Slave's Birthday Presents

It was Slave's birthday at the end of October. It must be easy for humans to find presents for a piggy lover and here are some of them.

This is a scarf that is absolutely covered with piggies!

Difficult to take a close up! The design is called "Lettuce be friends". Now she wants lockdown to be over so that our pigsitter can take her out for a much belated birthday dinner and she will be able to wear it.

This mug is called "The Anatomy of a Guinea Pig". We do not think that you will be able to read the captions but our favourite says " Squeaky Squeal Region ". The ears are labelled " Baby Cabbages" and the eyes are entitled " All-seeing vision beans."

Isn't this the sweetest little piggy? He is made of glass and you can tell how tiny he is from the next photo.

Yes readers. That is an apple behind him for comparison.

A Piggy A-Z. L is for Lots of Lovely Leaves.

 This is part of the farm where Slave goes to collect Lots of Lovely Leaves for us.

In the foreground there are Broccoli plants and behind those are Cabbages and Cauliflowers. Right at the back, in front of the farm building, there are rows of winter Lettuce. Slave's friend, who owns the farm, lets her pick anything that she likes for us.

Around the edges of the field there are lots of tasty weeds, shepherd's purse, groundsel and chickweed and she forages for whatever she can reach. Sometimes we get sow thistles and dandelions too but Slave has to watch out for nasty nettles.

 

 

Here are some of the cabbage plants. When they have been harvested, Slave will be able to get to the cauliflowers. They are our favourite.

On the other side of the road are the fields where she cuts boxes of grass for us.

"You two start at one end and I will start at the other," says Carter to Saoirse and Aoife. "We will meet in the middle."

"Quick Saffron," says Bounty, " let's eat this leaf before Ebony wakes up from her nap." " I think that it might be a bit too much for just us two," replies Saffron.

"Move up Miss Marple," say Mama Bonbon and Bella, " there is plenty for us all."

This post was inspired by the lovely leaves that the Surrey Squeakers were enjoying on their blog.

Photos from abroad.

We have a new photo to share showing two of our one time Junior Slave's herd of piggies. We call the US branch of Piggyfriends "Piggyfriends Two."

Here is one of Mama Rin and her daughter, Maki
.

And here is a newcomer! This little piggy is being fostered by them after being rescued from some terrible surroundings.

She will have a home to go to so they are not naming her as, once named, she will never leave. They are just calling her Minipig for the time being. She never stops eating or running around so it was difficult to get a good photo of her. Isn't she pretty?

Our Slave could never foster as they most certainly would never leave. We wonder what will happen with Minipig and will keep you updated.

Nail cutting day. Silly pigtures.

It is time for some of us to have our nails cut. None of us mind this at all but some of us will even lay on our backs so that Slave can easily see our little paws.

Here is Kiwi. He was so relaxed that he actually fell asleep like this. All of his nails are black so having him in this position makes it easy for Slave to see where to cut.

And here is Saffron. Although she is a plump lady, she is not as fat as this pigture makes her appear.

And here is her boarfriend, Bounty, who is definitely not as fat as he seems to be. He was sliding off our pigsitter's lap at the time.

Candle Lighting in Swannanoa, North Carolina

The Piggyville girls have sent us a report about their candle lighting ceremony.

The Piggyville girls lit a candle on March 9th. in memory of Peter Gurney and all of our dearly departed loved ones. They chose to place the candle next to a Peace Lily. The lily's bright green leaves and fragrant flowers symbolise the rebirth of the soul. The lily is also a symbol of peace and hope. May we all find comfort in celebrating the lives of the ones we love and have lost.

The girls decided that since Mum has such a short candle it would be better is they all sat for individual portraits.

Tilley, being the new piggy in the pen, was unfamiliar with the candle ceremony. She decided to strike her Sphinx pose.

Honeydew arrived at the candle lighting ceremony atop her favourite cozy.

Squirly prays for all the Piggyfriends and wishes everyone a good night.

New Piggyfriend! Meet Bounty.

Hello readers. We are delighted to announce the arrival of a new Piggyfriend.

His name is Bounty.

He was a long time coming to us.

Long story cut short....... Slave went to our local rescue in the hope of adopting him and another piggy called Carrot. Although many piggies have come to us from this rescue in the past, Slave had to fill in loads of forms and send them photos of our accommodation with measurements of indoor and outdoor homes. She went to meet them both and got to pick them up but was then told of further complications before she was allowed to proceed any further. There had to be checks with the small animals manager before she could take them home and a follow up appointment with the rehoming team.


At first, Carrot's photo was labelled reserved on their website but not Bounty's so Slave called and left messages ( no one ever seems to answer the phone ). Next she called her friend, who works on Reception and eventually got a call back from the small animals section. This time she was told that she could have them both but had to have an appointment to speak to the rehoming team. Then Bounty's photo had the reserved label but not Carrot's.


At long last, she went to collect them both but the rehoming person only had papers for Bounty and she was told that Carrot had already been adopted. No one there seemed to know why she had been told that she could have them both as "no one is allowed to take home two piggies unless they are a bonded pair "! The number of times Slave has brought home several piggies from this rescue counted for nothing nor the fact that our junior Slave used to work there or that Slave used to help him take the rescue film shows out to our local villages. Or that she had previously been asked if she would be willing to take problem piggies as she is an "experienced Piggy owner".

Although Bounty was allowed to come home that day, he was only "on trial" with us in case Slave  wanted to take him back. As if! She was then supposed to go back the following week to pay for him. She was so upset that she asked if this could be done over the phone and this was allowed.

A further call stated that she had not been told that she could have them both. Who is telling porkies then? So eventually Bounty became ours. He is a jolly little fellow who has made himself right at home.

This rescue used to be such a friendly place but how it has changed and Slave is never going back there again. It had better remain nameless on the grounds that we might incriminate ourselves. We hope that Carrot found a good home. Say hello to Bounty!

Friday Video: smart Cookie

Long overdue agent introduction!! She has been agent weight since 29 october 2017... And still keeping that weight above a kilo since then. Recently she has managed to up her weight to 1120, so she is doing a good job in the eating department.
Here you can see Agent Meerkat, aka Cookie, showcasing one of her special skills.
Next to the demonstrated skill, agent Meerkat is a very suitable name for her, because she is always keeping an eye out for us, especially for pig dad, and will alert the others loudly when she thinks food is on the way (which is pretty much every time she hears pig dad ;)!

View this post on Instagram

Cookie (the cream colored one,) WILL get that piece of veg I put in the middle of the bed for Raani (the black, red and white one) #guineapigs #chicory #smartcookie

A post shared by Mieke (@pandameisje) on Feb 17, 2019 at 3:12am PST

New Piggyfriends are coming!

We were very sorry to discover that our lovely Rodentologist at Palace Piggies Rescue is moving to Yorkshire, which is a long, long way away from Piggyfriends. All of the piggies for adoption need to find homes quickly so that the Palace Piggies people do not have too many piggies to move along with them.

If you look at their website.....

http://www.palacepiggierescue.org/piggies-for-re-homing.html

.....you will see that the top two piggies, Machu Picchu and Kiwi, are reserved. That is because they are coming to live with us! Slave cannot pick them up until next Tuesday so watch this space for more news.

P.S. If any Slaves in South East England have room for a piggy or two, Palace Piggies would love to hear from you. They always have more piggies than they have room to show on their adoption page. Contact details on their website.

Hard Times

The dreadful heatwave continues here at Piggyfriends. We cannot go outside to forage as there is nothing there to eat and even the humans have been advised to stay out of the sun between 11 in the morning and 4 in the afternoon. Not that our Slave needs any such advice.

She did come home with this box of pseudo grass yesterday. It looked quite like grass so we were willing to give it a try.

Unfortunately it was very coarse and the dandelions were not up to our normal juicy standard but, in the circumstances, we were willing to forgive our Slave, who had made the effort to find us something that was nearly grass.

Cosmo Piggyfriend thinks that this is more like a doormat than grass but he is giving it his best shot ."This is better than no grass at all", he says between mouthfuls, "but it takes a lot of chewing."

Carter, Aoife and Saoirse will have a go at anything that looks like grass and every Piggyfriend tried some although it was not quite so relished as the usual lush supply.

There has never been a day when no grass has been served at Piggyfriends, even when Slave has to brush off the snow to find it so we have been very disappointed in the weather that has ruined our favourite food.

We have all been moved into Slave's dining room, which is the coolest room in the house and we have lots of fans to keep away the worst of the heat. Some of us are in smaller pens than usual to fit us all in but who wants to run around when it is hot? We wish that it would rain!

A New Bed for Ted

Regular readers may remember a few months ago a new addition joined the Piggypals a little ginger teddy guinea pig called Ted.

At first everything went well Ted was put in quarantine for 2 weeks and then after 2 weeks had passed and he was not ill he was allowed to join us big boys. Things were OK for a couple of weeks and then Ted decided he did not like Hugo in fact he really didn't like Hugo and some serious fighting broke out.

This meant that the humans had to seperate Ted us from us which also meant that Mummy had to make Ted some new bedding as he is only a baby she decided he would like Ladybirds you can see how his fleece looks below.

Ted now lives in a seperate cage next to us where he can see, smell and talk to us but not get at Hugo.

We do spend time in the same run in the garden as the grass provides a distraction for everyone but this is under strict human supervision and if it looks like problems may start Mummy or Daddy will remove either Ted or Hugo.

Me I get on with everypig!!

Guinea Pig Crop Circle

Us Piggies have been very busy now that the nice weather has finally arrived in the UK can you guess what we have been up to?

Candle Lighting 2018

On the 9th. March at 8 pm. members of the GPDD light candles in memory of the piggies who are at the Rainbow Bridge as well as other pets and humans who are, sadly, no longer with us.

We usually ask our eldest Piggyfriend to light our candles so here is our beloved Otto doing the honours.

Below is another photo in which you can see him with his best friend Niamh. She was our candle lighter last year as our Slave was away on holiday so it was down to our pigsitter to be our photographer and he picked Niamh as he knew that she would sit still and not set fire to her whiskers.

Finally here is a better view of our candles, which were rather obscured by our candle lighters.

If any of our readers lit candles and would like us to post their pigtures, please get in touch at the usual address ( see Contribute ).

A Piggy A-Z. F is for Fans

We hate the winter, when the grass struggles to grow and we have to be indoors all the time because it is too wet and cold so we are reminiscing today.

It does not get hot very often in England but we do have a few days when it is too warm for us ( and for Slave ) so we have lots of fans around the house to keep us all cool.

In the pig room ( Slave calls it her conservatory but there are nearly as many piggies in it as plants ) we have a ceiling fan as the roof is glass and it lets in too much heat. Here it is.

It is nice and quiet and is also our light at night.

We also have several floor fans and you can see one of them below.

The towels stop us being in a draught but the cool air can circulate. That is me, Louis Piggyfriend, eating from my bowl. Otto and Niamh live next door to me but they are behind the towel and you cannot see them.

Slave tells us that, on milder days, the grass is beginning to grow but that it is very muddy in the garden after the snow has melted and we have had a lot rain today but we all look forward to going out to pick our own grass in the summer.

Slave's Guinea Pig Mugs

We had a request from Eddie and Nugget with Slave Cindy for a photograph of Slave's Christmas present piggy mug. We omitted to include this in our post about her piggy gifts so we are remedying this right now.

Below you can see the new one complete with matching spoon.

She has a similar one made by the same company in which she stores her paint brushes. She does not want to use them for coffee in case they get chipped. You can see them both below.

These piggies also appear on cards and calendars in the UK and we expect that readers from here will have seen them in shops or may own them too.

Whilst we had the camera out, an intrepid piggy climbed onto a stool to take a photo of Slave's row of other mugs on a very high shelf in the pig room. We thought that we would share this photo too. Here they are.....

The last of the taste tests.

We have come to the last of the taste test " treats". This one is called "Fruit Garden" and it contains Apple, Banana and Rosehip. Now we did not expect this to go down too well as none of us like banana. Slave can only remember five Piggyfriends ever liking banana in the very many years that she has been taking in piggies.

Tyrion filled the dish ready for us to try. Here is a photo of it. The dark bits that you can see must be dried rosehips. We are not sure why they are there but fresh rosehips do contain vitamin C, which we get from the many fresh veggies that we eat.

Unsurprisingly Carter dived into the bowl. He chucked out all the banana and tried a few apple pieces.

Saoirse joined him, sniffed at the dish and left.

The Dangermice were undecided about this. Cosmo nibbled a little bit of the apple.....

......but Casper retreated into his pig cave and would have nothing to do with it.

This is as close as Fernando would get to the dish and Martin ran away.

" No thank you." says Otto as Slave tried to tempt him with some of the dried apple.

As no pig was enjoying this box of treats, Slave took pity on us and went and picked some apples from the garden. Here is Louis munching a piece of real fresh apple. "Yum yum".

We all want to thank Nature's Feast for sending us all this food to try out and we are sorry that we did not like the Treats but the bag of food was good. We think that the treat boxes may be more suited to hamsters. We are going to email Nature's Feast and tell them about our test in case they are not reading our blog.

Tyrion, Ivan and Magnus all say " This is the food that we love the best. GRASS!"

Trying out the treats continued.......

Next we tried the "Vegetable Patch" box. This contained dried carrot, parsnip and flaked peas. We all love flaked peas, which our Slave buys loose from the pet shop and sprinkles on our dishes of nibble.

As we were filling the dish, Slave noticed a sunflower seed in the mix and quickly whisked it out. It is said that seeds present a choking hazard for piggies. We never have them but better safe than sorry.

Louis tried it first as carrots are his absolute favourite veggie. You can see in this pigture how it looked from the start.

He ate some of the carrot flakes and started on the flaked peas. As we all wanted to try this treat, we moved the dish on to the next pen where Fernando had a few pieces but his brother, Martin, was not interested.

Next we gave the dish to Carter, Aoife and Saoirse.

Needless to say, Carter rushed over and had some of this treat and Aoife joined him. Carter says to please forgive the state of their pen but the housekeeper has not been round yet.

Some of us are not fond of carrot so not all the Piggyfriends joined in this taste test but Casper Dangermouse ( below ) had some.

Magnus was not sure about this although he likes carrots and his brother Ivan would not try it so he  is not in this pigture. ( below ).

By the time the dish had gone the rounds, not surprisingly all the flaked peas had gone. No pig wanted to eat the dried parsnip, which was very hard and we never eat parsnip anyway. We could not see the point in having dried carrot and much prefer having a nice fresh carrot pulled from Slave's vegetable garden.

All in all, this "treat" was better than the "Flower Garden" one but we would rather just have our usual flaked peas and fresh carrot.

We might give this 3 stars as some piggies, who are not so fortunate as to have a never ending supply of fresh carrots might like it.

The last treat box is called  "Fruit Garden" and we will be testing this soon so look out for our post.

Testing the new food......continued.

We have heard from a Slave on the GPDD called Chris, who has been trying out the new food and her four girls love it.

Today we have been trying out the "Nature's Feast Snack Selection", which has three different contents. First of all we opened the box called "Flower Garden". The next photo shows you what it looks like.

This is a mix of dried flowers, namely Marigold, Rose, Cornflower and Sunflower. Now, we eat flowers in our daily forage but Slave picks Vetch in season and that is our favourite. We also like Dandelion and Sow Thistle flowers but we always have them fresh. The instructions on the packet are to give out one teaspoon of snack per day but, as there are a lot of us, we decided to pass the dish around from pen to pen.

Now Carter will have a go at any new food and he rushed over to see what was in the dish. He sniffed at it and retreated. His girls did not get any nearer than you can see in this photo.

Fernando also came over to have a look. He did pick up a couple of flowers but dropped them back into the dish and went back to his cucumber.

The instructions on the packet suggest " Hand feeding snacks helps you bond with your pet." Now we could not be more bonded with our Slave but even this could not tempt us to eat these flowers.

"Sorry, Slave." says Niamh. " Even hand feeding will not tempt me to eat this. I am going to hide in this house."

" No thanks," says Otto, " but if you have any Vetch, that would go down a treat."

No pig was interested in this box but the label does say that it is for Rabbits and Hamsters too so maybe they would enjoy it. Sorry but we can't give this any stars. Tomorrow we are going to try another box and that may be more to our liking.

Slave tipped the dried flowers onto her basket of pot pourri.