Caprice….

Caprice arrived in 2005, aged 8 weeks, for the Satin study. A very kind breeder in the Cavy Fancy had given her to me and explained her background. She had come from Champion stock winning lines and there was no history of an Osteodystrophy like disease in her lines, that were known of.

Caprice was a typical “baby” guinea pig, extremely lively and wriggly! Even at 5 months when it was time for her to have her x ray for the Satin Study she was still very wriggly. So much so that in order to do a conscious x ray of her James had to “develop” a new method of gentle restraint for her using towel wrapping in a different way to that of the others, just to stop her wriggling. Her x ray came back as negative, no signs of Osteodystrophy but no guarantee, of course, that she wouldn’t develop it.

Despite being wriggly Caprice was very happy to be held and attended 5 Piggy PMs either representing Satins or as a Cuddle Pig in the Guinea Pig Room, she earnt her keep by raising money for the guests at Reading Guinea Pig Rescue.

Recently she started to act “out of the ordinary” being very vocal some days and not others, more active on some days than on others, no symptoms but something that was duly noted and monitored. One Sunday afternoon she suddenly went down hill and by the end of the afternoon had left us. She was given Rimadyl to see if there was any pain with a view to then sourcing the problem, this had little or no effect 🙁

Caprice will always be remembered as my “Happy Guinea”, little dark golden nose poking through the grids asking for whatever was going, ever optimistic Caprice 🙂

April 2010