[Gpdd] ANNOUCE: Sugar Plum is a Boy!!!

[pat schuett]

About a week ago I saw the picture attached on my local Humane Society website listing of animals up for adoption (I was checking to see if they had any girl mice who might like to hang out with Amelia, but the piggies are just a click away from the mice, so why not?).  The poor little piggie looked so sad and nervous that I could only hold out a few days before I was out there with a carrier and the adoption fee in hand.

When I had called about it earlier, they told me that the people who brought it in said it was a boy, but the shelter's two staff members who were most expert at sexing small animals were both positive it was a girl.  This was fine with me --- my three piggies, Doris, Olivia and Apple, are all girls so another girl would definitely simplify living arrangements.

LUCKILY, you get a free vet check with adoption from that shelter, but I didn't get around to that until last Thursday, by which time the new piggie had been christened Sugar Plum and was settling in quite splendidly. I was already watching how it interacted with my girls on their visits through the bars, with a view to determining which one it might get along with as a cage mate --- I had not really handled it much, though, and it's a Peruvian piggie so most anatomical features are obscured by long silky hair anyhow.

Suffice to say, when the vet and I turned the piggie over and had a good look at its nether regions, the little guy left no doubt, giving us quite an eyeful of his "man parts"!  He's only five months old, but everything appears to be in good working order already.  This is my first boar, so a it's going to be a new experience for sure!  

Now I'm nervous about how much contact he should be having with the girls, even through the bars.  They are all interested in him, though he is much more interested in them than vice versa.  They go to visit when they get out for floor time, but then they run off to their other little projects and errands while he dashes around his cage, trying to keep them in view.  Apple is his favourite, I think --- he puts on great rumble-strutting displays for her whenever she comes close.  She is more than twice his size and is not at all impressed with his antics...
                                                      Pat S.