Guinea pigs, like other pets, need to be regularly exercised and played with. But there are plenty of fun, adorable and relatively simple ways to exercise and also play with your guinea pigs that you may not have thought of.
Let’s dive a little deeper into how to play with and exercise guinea pigs.
Generally, there are three main places to exercise guinea pigs: In their cage or hutch (they also need to be exercised outside of their living area on a regular basis), indoors, also known as floor-time, and outdoors. Here is a quick explanation of floor time and also some information on letting them play outdoors.
Floor time is when you set up an indoor play area for the guinea pigs. Make sure the room is free of sharp things your guinea pigs could get to such as knives, as well as electrical cords, household chemicals or other dangerous items that just might be lying around, before letting them out to play.
Playpens designed specifically for guinea pigs and other small pets are another option for an exercise area, but they can be expensive. Floor time is a particularly common way to exercise guinea pigs.
If you take a guinea pig outside, it’s not the best idea to just let it roam freely wherever it wants, unless it’s under close supervision. It’s a much better idea to use an outdoor playpen or run.
Always make sure that your guinea pigs are supervised if they are going to be playing outdoors even if you are using a run. If you are hoping to take your guinea pigs outside to graze, make sure that the grass hasn’t been sprayed with chemicals, which are frequently harmful to guinea pigs.
If your guinea pigs have never eaten grass before, slowly introduce it into their diet by starting off with a small amount, a handful for instance then slowly add more. Also make sure that the temperature outside is alright for guinea pigs. A good temperature is about 64 to 73 degrees Fahrenheit (approximately 18 to 23 degrees Celsius).
Now let’s talk about 10 specific ways to exercise guinea pigs.
Exercising them in the cage or hutch
Here are 2 simple and straightforward ways to exercise guinea pigs inside their cage or hutch. These are great boredom breakers but make sure these aren’t the only form of daily exercise you use for them.
1. Put random, everyday household items in their cage
I know that putting normal household items in a guinea pig cage may sound like a crazy idea, but it actually is a good way to get them to run around and explore. Safe, fun items to put in the cage can include a dustpan, a small plastic bin, brown cardboard tubes, empty cereal boxes or any other guinea pig-safe household item.
Switch up the items regularly to make it more exciting and enjoyable for your guinea pigs. Also, if you put a plastic item in their living area, only have it in the cage for a limited amount of time. You can even hide food in or under the items to make it even more fun for the guinea pigs.
2. Rearrange the cage set-up
Rearranging the cage set-up is one of the easiest ways to motivate your guinea pigs to run around and explore in their cage. Sure, you can buy or make new toys or accessories to rearrange the cage set-up, but that’s not necessary; an easier way to do this is to just put the stuff that’s already in the cage in different places than they were before.
You can move the hiding spot to where the food bowl was earlier or move the hay rack to where the water bottle was. Another good way to change the set-up is to just flip a hideout over, and cover the top of it with a piece of cloth or change the look of another accessory or toy; guinea pigs love to explore a new-looking area.
Whenever I rearrange my guinea pigs’ cage set-up they love to explore and run around their “new” cage.
Exercising them outdoors or during floor time
There are 4 ways to exercise and play with guinea pigs can be used for outdoor or indoor play, so if you’re uncomfortable with taking your guinea pigs outdoors you can also enjoy these exercise methods inside. They are relatively uncomplicated and are often tons of fun for guinea pigs.
3. Make them an obstacle course
Building an obstacle course for guinea pigs isn’t too hard, and it’s a lot of fun. Simply use tubes, ramps, cardboard boxes or other items that you may already have in the house to make one.
Fun obstacles that you can easily make include small balance beams, which you can make by gluing a long, flat piece of wood to one wood block on each side of it to hold it above the ground; a jump, which you can make by lifting a cardboard tube slightly above the ground, or anything else that they can go under, around or on top of.
Whenever they finish the course, reward them with one of their favorite foods! If your guinea pigs haven’t done an obstacle course before, make a small one at first and reward them after every obstacle, then make larger and larger courses until you’ve worked up to the size you want the course to be.
For extra fun, time each of your guinea pigs to see who wins, then give the winner an extra treat. This is good exercise for the guinea pigs and fun to watch.
4. Teach them to run up the stairs
It’s super cute when a guinea pig runs up the stairs, especially if they run really fast. It’s also good exercise for them depending on how many stairs you have. To teach them how to run up a flight of steps, you will need steps—obviously— and some kind of treat that your guinea pig likes.
Put the guinea pig on a step; then hold the treat so that the only way for the guinea pig to get it is by putting its front paws on the next step up; when it does this, give it the treat; then help it climb up to the next step. Soon it will learn to run up the stairs without any help.
Our guinea pigs run up our flight of steps super fast, and when we have visitors over we love to them how fast our guinea pigs run up the stairs!
5. Make them a maze
Watching guinea pigs run through a maze is very entertaining and is good exercise for them. You can make your own using a large cardboard box, scissors and tape or non-toxic glue.
To make the maze, first you will need to plan out the way through, then add a few dead ends—but not too many because guinea pigs don’t have really long attention spans (two or three is often a good amount)—make the base; the base doesn’t need to be fancy, it can just be a large piece of cardboard; make the walls of the maze; then glue or tape the walls to the base.
Also, make sure you have some treats ready for when the guinea pigs finish the maze. If your guinea pig has never done a maze before, you should start off with a smaller one. Also be ready to help your piggy find its way through the maze.
6. Make a tunnel playground
A tunnel playground is just floor time (or outdoor time) with lots of tunnels for your guinea pigs to explore and play in. This is a great way to play with guinea pigs as most love tunnels. You can use pretty much any kind of tunnel as long as the guinea pigs fit in it; also make sure it doesn’t have sharp edges.
It doesn’t even have to be a real tunnel; you can also use a small willow bridge for a tunnel as long as the guinea pigs can fit through it. Another good option for tunnels is large PVC pipes.
For even more fun, hide special treats, such as carrot greens, inside of the tunnels. Just be sure not to overcrowd the play area. It’s really cute to watch them pop their little heads in and out of the tunnels.
Exercising them in the cage, during floor time or outdoors
Here are 6 ways of letting your guinea pigs exercise and play, which can be used inside their living area, during floor time and while they’re outdoors. They are not too difficult to set up and your guinea pigs will most likely love them.
7. Veggie hunt
Fresh vegetables are a necessary part of a guinea pig’s diet, so why not put a little more fun into it by hiding them? You can cut up fresh vegetables and hide them just about anywhere in their play area or cage.
You can also make veggie hunts seasonal; here are a few ways to it. During Christmas time, you can hide Christmas trees made out of cut up cucumbers or you can hide wreaths made out of parsley, dill or cilantro.
On Thanksgiving, you can hide a thanksgiving feast for the guinea pigs, made with squash, pumpkins or any other kinds of vegetables that they like and are safe for them.
For Halloween, you can carve faces into the vegetables to make Jack-o-lanterns or you can cut them up into small pieces so that the vegetables will look like little pieces of candy.
You can also make an Easter egg hunt for them. Make the Easter eggs out of tomatoes or a similar kind of vegetable. If desired, you can scoop out the inside and put their favorite treat inside of the “eggs.”
If it’s one of your guinea pigs’ birthday, you can hide a veggie cake and veggie pizza topped with bell pepper, some kind of herb or other kinds of vegetables.
Remember to ensure that all of the veggies you feed your guinea pigs are safe for them!
8. Give them a whole cherry tomato
If your guinea pigs like tomatoes, giving them a whole cherry tomato is a great treat for them. The way you get the guinea pigs to run around and play by giving them tomatoes is by not just giving each guinea pig its own tomato, instead, only give one tomato for every two guinea pigs.
The guinea pigs that didn’t get any tomatoes will try to take one away from another guinea pig. Once he gets it, another guinea pig will try to take it away from him.
If your guinea pigs don’t like tomatoes, you can use another kind of vegetable such as lettuce, cucumber or carrot. This is really funny to watch and you will hear lots of noise as they are stealing the food from each other.
9. Stuff a cardboard tube with hay or vegetables
Stuffing a cardboard tube with a kind of food that your guinea pig likes, such as hay or vegetables, carrot greens for instance, is a great way to get them to run around and play.
If you only put a few tubes (about one for every two guinea pigs you have) inside the cage or play area, the guinea pigs will probably try to take the tubes from each other to get the treats, similar to when you don’t give enough separate pieces of food for each of the guinea pigs.
It’s really cute to watch them steal the tube from each other and also convenient to make because it’s quite possible that you have a toilet or paper towel roll already in the house, just always make sure that the roll is brown because if the roll is white, it means that it has been bleached and the chemicals in bleach can be harmful to guinea pigs.
10. Make a towel area
Sort of like a tunnel playground, a towel area is just a place with towels that your guinea pig can easily hide in and explore. Old towels frequently work well for this purpose.
Another way to make a towel area is to drape the towels over hide houses, which makes the houses more exciting and fun. This is an entertaining and enjoyable way to play with guinea pigs since they love to explore.
It is also very easy to make; simply set up an area for them and plop some towels on the floor; you can also make a towel area inside of their cage.
11. Teach them tricks
Another way to exercise guinea pigs is by teaching them tricks that involve exercise.
12. Provide Ramps
Providing ramps in your guinea pigs’ living or play area is a great way to exercise them. Ramps are fairly easy to make and are super fun for your guinea pigs. You can buy them from pet stores or you can also make them yourself!
Some guinea pigs love to race up and down ramps (especially young ones) while some guinea pigs are afraid of heights.
Even if your guinea pigs aren’t afraid of heights, don’t make the ramps very high above the ground because if they accidentally fall off they might hurt themselves. Also make sure that ramps don’t ever replace floor space.
I hope that you try out at least some of these ways to exercise your guinea pigs because they are simple to make, entertaining and enjoyable.
