. He was just so pretty to look at, not that all guinea pigs aren’t cute, but Smudge was something else.
He certainly packed A LOT of personality into his small body. Soon as he hit a few weeks old he was on a mission – a mission to make sure EVERYONE and EVERY guinea pig knew who he was.
As soon as Smudge was old enough we got him and his brother Laser, neutered. This worked really well until we moved house in the summer of 2021. The larger space and increase in number of females within our herd must have upset the boys. Smudge became a serious bully. Laser was so frightened of him that the ONLY time we have ever experienced a guinea pig jumping off a platform was when Laser was trying to escape Smudge.
It was at this point we realised that something needed to change.
We removed Smudge from the herd but he became depressed. He wasn’t a guinea pig that was happy to live alone like our lone boar Thor. We were left with a difficult decision. We weren’t in a position to get Smudge a herd of his own, but we also didn’t want him to be lonely. We didn’t have the space in the house to bring a sow inside with him (due to other boars in the house, which I personally feel is unfair) and he simply wouldn’t accept a younger male.
Being in the public eye made the decision ten times harder because, no matter what we decided to do, we would upset people.
We made the decision to rehome Smudge. This decision was not taken lightly and it took us several weeks to come to this. Every now and again we would change our minds but then seeing him, just sitting in a house or under a blanket, not moving or interacting, it was becoming more and more apparent just how unhappy he was.
He now has his own herd of ladies with a subscriber of ours and as you can see, he is very happy. I am told he is often flashing off how sexy he is to the girls. Just as it should be.
This was a decision made with nothing but love.
They are a lot like us. They have social groups, friends and those they don’t get along with. There’s a German documentary called “The Secret life of guinea pigs”. Have you seen it? Smudge is living his best life now, I’m sure.
You made the best decision for the best reason, and smudgmeister is a happy boi. Still it must have been very hard for you. Xxx
It was definitely the right thing to do. He’s a beautiful boy and deserved his own herd of lovely ladies.
He looks very very happy.❤️🐾
Smudge looks very happy with his new ladies 💕