Guinea pigs have a lot of behaviors that can be considered odd to us owners, especially when it comes to their peeing habits.
They’ll pee on almost anything and that includes their cage mates, so why do guinea pigs pee on each other?
Guinea pigs will pee on each other when they’re trying to establish dominance, when they’re being bothered by another guinea pig, and when they’re trying to mark their territory.
So when you see your guinea pigs doing this it usually doesn’t mean that something bad is going on between them, it’s just one of the natural processes that they go through most of the time.
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Why Do Guinea Pigs Pee On Each Other?
One of the first reasons why guinea pigs pee on each other is because they are trying to establish dominance.
What that means is that they’re trying to figure out who’s the boss of every other guinea pig that’s in the enclosure with them.
This usually happens when you first put them together but it can also happen later on in their lives as well when they have other small fights for dominance.
So when they pee on each other it’s basically like one of their ways of creating a pecking order.
One guinea pig will be at the top of the pecking order while the others will have their own positions within that order.
Another reason why guinea pigs will pee on each other is if they’re being bothered by one of their cage mates.
So you’ll usually see them pee on another guinea pig if they come up to them from behind and start bothering them too much.
It’s like telling another guinea pig to back off when they pee on each other, almost like a warning sign.
One more reason why they’ll pee on each other is when they’re trying to mark their territory.
So an example of this would be a male guinea pig sometimes peeing on a female so that they can mark them as their own, especially during their mating season.
That means that you’re more likely to see them peeing on each other if you keep the males and females together.
Not only will they try to mark another guinea pig as their own but this can be done with the items in their cage too, so that’s something to look out for as well.
Are They Peeing On Another Guinea Pig Because They Don’t Like Them?
Because guinea pigs can pee a lot and they do it on one another, it can sometimes look aggressive and that can lead you to wonder if that means that they don’t like each other.
But most of the time it does not mean that your guinea pigs don’t like each other though.
It usually just means that one of them is trying to be dominant over another guinea pig, which is what they naturally do.
It can even seem like they don’t like each other when they pee on one another because one of the guinea pigs is bothering the other.
But in this case, they’re usually more annoyed than angry so they will try to get their cage mate to go away for a while by peeing on them.
However, sometimes there are situations where they constantly fight and pee on each other in an aggressive way over a long period of time.
That can lead to actual fighting between them so if you know that that’s the situation that you’re in, then it may be time to separate your guinea pigs.
How Normal Is It When Guinea Pigs Pee On Each Other?
Even though it can be an odd thing to see, just know that it’s normal when one guinea pig pees on another.
For example, you can see female guinea pigs spraying their pee on the cage mates that are around them and even the cage itself sometimes, and that’s completely normal.
The males can do that too but they will usually do it a lot less than the females will, so it’s still normal to see them pee on things too.
But out of all of the reasons why they’ll pee on each other the main reasons why they’ll usually do it is for dominance and when they’re trying to mark their territory.
Guinea pigs will play and fight with each other when establishing dominance and marking their territory and that can look very similar most of the time.
But when they pee on each other it’s usually considered to be non-threatening, although it can lead to some actual fights and you’ll need to know what to do.
That being said, most of the time it’s not a bad sign when they do this and it’s usually nothing to worry too much about.
Should You Stop Your Guinea Pigs From Peeing On Each Other?
It can be normal to want to stop your guinea pigs from peeing on each other, but that’s not something that you should do because it’s natural for them to display this type of behavior.
One of the reasons why you wouldn’t want to stop them from doing that is that it’s apart of their normal dominance behavior.
You don’t want to stop them from displaying that behavior because you could potentially mess up one of the natural processes that they go through.
Guinea pig dominance can last for a while, but in most cases when they do it to show dominance and it’s established, then they’ll usually stop all on their own.
Plus it’s not something that you can fully stop yourself because they’re going to do it even if you try to get them to stop peeing on each other.
So if you do notice that your guinea pigs are peeing on each other then usually you won’t really need to do anything when it initially happens.
What you can focus on instead of trying to stop them is cleaning up the guinea pig that got peed on.
After they get peed on you can wipe them down with wipes that are safe for small pets or use some safe shampoo like this one on Amazon to give them a bath.
One thing to note though is that you won’t need to clean them up every single time they get peed on.
It’s usually okay to clean them off about once a month if they’re consistently getting peed on by another guinea pig.
Cleaning them off any more than that and you’ll be washing them too much and that can be bad for their skin and fur.
So if your guinea pigs are peeing on each other then let them do it because it’s normal for them, but always make sure to clean them off every now and then to keep them fresh when that happens.