Can guinea pigs swim in water?

Keeping guinea pigs at home involves periodic walks of the animal around the house or lawns. Due to the fact that these rodents are tame, they easily navigate the terrain and have a good time outside the cage.

Under these conditions, a rodent can fall into a nearby body of water, so it is important to know if guinea pigs can swim. Let’s consider this issue in more detail.

Can a rodent swim

This may come as a surprise to some pet owners, but guinea pigs swim in the water and do well. Moreover, some individuals are born swimmers and will be happy to be in a small pond.

It should be noted that despite the ability of these rodents to be in a pond and not drown, a long stay in the water is tiring for them. This is especially true for older rodents or those pigs that are overweight. Thus, if a similar type of animal falls into the water, then he will swim, just not to drown, rather than from his desire.

According to scientists, guinea pigs today can swim thanks to their distant relatives, capybaras. They lived on the banks of the river and could be under water for five minutes. Despite this, domestic pigs are not adapted to such a load. Their breed was bred to live on land. There, the main source of liquid should be a small vessel of water for drinking.

Interesting! If we compare the behavior of guinea pigs in water with other animals, then cats will be the closest in sensations. They also know how to swim, but they do it extremely reluctantly and in emergency cases.

How to understand that an animal can swim

To understand whether your animal specifically likes to be in the water, you should put a rodent near the reservoir.

After that, you need to slowly lower the animal into the water and see how it reacts to it.

If the pet is agitated, then it is better to immediately pull him out of the water. If he starts to swim, then this suggests that the guinea pig does not mind swimming at all.

How should pigs swim?

The contact of these animals with water has the following features:

1. It is better to choose not deep bathing containers. They should not be narrow and long.
2. Bathing water should not be hot or cold. It is better if it is at the optimum average temperature.
3. Chlorine, salt and other impurities should not be added to the water. Shampoo can be especially dangerous.
4. Don’t force your pig to bathe. It is best to accustom them to water from an early age. Adults will no longer want to learn to swim.
5. It is necessary to lower the animal into the water gradually so that it does not have stress.
6. The rodent should be in the water no longer than a few minutes, otherwise it will get tired.
7. Do not lower the animal into the water immediately after feeding.

Watching guinea pigs swim is quite interesting, as the animals amusingly move their paws in the water and swim quickly. The most important thing in this case is not to overwork the pet and carry out water procedures no more than several times a week.

You can learn more about the interesting features of guinea pigs in our articles: “Interesting facts about the guinea pig” and “Vision of guinea pigs”.