The affordable fancy pet

Have you ever wanted to have an exotic fancy pet but didn’t want to have the expense of getting a special permit or building special housing? Well have I got a suggestion for you. It’s a guinea pig, yes I said a guinea pig. I bet you didn’t know that guinea pigs came in wide varieties did you. To be quite frank about it neither did I until a few days ago. I was doing some research on the patagonian cavy (a relative of the guinea pig) when I came across this photo:

It is a long haired show guinea pig called the Peruvian cavy. There is a breed club that has more information about them at acbaonline.com or check out this book on guinea pigs.

Let’s face it, you will not find this breed for sale at your local pet shop. You will have to find a breeder that specializes in this breed. I would recommend this breed of guinea pig only to people that love to care for long coated animals. This is not a low maintenance pet, but exotics never are. Housing will have to be larger than the average guinea pig is kept in, due to keeping the long coat hairs from breaking off.

I mentioned the patagonian cavy earlier and they also make wonderful pets. I have a special post coming up all about them and how I met one in person that started me on my cavy research. The patagonian would be like having a miniature deer running around the house.