Saturday, March 31, 2012

Year of the Pig

This guinea pig boom is getting a little ridiculous. In the past six days, we've received eight new pigs! Right now, TAS South has 11 guinea pigs - 6 in foster care, 2 at Pet Valu, and 3 at the shelter. I shouldn't complain though, because it's much easier to deal with a boatload of guinea pigs than it is to deal with a boatload of rabbits. It's just super weird.
Lenny here arrived today, just while I was walking in the door. His owner had bought him from a pet store only a few months before, but now his girlfriend was moving in and she was allergic. Sure, you might think they'd have some inkling that this move would be happening a few months ago, but who knows? Maybe she just ambushed him one day and appeared in his house with all her stuff, ninja-style. Lenny had sore feet from inadequate bedding and repulsively long nails, so he's probably better off anyway.
Carrot Top arrived yesterday. He was also surrendered, but I have no idea why, and I'm not sure the staff bothered asking. He's also 6 months old. Perhaps his owner thought he was buying a stuffed animal and mistakenly bought a living creature! That would explain a lot. Carrot Top is cute, but man is he skittish. He's a guinea pig, though, that's kind of their default setting.
Cherie arrived the day before Carrot Top. You know what they say, a guinea pig a day keeps a shelter full! She's really stunning to look at, but unfortunately I think there's something going on with her, health-wise. She kept twitching and shaking her head when I did her photo, and she was sneezing. The vet will have to look at her on Monday and see if it's something we can handle.
Then we have Lorax here, a dashing, handsome fellow who was left in a box on North Region's doorstep, along with his four girlfriends.
Yes, that's right, four girlfriends. Lorax must have been a busy guy.
He was quite down in the dumps at the shelter, since he was used to living in a group and we had to take his girlfriends away (and put them in foster care). Happily, a nice guinea pig experienced family adopted him today to be pals with their 5-year-old boy, so Lorax is part of a family once more!

His adopters were the perfect counterpoint to the owners who surrendered Lenny (or Carrot Top, or Cherie) - they'd kept their boy for four years, they doted on him, and they were careful to pick the right companion for him since his bonded partner had just passed away. Lorax is a lucky guy.
And finally, here are three of his girlfriends! The fourth one is at another foster home, but this trio of lovely ladies is hanging out at my house on pregnancy watch. Salsa (on top) and Polka (on the left) are hopefully too young to be pregnant, but Tango (on the right) is looking pretty round.

On the upside, Sweet Tart has finally been adopted. And on the rabbit side of things, Scotty and Morris have both been adopted, leaving us with an astonishingly low number of rabbits. Of course, the cynical side of me says "Oh good, we've cleared out room for the post-Easter rush", but shush, cynical side.

Guinea pigs are easy to adopt out, so I shouldn't complain, but sheesh. They're living animals, people, not collectibles. Put some thought into it before you buy one!

4 comments:

Caroline said...

Hi Laura,

How is Salsa balancing on top? Is she 'piggy backing'? Pardon the pun!

selkie said...
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