Guinea pigs need rescuing, too

Shelters are overwhelmed; that's not new news. But did people know Rio Rancho has its own hamster and guinea pig rescue?

Haven for Hamsters Rescue and Sanctuary operates on an emergency basis to rescue hamsters and guinea pigs for the entire state of New Mexico. Owner Cindy Cribbs says they, like other rescues and shelters, are chock full of animals.

"Hoarding situation rescues have gotten extremely bad since COVID. COVID was the first rescue we are reporting. Right before March of 2020, the city of Albuquerque took, I want to say, 30-something guinea pigs out of somebody's apartment that were just free living in the apartment. Of those 30, we took 13 and all the girls were pregnant, so that 13 turned into close to 30," she said.

Currently they have 76 guinea pigs — nine babies under 6 weeks old — two hamsters and six degus. On Memorial Day, 38 guineas were set in a box outside the Albuquerque office.

"It's just been getting crazy. The calls used to be, 'Hey can I surrender my two guinea pigs?' Now it's, 'Can I surrender my 13, 15, 20?'" Cribbs added.

She attributed the large numbers to people wanting to breed and sell guinea pigs. However, she says people just aren't interested in them anymore.

"I can't give them away, much less sell them. Even the pet stores have gotten bad. They're doing buy one, get one free because they can't sell them. But they think just like dogs, just like cats, 'I'm gonna breed them,'" she said.

Unfortunately, she added that pet store guinea pigs and hamsters tend to have health problems and only live a few weeks after people take them home. A common problem she sees is with the hairless guineas, which she calls 'skinnypigs,' is that people don't know they come with needs for health care. Hairless guinea pigs can develop skin or eye conditions because they don't have that extra layer of protection.

The harder part of the job is telling people no, according to Cribbs. She used to take in the rodents under any circumstances, but because of some bad experiences with people, she's reduced to just emergency situations.

"We do not take from the public unless it's an extenuating circumstance. Then we will step in and and help where we can," she said.

Some examples of an extenuating circumstance would be the hoarding situations, inability to take care of pregnant guineas and their babies or from shelters who don't have holding for small rodents.

"Most shelters in the state are not equipped for any anything other than dogs and cats," she explained.

"We've tried helping them and setting them up with stuff, getting them cages; they're not interested, they don't want it. They just want dogs and cats because it's easy."

But just like dogs or cats, people abuse their guinea pigs, sometimes in brutal ways. Cribbs sees situations where people get angry because their guinea pig doesn't want to be held. In one case, she received two injured guineas and refused to take them because of the circumstances. According to her, the parents let their toddler play with the guinea pigs. The toddler, who didn't know any better, hurt the guinea pigs.

She won't let those types of individuals adopt from her.

"But that's OK. These guinea pigs are taken care of. They do not need to be adopted," she said.

Once the guineas are rescued, they keep the sexes separated. In the past, when all were together and of age, babies would pop up randomly.

That doesn't help those that are already pregnant, though. She says once babies are born, they are taken care of in the same way the adults are. Baby guinea pigs are born precocial, meaning they can eat normally and walk. Their feeding period is only a few weeks but they can start eating regular foods as early as 24 hours after birth.

All of the guinea pigs she has are well taken care of with food, water, hay and bedding. But that's not cheap.

"We are not nonprofit and pay for everything," she explained.

What Cribbs needs from the community is donations to keep the animals happy. She asks for food and bedding because both can be expensive. One thing she accepts as payment is a donation of food or bedding. For the kids, she lets them bring food to feed them when they are adopting.

"Let your kid go to the grocery store and pick out veggies for the critters and then have them bring it over, and that's how they pay, because to kids, money's money. I mean, it's it's not the world for them, but them being able to feed them or go buy a bag of food at Walmart and bring it in knowing it's going straight to them. It's it's such a great thing to watch them because they really feel like they're interacting now. They think that they just paid for it because they brought some carrots," she said.

For more information, visit the group's Haven for Hamsters Rescue & Sanctuary Facebook page.