Chester's Long-lost Relative

Top Picture: by me 8/13
Bottom Picture: http://cookieclicker.wikia.com/wiki/File:Capybara-02.jpg

Chester was in his playpen minding his own business when he had one of the most frightening experiences of his whole life. Meeting my little cousin. Her name is Vanessa and she is three years old. Seeing Chester sparked her curiosity and she began to chase him all around his cage while Chester tried to run away from her on his chubby little legs as best he could. Once Chester began to squeak for help, I took her away and calmed Chester down with some kale. This made me think though. Who are Chester's relatives?

After some research, I learned that guinea pigs are closely related to the Capybara. Guinea pigs and capybaras both are native to South America and live in groups called herds ("Guinea Pig Fun Facts"; "Rainforest Capybara"). Capybaras live in herds made up of predominantly submissive males and females with are led by a male leader ("Rainforest Capybara"). This was interesting because I began to realize that even though guinea pigs and capybaras have a huge size difference—A 4.3 foot capybara ("Rainforest Capybara")  vs. a 10 inch guinea pig ("Guinea Pig Profile...")—they are a lot alike. As I continued my research on capybaras, I noticed that a lot of their characteristics reminded me of Chester's. For example, they both have teeth that grew continuously, they both eat a lot, and they both eat their own poop for needed nutrients ("Guinea Pig Profile..."; "Rainforest Capybara").

I wonder what Chester would do if he ever met a capybara? Would he like it or possibly try to fight it for dominance? Though these questions may never be answered, it's not hard to imagine Chester trying to hide from a capybara like he tried to hide from my cousin.

Chester's Superiority Complex

For a while now Chester has been a bit fussy when it's time to put him back in his cage for the night. He used to let us pick him up or simply climb into his cage without much struggle, but now, this has become a problem. Whenever my sister or I try to pick him up he will make a "durr" sound and shake his bum. Since this had been going on for a bit, yesterday I decided to look up why this happens. On a wedsite called HappyCavy I learned that the purring sound a guinea pig makes is caused by them feeling that their role as dominant guinea pig is being threatened ("The Guinea Pig..."). I understand that male guinea pigs tend to make dominance over each other a big deal, but I have no other guinea pigs and I don't think anyone has tried to take his guinea pig dominance over anything away as long as he's been here. 

Taken by me, 10/19

Even though Chester may have some kind of superiority complex, he is still being the lovable little (not really little) guinea pig I had when we first brought him home.

Work Cited

"The Guinea Pig Sound: Purring [AUDIO]." HappyCavyBlog. N.p., 17 Feb. 2013. Web. 19 Oct. 2014.

Playing Tag with Chester

Taken by me, 9/30

Ever since Chester ran away, he has been much nicer to my family and I. He lets us pet him and poke him without putting up much of a fuss like he used to. He has also become friendlier and more playful now that he's back. Recently I have discovered that Chester likes to play tag, his own version though. He likes to chase things and people around his playpen. He seems to enjoy being able to catch up with something that has caught his interest and has run away from him.

Just a couple of days ago, my sister had been walking around his playpen for fun when he began to follow her around. This then led to my sister encouraging him to run and running and jumping in circles trying to get him to keep up with her. “He would make sharp turns to avoid his bowl and jump over his bear's paw” (filed notes, 10/6). He seems to like being chased around for a while then changing to being the chaser whenever he seems to get tired. Although he does seem to understand the term "you're it" once in a while, he chases my sister around on his own terms for the most part. 

Even though Chester likes chasing other objects around as well, he seems to enjoy chasing after my sister or me more. It's cute really. The downside to this is that Chester wants to play when he wants to and no one can change that. If he wants to be left alone, he will turn his back to whoever is trying to play and go to the other side of his cage or playpen. When he wants to play though, he'll jump around and let whoever is with him know that it's time to play. I hope he can find a way to work around this so that he learns that it's not all about him when it comes to playtime.

Freedom Sucks for Guinea Pigs

Most people have heard of dogs running away, cats too. Yet, not many people have heard of a guinea pig running away. Well that's what happened last Monday. On my way home from school, I get a text from my sister saying she can't find Chester outside. Like any other person, I began to panic. I ask my dad where he put Chester hoping he tells me that he is hidden somewhere as some kind of joke, only for him to tell me that he put him outside in his playpen. Once I convinced my dad that my sister was not joking around and Chester was really gone, we rush home and begin searching the backyard.

So the search for my missing guinea pig began. My dad, sister, and I searched the background for about ten minutes until I tell my dad that my sister and I will walk around the neighborhood and look for him. My sister and I split up and walked around for a good 40 minutes until my dad calls me to tell me Chester had been hiding in my neighbors bushes. By that time, my sister and I had met up and began to run home. Once we got there my eyes immediately tried to find him. It turns out he had been in the very back of the bushes that grew right in front of my neighbor's front yard (they are against the wall of the house). When I saw Chester laying in the dirt calmly I felt a wave of relief wash over my, calming my nerves.

The next part of this eventful day was getting Chester back in his playpen. This turned out to be much harder that I thought it would be. See, Chester does not like being picked up so picking him up and expecting an easy submission was out of the question. Then my dad got the idea of putting him a box so that he couldn't run away. Since I honestly thought this was a good idea, I went with it and helped my dad get him in the box. This was a lot harder than I thought it would be; this took us a good 15 minutes. In the end he was in and that's all that mattered to me.

9/29  Photo taken by me.
Taken right before he made the jump.

Once Chester was safely in the backyard, I was finally able to relax and feel happy about him being back, that is until he tried to make a jump for it. The box was up to my knees, yet he was able to almost make it out of the box. He would have made it out except he tried to jump between my knees which ended up with him being squished between my knees and my sister pushing him back into the cage from behind me. After he was back in the box, my dad put a blanket over the box to keep him in there. After that was done, and his playpen was put somewhere where there were no holes for him to escape from, he was put back in there.

Since then, Chester has been much more tame and calm. I like to think he has learned that life is not easy, especially when you're a guinea pig. I mean, being a prey animal must not be easy and not everyone is going to feed him kibble and kale whenever he's hungry. I hope Chester has learned that freedom isn't easy to handle.

9/29  Video taken by me.