Candle Lighting Day 2020

Every year the GPDD organises a Candle Lighting Day on March 9th. when their members and friends ( and anyone else who would like to join in ) light a candle at 8pm. in their respective time zones so that the light goes around the world in memory of friends both human and animal who are at the Rainbow Bridge. This is the date of Peter Gurney's birthday. He wrote many guinea pig books and had lots of piggies of his own.

"Would you like to light our candle this year Miss Bonbon as you were not here last year?" asks Slave.

" I am not sure that my little paws can manage that dangerous looking device," says Bonbon.

"That is alright," says Slave.  "I will switch it on for you. See!"

" That is better," says Bonbon. " I would not want to get too close and singe my whiskers."

 " Now sit nicely next to the candle," says Slave. " I will take your photo and send it to Audrey. She is going to collect the photos and put some of them on the GPDD home page for everyone to see."

We are lighting our candle in memory of a whole host of Piggyfriends past, our dogs, fish, birds and mice and most especially for our human Daddy Slave, who passed away last year. We are grateful to our pigsitter, Sean, who helps Mummy Slave by fetching hay bales and taking all of our soggy paper and hay to the tip, jobs which he used to do. We all miss him very much and try to cheer up our Slave every day.

We love snow days

Our friends, the Piggyville girls from North Carolina, have sent us a report about their snow day. Here in England we just have rain, rain and more rain so this makes a pleasant change.

" Hey girls!  Wake up." says Honeydew. " I think that I heard Mom say that today is a Snow Day. Aren't these Mom's snow wellies?"

"What is a Snow Day?" ask Squirly and Tilley. Honeydew explains that a Snow Day happens when children cannot go to school because there is too much snow on the roads. Just one inch of snow is enough to keep the school buses off the roads in Swannanoa, North Carolina.

" Do we go to school?" asks Tilley. " Of course not, "replies Squirly. " We stay at home and teach our humans how to come running every time we squeal or rattle the bars.Today we will try to teach them how to take a photo of us out in the snow."

The Piggyville girls ponder how they are going to go outside in the snow without any snow wellies.

" We are pampered piggies!! Our Mom made sure that our little feet did not get cold by putting us on vet bedding. We love Snow Days. Too bad all the snow had melted by the afternoon but we sure had fun watching Mom slip and slide whilst trying to take our pigtures."

A Guinea Pig A to Z - "J" is for Jasper !

Hello everyone --- I'm Jasper from the Prairie Pigs!  

In the proud tradition of Peter Gurney's famous guinea pig, Free Range Fred, I am a free-range piggy too and spend most of the day running loose in the piggy room, visiting my friends and sampling the hay from their hay racks.  (Actually it's the same as the hay in my own hay rack, but for some reason stolen hay always seems to taste better!)

When I first came to the Prairie Pigs, I had a touch of scurvy (the staff at the local Humane Society shelter didn't know how important it is to give guinea pigs Vitamin C) so my gums and teeth were sore and I just was not feeling well.  Slave decided it might encourage me to eat and move around more if she left my cage door open, and even after the daily Vitamin C and regular servings of fresh veggies made me feel a lot better, I convinced her that this was a tradition we should keep alive !

Here I am, hanging out with my girlfriend, the beauteous Bonnie McSmithers.  Isn't she gorgeous???

Now I'm over at Heathcliffe's cage, having a chat.

Of course, though I do love being "out and about", sometimes a piggy just wants to curl up in his very own hay box for a nice afternoon nap...

Happy Valentine's Day

                                                        Pig to love.

                                     
                                                       Pigs to love.

                                       
                                                          Lovely, lovely pigs to love.


Love your guinea pigs on Valentine's Day. Love them every day. Courtesy of Bon Bon, Miss Marple and Bella Piggyfriend.

A Piggy A-Z. I is for Ivermectin and Isoflurane.

We thought that it was about time that we got back to the Piggy A-Z so here we go with I.

I is for Ivermectin, a wonderful medicine that kills mites, the bane of all piggies.

Our Slave buys this from our Rodentologists and it comes in the little dropper bottle, pictured above, which gives out a measured dose. We all get two drops of this every three months and it keeps mites away.

Sometimes piggies have come to Piggyfriends already suffering from mites and they have been given the two drops of Ivermectin followed by a second dose a fortnight later to kill off any eggs that might have hatched since the first dose. In very rare cases, a third dose can be given after another fortnight.

Slave keeps a chart with all of our names on it and she puts the dates when we are "Ivomeced" so that no pig is ever missed. We are all given a dose of Panacur at the same time and we will cover this when we get to P. We always get a treat afterwards especially if we are good piggies.

I is also for Isoflurane, the only safe anaesthetic for piggies but we do not have a photo of this. If anypig ever has to be given an anaesthetic, make sure that this is the one used by your vet.

Do any of our piggy readers have a name beginning with I? If so, we would love to see your pigture.

Look what Slave received at Christmas!

We were going to post this earlier but we wanted you to have plenty of time to meet new Guinygirl, Linn.

Slave's eldest son, our pigsitter, came to stay with us at Christmas and he gave her this calendar. It is full of lovely pigtures and is hanging where we can all see the pig of the month.

He also gave her this little book.

It is the next in the series of classic stories adapted by Bloomsbury Publishing to feature guinea pigs
in the starring roles. This one is the piggy version of the Nutcracker ballet. We all know how graceful piggies are don't we? Don't we........? Say yes everyone.

We particularly love the Sugar Plum Fairy pictured above. Slave always calls us her little sugar plums and we thought that this was appropriate.

And here is the handsome Nutcracker prince. We hope that Bloomsbury do not mind us sharing these photos especially as they might encourage our readers to go out and buy a copy.

New guinygirl: Linn

Hi everyone,
My name is Linn! I am a little over a year old.

My previous owners brought me to an animal shelter after my friends went over the rainbow bridge.
The animal shelter I came from is the 'dierenbescherming' slave thinks this is like the english RSPCA (=Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals). There was one lone piggy in the shelter, the others already had friends, that was me, I am glad Cookie and Binky liked me enough to take me home with them.
You probably already know my new friends, Cookie and Binky. Unfortunately they had to say goodbye to their friend Raani just before halloween, she had a saddle back and quite some bladder stones in the 3,5 years of her life.
I really like my new boar friend Binky, we love to lie next to each other in the cage. He is very big compared to me... Here we are sharing a leaf of endive (just before I ran of with his leaf again ;)

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Welcome to our new addition to the piggie herd: Linn (unless we think of another name 😉)! They are starting to tolerate each other and here she is sharing a leaf of endive with Binky (after running away with his leaf three times)...

A post shared by Mieke (@pandameisje) on Dec 8, 2019 at 1:38pm PST

Though big, he and Cookie did loose weight since they meet me, I think all that running after me has made them more active.

I am a very vocal piggy, which slave Mikey likes a lot. Raani was also a little chatterbox at times, so she is happy I am a chatterbox as well.

At first I was rather afraid of taking veggies from the slaves. But the others always run up to the front of their cage, so I had to see what they were doing. I came here on 7 December 2019, and I now come to get my piece of veg, though occasionally I will steal a piece from the others. Slaves are sure I know my name, because when they call it out they can see me reacting. So after a week or so I learned when they are calling my name it means they have a piece of vegetable waiting for me. By now I have also learned that pills are okay, they others were so enthusiastic so I just had to try that. Slaves are glad I take the pills now, they say it will come in handy when I actually need pills, not sure what they mean by that...

I am not the best of friends with Cookie (yet), but she tolerates me most of the time. I do know she is safer then whatever is outside the cage and I tend to hide behind her or Binky whenever we get spooked by anything.

By now slave Mikey is pretty confident we get along well enough, ever since she found the three of us in and under our new hammock like this...

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Wie durft te beweren dat we niet allemaal in en onder de hangmat passen..? Who dares to argue we don't all fit in and under the hammock..? Hangmat en standaard van / hammock and stand by @slaaplekkerzacht

A post shared by Mieke (@pandameisje) on Dec 30, 2019 at 3:30am PST

This was taken half an hour after the one above, we were still in the hammock. Cookie is with her back to us in the first pigture, if you can browse (press >) to the second pigture, you can see she was enjoying a bit of sunshine. Mom thinks Cookie might think she is a cat...

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Ik denk dat de koppeling met newbie Linn nu zeker weten geslaagd is, na ruim een half uur liggen ze nog met zijn drieën in de hangmat... Bekijk op de tweede foto waarom Cookie met d'r rug naar ons toe ligt #hangmatvriendjes

A post shared by Mieke (@pandameisje) on Dec 30, 2019 at 4:16am PST

Anyway, now you know a bit about me,
wheeking new year, Linn
and the others Guinygirl Cookie, boar Binky
and slave Mikey

Happy New Year 2020!

Here is Bonny Piggyfriend to wish you all a very Happy New Year.

" There won't be fireworks, will there?" asks Bonny.

"Not if I can help it, " replies Slave. " I do not like them either. If there are any nearby, I will put on a CD to drown the noise."

" I do not mind the pretty ones," says Bonny, " but not the ones that go BANG!".

"Me neither," replies Slave. " Luckily not many people live near us so we should all be OK."

The Piggyfriends all say HAPPY NEW YEAR READERS! If you have a New Year photo of your piggies, please share it with us.

Happy Boxing Day from the Prairie Pigs !

Hi everyone, it's me, Pavarotti from the Prairie Pigs!  We all want to wish everyone a wonderful peaceful and happy holiday season.  It's Boxing Day here in Canada and the silly humans are all out shopping, but we guinea pigs know how to really celebrate --- by eating cilantro out of boxes!

We received two piggy-themed Christmas cards this year (behind me in this photo).  The lovely card on the right came from Auntie Penny, all the way from England, and when you open the one on the left, the guinea pig sings Jingle Bells.  I`m known for my singing voice too, but I'm more of a tenor while the guinea pig who sings on the card sounds like a soprano (or maybe a chipmunk!).

Happy Christmas Readers!

Carter Piggyfriend here. On behalf of the Piggyfriend herd, I would like to wish you all a very Happy Christmas.

I hope that you all received lovely presents from your Slaves and that you are full of carrots and other good things. Now all of you be good piggies and let your Slaves have the rest of the day off after preparing Christmas feasts for the humans.

Slave Penny says Happy Christmas to all the readers too.

Happy Holidays!

Nugget here. I've never been in a holiday photo without my brother Eddie
or my brother Stuart Little, but this year (not for long, my mom tells
me) I am a lone pig. Therefore I am here with my buddies Tommy the Elk
and, of course, Snoopy. We had fun posing together. I hope my mom and
dad put lots of goodies in my stocking, and I hope you get lots of
wonderful treats, too!

Sometimes posing for a pigture is a little bit scary.

Martin Piggyfriend here. Slave is taking lots of Christmas pigtures ( there is no stopping her once she gets out her camera ) and she wanted me to pose with this huge reindeer.

How come Bonbon and Magnus got to pose with the pretty things from the boxes? This was a step too far so I ran and hid underneath it.

Slave's son is home for Christmas so he picked me up to show me that the reindeer was not really scary just BIG compared to a little piggy like me. Actually, up close, he looks rather friendly so.....

.....I agreed to sit next to him and this is the result.

After all that excitement, I flaked out for a nice nap. I was too tired even to tackle that chicory leaf  ( but I did eat it later ).

We have received a Christmas card!

"Look piggies! We have received a Christmas card," says Miss Marple Piggyfriend.

" And it has lovely piggies on the front. I will prop it up so that you can all see it."

Miss Marple shrewdly suspects that she has seen these piggies before and she is right.

She opens the card and detects that it has been sent by our friends the Surrey Squeakers.

" Thank you Squeakers," say all the Piggyfriends in unison " and thank you to Slave Stefanie too."

The Piggyfriends cannot help but notice that the Squeakers are eating grass, which is in short supply here at the moment as Slave's friend's farm is flooded due to the endless rain.

Magnus is helping too.

Here is another box of pretty Christmas things from the attic. Maguns is helping to unpack them.

" Mama Bonbon said that there might be carrots in the next box," says Magnus.

" I do not think that this is what she had in mind, Slave. This is a nice, jolly carrot and it is fuzzy and orange just like me but it is not what I was expecting."

" How about this one sweetie?" asks Slave. " Now that is more like it," says Magnus. " Thank you! I will share it with Martin."

I am helping.

Hello readers. Bonbon Piggyfriend here.

Slave brought boxes and boxes of pretty things down from the attic and I am helping.

"Look!" says Slave. "Candy canes."

"Well, yes, they look very nice but I am not sure that they are edible. Maybe there will be carrots in the next box."

Are your Slaves doing weird things like this?

More photos of our new girls.

Bounty loves his new girls. Our pigsitter came to visit and he held them on his lap so that Slave could take some better photos. Please excuse the tatty towels but Slave did not want him to end up with soggy trousers.

Here is Saffron

And here is Ebony.

Slave loves an agouti because they are a different colour underneath. You never see this so here she is in an undignified pose so that you can see her orange tum.

Our new girls have settled in really well and have discovered the radiator that runs along the back of the pen. They would rather nap here with Bounty than use their wooden house. Slave tried to take a photo of them all in a row but they saw the camera coming and scattered. Maybe next time!

New Piggyfriends!

Hello readers. Bounty Piggyfriend here. Slave found a piggy rescue online called Pooh Piglets and she called them to see if they had any piggies needing a new home as I have been on my own. The lovely lady that runs it knew Lyn and Liz from Palace Piggies, from where many of the Piggyfriends came before they moved away and she also knew our wonderful retired Rodentologists as she went to see them for lessons. She also knows Jason, who gave us Bonbon, Bella, Miss Marple, Hazel and Bonny as they both show their piggies. Slave says that it is a small world. Well piggies are pretty small.

So last Monday, Slave took me to meet some piggies. I was in charge of the sat nav as Slave did not know the town to which we went and she did the driving. Miraculously, we parked in front of the rescue on time and we went into the shed to meet some piggies. Slave was hoping for a baby boar to be my companion but they did not have any.

Slave put me into a pen on the floor whilst she looked at some prospective dates for me. She was spoilt for choice but she saw this little lady and she put her in the pen with me.

Slave loves an agouti and said that she looks just like Kiwi, my neighbour at home except that she has a little crest on her head. Her name is Ebony, even though she is not black. She came to the rescue from a breeder who did not want her any more and she has had lots of piglets. She was rather nervous but she came and sat next to me whilst we ate chicory and Slave looked at the other girls.

She thought that this piggy looked pretty ( and so do I ) so she was put in the pen with me and Ebony. She did not even have a name poor thing and she also came from a breeder. We all got on well together and I was hoping that Slave would take these nice girls home with us.

The lad who helps at the rescue went to get some more piggies. He came back with a cosy full of baby sows and Slave said that my pen at home is big enough for more piggies. She would have added one or two of these little girls but the sharp eyed lad noticed that one of them had fungal in her coat and Pauline, the rescue lady, checked them all out and they had to be returned to the other shed for treatment when we had gone. All the humans furiously washed their hands and Slave looked at a cage full of feisty Abbies instead but when she saw how well Ebony, the nameless girl and I were getting on she decided that she would just take them.

Slave had taken an extra carrier just in case she found me some new friends but Pauline said why not put them all together for the ride home and here we are.

A bit of a squeeze but it was nice and warm in the car and we were all full of chicory so we fell asleep on the way home. Slave decided to name my second new friend Saffron.

Ebony had only been collected from a show the day before we went and, having only spent one day at the rescue and then being driven a long way to our house, she was understandably nervous. Here you can just see her peeking out from behind my house. She and Saffron explored my home.

Slave gave us a pile of grass but my new friends were unsure what to do with it. They said that they had never had grass before. How dreadful! They had a sniff at it and ate a few blades but....

.....Saffron preferred the broccoli leaves.....

.....and so did Ebony.

I love my new friends. When they have settled in, Slave will take some more photos to share with you. In the meantime, please welcome Ebony and Saffron to the Piggyfriend herd.

Happy Hallowe'en to all of our Readers.

The Piggyfriends would like to wish you all a Happy Hallowe'en with lots of treats. We apologise for the paucity of suitable seasonal decorations but Slave cannot open the little cupboard where they live. These were all that she could come up with as they are too big for the cupboard.

"Will you help me light this candle please Slave," says Bonbon. "I have never done this before."

Take care with the candles everypig!