Guinea Pigs (Cavys)

H

Hen-Gen

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Island of Fetlar, Shetland Islands
Maybe having a reversion to an earlier life but thought it might be fun to take up guinea pig breeding again. But lots of new varieties since then so went on Amazon to buy an up to date book on cavy colour genetics. Nought, zilch, zero. Astonished! How can one of Britains most popular pets have escaped without anyone writing a book on this subject?
 
I guess we will have to have a hunt around for you, we have an independent book shop in our town, which sells different books. Will send the OH in there to have a look for you
 
Have you asked any of the cavy breed clubs? They may have a privately published book.
 
There's a blog, HenGen. http://emmasguineapigs.blogspot.ie/p/genetics.html
I'm afraid the only thing I know about them is that one mortifying time, my tomcat brought home a dead one! I thought he had yet another young rabbit until I realised it was rather colourful rabbit! When I went to investigate, I found he was the very proud possessor of a very dead guinea pig! No idea where he had got it or how! I did ask around the neighbourhood, but nobody seemed to keep them. Mind you, I've no idea how large his territory was, he could have got it miles away!
 
Thanks for the input guys.
Found an article on one of the guinea pig sites and have downloaded it. It's comprehensive and easy to read. Never seen a gold, white and lilac gp before but what a beautiful animal!
Several new coat types that I'd not heard of before, eg Texel, Alpaca etc, so plenty of choice. Even a Shetland breed!!!
 
We will look forward to pics! I believe that somewhere in South America, they are kind of the national dish. You can buy them in sort of "snack boxes"!! Looks quite gross, with the little legs.
 
I love guinea pigs. I have several here, taken in over the years as "rescue"/unwanted pets. They are so characterful. My favourite colour is brown agouti.
Good luck with the project HG.
 
Love guinea pigs.
I do struggle to see how you can have a Shetland version, I mean Shetland breeds tend to be shorter and sturdier than others, what can be shorter and sturdier than a bog standard GP?
 
I google imaged them. They appear to have longish hair but not as long as a Peruvian. I'll certainly not be keeping any of them. Prefer the standard short haired variety. Actually called Shelties - I'm assuming that is short for Shetlands?
 
I used to have a couple of guinea pigs when I was a young teenager. An albino one and a dark brown/white. They were so friendly (apart from the pooping around the floor thing!), they used to climb up under my jumper and have a snooze there while I did my homework.
 
When our kids were little we had a guinea pig called Budleigh Salterton who would whistle for attention when he felt a bit lonely. He replaced a hamster who was left with the run of the bathroom whilst we went away on holiday, and provided with copious amounts of food and water. Despite this, he somehow managed to climb up the toilet overhang and down himself in the Harpic. Still wondering how he did it!
 
Great minds think alike Hen-Gen... Having got very fed up with all the lockdown and the new rules and regs for showing etc. I started looking for a possible new breeding hobby a few weeks back. I firmly ruled out ANYTHING that DEFRA might be vaguely interested in, I ruled out rabbits due to the new diseases and costs of vaccination and I came up with Guinea pigs! :-)08 I haven't gone any further into it yet apart from looking into health issues etc. I used to keep them as a kid..Until they got wiped out by our local feed merchant putting antibiotic treated rabbit pellets into the usual feed we used to give our piggies, but this was back in the 60's and there was no specialist guinea pig foods on the market back then. And to be honest I think lots of people were pretty ignorant about their needs back then.

Anyway I love the look of that Lilac Gold and White you found. Very pretty. I was wondering about the new Teddy coated ones. Seems the satins have health problems so I will avoid those.

Henk has a guineapig coat colour calculator at kippenjungle http://kippenjungle.nl/kruisingCavia.html

Eris
 
Far be it from me to present the rebuttal of 'fools seldom differ' :D

Thanks for the link. Henk makes a contribution to knowledge way above his punching weight.
I'm still keen on chickens myself but also sheep and guinea pigs. I've recently lost some of my land due to the owner moving away and the new purchaser giving me notice to quit. Incomers huh! But still carrying on in a small way.
 
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