So of course I know how to put a ball into a cup. Actually, I know it all too well. And you know, sometimes it gets a little boring doing a trick that I already know. So since my human lacks the creativity, sometimes I need to take matters into my own paws and spruce up the tricks all on my own! Putting a ball in a cup was a prime opportunity for that! I mean, I can play basketball and put the ball in a net! Why should I be downgraded to putting it in a cup on the floor? Basketball is way more fun (and so much cooler) than that!
Plus, the human needs to lighten up and learn to have some fun once in a while. I don’t always have time during training sessions to be my usual silly self (there’s only a few minutes to eat as much as I can!) so I usually reserve goofiness for times when there’s no food involved. But sometimes it’s pretty hard to resist the opportunity when I have the human’s full undivided attention (they’re pretty easily distracted creatures you know!)
Basketball is way more fun than just putting a ball in a cup.
Now THIS…. This is fun.
Anyway, what was I talking about again? Oh yeah. The human doesn’t seem to mind too much when I act silly during training time, although she never feeds me for it. She usually just laughs at me and tells me what a silly pig I am. Sometimes I’m a goofball too, or even a silly fuzzball! I’m not sure what any of that means, but she always seems happy when she says it (not happy enough to feed me though!)
On another note, can you believe the video above is only 38 seconds?! So disappointing, I swear I had enough footage for at least 3 minutes! The human shouldn’t have edited so much. I mean, sure, I did the same thing a few times, but how creative do you expect me to be? All she gave me was a couple balls and a cup. It was as if she actually expected me to just put the balls in the cup without adding my own dramatic flair! Personally, I was pretty proud of myself, given what I had to work with.
I think that was enough silliness for one video though. I think I might even stick to being silly outside of training time from now on (well, until tomorrow anyway.) I mean, it was fun, but a little too much work for my taste if there’s no food involved!
Anyway, thanks for reading my latest adventure!
~Ace
Note from Ace’s human:
Only Ace can turn something from simple to silly in the blink of an eye. He’s a true clown in every sense and loves to add his own flair to everything. ♥
Out of curiosity, can you guess how many tricks I know? I’ve been learning all kinds of things over the last two years, and still learning more every day! To be honest though, I don’t really keep count of all my tricks (I don’t even think the human does either anymore) but trust me, I know a ton of tricks! I love to play basketball, chase my human around, spin circles, and so much more!
I can jump and play fetch too, but I don’t know if I would rate those among my favorites (there’s way too much running involved in between the treats.) Sometimes, it almost seems like the human wants me to do some of these tricks just for exercise or something….. Crazy, I know.
Anyway, those tricks are cool I guess, but my favorite tricks of all are the ones with a little more creativity. The human’s tricks can get kind of boring after awhile, so sometimes I have to give her a little hint or two.
See, humans can be good at playing dumb sometimes. When she sees me stealing stuff or running in circles with my ball, she thinks I’m just being silly! So ridiculous, can’t she see that I have better trick ideas than she does? The silly human doesn’t even give me treats for all the amazing tricks I make up all on my own! Can you believe that? I can only imagine how boring all my videos would be if I didn’t take matters into my own paws sometimes.
Anyway, maybe you’ll see what I mean when you watch my newest trick video below. I’m sure you will be able to pick out my favorite and most amazing tricks!
I know some pretty amazing tricks, don’t I? Of course, I still think the tricks I invented are the best, but the human says my basketball and scent work tricks are really awesome too. Regardless, it was pretty fun learning all the tricks in the video (and all the lettuce was great too!)
After watching my new video, don’t forget to let me know what you think! What are your favorite guinea pig tricks from my video? Has your guinea pig taught you any cool tricks lately?
One of my all time favourite tricks is where I get to run around with my human. I love to be under the human’s feet as much as possible when I see her walking around. When she has food, I discovered that chasing her around and trying to climb up her leg is by far the best way to get it!
Usually the human doesn’t appreciate “tripping” on me all the time (although secretly I know she likes when I follow her around.) Personally, I find it funny to watch her shuffle across the room to avoid stepping on me. I like to sneak up behind her sometimes too. I can make her stop really really fast when I run in front and cut her off! It’s one of my favourite past times, and a fun one when you’re getting bored of your human!
One of the best tricks the human has ever come up with is where I get to cut her off and be rewarded for it! Well, to be honest, that’s not exactly the point of the trick, but I make sure to sneak it in here and there. 😉
Weave walking is where the guinea pig (that’s me!) has to go between the human’s feet every time they take a step. I usually weave walk all across the room and back, which is about 4-5 steps each way.
Isn’t it a cool trick?
When I first started training the human to do this trick, she didn’t quite get it. She was supposed to give me the treat just for begging nicely and being cute! But since she didn’t understand, I went along with her plan and we just learned this weave walking thing together.
One thing I did train her to do though, was walk faster! Humans are so slow and clumsy. I don’t think she knew how fast I could weave, so I decided to just take matters into my own paws and speed things up myself to show her how it’s done. 😉
It ended up being a lot of fun overall, although I still think it would be better to run in front of the human’s feet instead of through. But even after all my efforts to get my thoughts on the matter across to her, she’s still adamant that I’m not supposed to cut in front. Oh well, I guess I’ll have to settle for catching her off guard once in a while when she’s not expecting it.
If you want to teach your human to weave walk just like I did, all you have to do is follow what I did in the video below or find tips on the weave walk trick tutorial page.
Keep in mind that this trick isn’t always as easy as it looks though. The human says I’m a bit of an odd ball (a cute fuzzy odd ball she says!) so not all piggies would be as eager to be near a human’s moving feet as me. I mean, I understand how they feel; humans look awfully huge from down here! If the human is patient and takes slow steps for awhile, I think that would make most guinea pigs more comfortable and maybe they would enjoy this trick too!
As fun as it was, all that running made me hungry (okay, well, I’m always hungry.)
But anyway, maybe all you piggies out there can have some fun weave walking with your humans too.
P.S. If they play dumb like my human sometimes does, just remember this one thing; it can take awhile for humans to learn new tricks, so be patient with them! All humans will eventually catch on with consistent training.
My human told me one day, that fear means there’s something awesome on the other side. I, of course, would have set her straight right from the beginning if I could talk! After all, guinea pigs know best! If there’s fear, it probably means there’s a giant bird about to swoop down on you! But it’s clear humans have a funny interpretation of fear, so I just went along with it this time.
So, I’m pretty proud to say, I don’t get scared easily. Ceico may run for the hills at every little insignificant noise, but I like to be brave and watch out for my human. (Plus, Ceico doesn’t know this, but sometimes those noises involve food, and I like to get a head start!)
Now after hearing that, you may be a bit surprised at the next part of this story. As you might already know, breezing through new tricks like I already know them is kind of what I do! So it was a little odd when I hit a brick wall with a new (and otherwise quite ordinary) trick. My human was even more surprised, pondering why I was acting so odd with a new trick.
I guess describing this trick as “ordinary” wasn’t totally accurate, so I’ll fill in some background on it. This trick was going to be my very last trick to learn and include in my video submission to become a Champion trick guinea pig! Oddly enough, it was also the very last trick that my human’s previous guinea pig, Spartan, learned just before he passed away. My human always speaks very highly of Spartan, and says he learned this trick within just one short training session! I guess he one-upped me on this trick! There’s a video of Spartan below if you want to see my human’s first trick piggy (before I was even born, can you imagine!)
So what trick am I referring to exactly?
Well, the trick in question involved flipping up this colourful triangular shaped hoop thing and going through it. Sounds simple enough, right? But for whatever reason, it felt odd to me when I put my paws up and it started to tip towards me. So what did I do?
I jumped off immediately and bolted. I know, I know, what a chicken. My human couldn’t believe my reaction and immediately tried to reassure me that the hoop was perfectly safe.
I didn’t believe her at first though. Like I said, humans have an awfully funny interpretation of fear and I wasn’t taking any risks this time. She then brought Ceico in and showed me that even Ceico could do the silly trick without getting scared. But that was Ceico’s decision to be eaten by that funny looking cardboard monster, and as far as I was concerned, Ceico must have a funny interpretation of fear too!
Look at this big freaky thing – it really does resemble a monster, doesn’t it!?
There are so many tricks that are more fun than this silly rainbow hoop trick…. like skateboarding, for example.
I made it perfectly clear that just because Ceico was willing to run the risk of being eaten, didn’t mean I was going to! I was holding my ground on this one! No way was I going near that thing!
And I didn’t go near that thing ever again! Okay, fine, well, until the food came out again. Of course, my human knows I have no impulse control whatsoever when it comes to food (I know, I’m ashamed….. well to be honest….. not really) so with the help of my favourite foods, she encouraged me to get close to the scary thing and check it out once more. She kept feeding me, so I didn’t really get the chance to run away again. (I mean, how can you run away when you are constantly offered more food???)
Plus, if even Ceico can do it, it can’t be that bad….
Before I knew it, I had my paws up on that thing and wanted to run away, but the food…. wasn’t moving anywhere, so I unfortunately had to stay. Once the food was gone, I found myself waiting patiently with my paws up on the hoop. I mean, it hadn’t eaten me yet, so why would it do something now, right? The human took the hoop away and told me we would work on it again later.
Next time I saw the hoop, I put my paws up more readily. After all, it didn’t move last time, so I assumed everything would be okay now, and keeping my paws on that thing would be a super easy way to get food. But this time, after staying still for the first minute or so, the hoop started to tip ever so slowly towards me again! I looked at the human, wondering if she believed me now. See? It did try to eat me! She must have seen it, because her hand was even holding the hoop at the same time it tipped back ever so slightly. She didn’t seem concerned about her unpredictable tipping hoop, and instead offered me even more food and praised me for not totally losing it over the tipping hoop.
So…. do you think I earned my champion trick title after all?
Spartan was a pretty amazing trick piggy – He learned some tricks even faster than me!
Eventually I noticed a pattern start to emerge; every time the hoop tipped ever so slightly (but never all the way) the human would say “Good boy Acey!” in a happy voice and give me lots of food. I couldn’t help but start to look forward to when the hoop tipped backwards.
Next time we practiced with the hoop thing, it started tipping even further back! This darn thing really has a mind of its own. But I did notice one not so subtle thing; the further the hoop tipped back, the more food I got!
To be honest, maybe this whole thing wasn’t as bad as I initially thought. All these scary things result in lots of food!
Eventually I became more relaxed and even leaned back a little. When I did that, the hoop moved again! The human dished out a ton of food when that happened. I tried leaning back again, a little more intentionally this time, and the hoop moved ever so slightly again. And again, the human gave more food. This quickly became a game, where I tried to move the hoop and get more food as quickly as I possibly could.
This was getting kind of fun after all!
This game was getting quite predictable at this point, and not nearly as scary as before. Then, one time I accidentally leaned too far back, and the hoop tipped all the way over! My paws clumsily slipped off the hoop as it tipped, and I couldn’t help but feel kind of shocked that the hoop fell over like that!
I didn’t really have time to comprehend what I thought of the hoop rudely tipping over, because the human sounded so excited and happy at that moment, and gave me lots of food. I couldn’t help but purr like a motorboat and dig in!
After that, I started to experiment with how I got the hoop to tip over. The human still gave me food when I tipped it back a little bit, but the real jackpot came when I managed to tip it all the way over.
I started to really get the hang of it after awhile, and was soon proudly tipping it over every single time!
Paws up on the *previously scary* monster thing. Yep…. pretty proud of myself.
Turns out scary things can sometimes turn into a pretty fun trick!
Shortly after that, I learned that I had to go through the hoop after I tipped it over. We also added some distance to the trick, where I had to run over to the hoop, flip it up, go through it, and run back to the human for my treats. It turned out to be a pretty awesome trick!
If you want to watch some of my progress, and the awesome results of the finished trick, check out the video below!
This trick actually turned out to be a lot more fun than I thought it would be. I guess difficult tricks really are worth working through sometimes, and the end result can be pretty cool!
Thanks for reading my latest trick training adventure, and good luck slaying your own unicorns, no matter what they may be.
~Ace
Note from Ace’s human: I’m so proud of Ace’s progress with this trick. Despite being hesitant about a totally unexpected new trick, he conquered this trick to the very end and by watching the finished product, you would never have guessed how difficult it was for him at the start.
The human has given me a lot of toys over the last couple years, but I have to admit….
This new one she brought home is eerily different.
When the human first showed me this thing, I sort of thought it might be another guinea pig that I could purr at! Ceico can be kind of boring sometimes. I mean, he just wants to sleep all the time! And he’s less than amused when I try to take initiative and get him to play with me…..
But that’s a topic for another day.
Anyway, going back to this new thing…. The human put it on the floor right away, and seemed to be encouraging me to check it out. I wasn’t exactly sure what it was, so I approached with caution at first. It didn’t smell like another guinea pig, and it wasn’t moving at all, so I figured it must be something else.
At closer inspection, it appeared to even have eyes and ears, just like Ceico and I have! It had all the same colors as me, and even the same little white marking on its head, just like me!
Strange.
What was this thing???
What is this thing? It doesn’t run around like other guinea pigs!
Once I got close enough, I started the sniff test. I hate strong smells, and I make sure the human knows that by sticking my nose high in the air and shaking my head back and forth whenever I smell something I don’t like.
This object had a less intense scent that wasn’t really overwhelming in any way. Still, I could smell something subtly sweet on it, and kept sniffing for a minute, trying to figure out exactly what it was. It smelt good in a way, but it was also distinctly different than my usual favorite scents (ie. lettuce and carrots.)
After the sniffing, there was one more obvious thing to try. All my favorite toys so far have involved either eating or sleeping, so I chose to test out my favorite option….
Eating, of course! (There was no way I was sleeping right after I got a new toy!)
Anyway, I quickly realized this thing doesn’t have the right texture to eat. The hairs don’t taste particularly good, and they tickle your mouth when you try to chew. The human definitely didn’t want me eating it either (which of course, never stops me,) but I have to admit that she was right on this one.
I may be biased…. but this little guy is kind of handsome.
“Mine! It’s all mine!”
My next inspection consisted of everything else I could think of! I tried running around this thing, jumping over it, sniffing it some more, pushing it around…. It still hadn’t moved since I first saw it, so I figured it was pretty safe to let my guard down.
After awhile, I eventually came to the conclusion that this thing was a little boring…. after all, I still can’t eat it or sleep on it! But it did smell kinda good, and it was pretty fun to inspect this interesting new guinea pig thing.
Plus, I may be (just a little bit!) biased, but the little guy is awfully good looking too. 😉 I think I might just keep him around to play a bit more.
By the way, if you want to see my *very thorough* inspection process, check out the video my human put together below! It captures all of the most important steps I take when inspecting any new toy that the human brings home. 🙂
Thanks for reading my latest adventure!
~Ace
P.S. For some reason, the human doesn’t leave my little friend unattended with me…. I have no idea why, of course. I mean, it’s not like I would take the opportunity to try to taste the little guy again or anything….
You may have read part 1 of my painting experience, where I learned what a paintbrush was, and what *not* to do with it. After some brief hesitation, the human decided to let me try again from where we left off.
Well, not quite where we left off. She seemed slightly hesitant to put that colorful smelly stuff back on the paintbrush this time. So for awhile we just practiced picking up the plain old paintbrush without anything on it. Pretty boring stuff.
When the human finally decided to give me another chance with the funny smelling substance she called “paint,” she covered a big part of the floor with newspaper first. Plus, fenced off all the areas in the room that weren’t covered with paper.
What a way to spoil all my fun, right? Now I couldn’t even sneak off and take the paintbrush to my den for further inspection!
Turns out, I learned that meeting the human halfway with some things can work out after all. While running off with the paintbrush was pretty fun, I realized pretty quickly that painting is actually more fun when I stay near the paper thing that was sitting beside me.
This “canvas” object was the key to a lot of treats! Every time the paintbrush hit that canvas, the human seemed to get really excited and hand out a ton of food. Most of my tricks take more effort than this, but throwing the brush towards the canvas and getting a treat for it is pretty easy.
Of course, I still had to find a way to put my own spin on it, so I started hitting the paintbrush against that canvas full force, pulling the brush up and down. The human laughed at that and gave me even more treats! I guess painting might not be as boring as I thought it was.
A little progress after my day 1 attempt at painting again.
A couple colors later…. Big progress!
From there, we progressed pretty quickly. The human used a new color on the tip of the paintbrush every day, and the canvas started to look more and more like a rainbow! A week or so later, the canvas looked just like the picture below.
The human said I did so well with my new trick, and that I’m just as great of an artist as Ceico now! (But between you and me, I know my painting is way better than Ceico’s!)
Painting was a pretty fun trick, but I think I might take a bit of a break from my artistic side for now, and leave the painting to Ceico. After all, I like to think of myself as more of a sporty pig. 😉
And I think the human might need a break from my painting trick too. I forgot to mention, in my enthusiasm, I might have painted a few things other than the canvas….. It’s all for the best though, as I still have so many new tricks up my sleeve to show everyone!
Maybe I will be like Ceico, and take up painting more once I get older and retire from learning too many new tricks. Although “retire” kind of sounds like “tired” which I don’t think I’ll be anytime soon!
Proudly standing beside my very first painting!
Thanks for reading my latest adventure, and be sure to follow my Facebook page, Amazing Animal Tricks to catch all my new tricks as I learn them!
P.S. The pictures below are a comparison of my first painting with Ceico’s very first painting. Mom says they are both equally beautiful, but we all know mine is totally better, am I right?
Lately my buddy Ceico has been learning to paint a picture using something the human likes to call, “the paintbrush.”
The paintbrush is this stick shaped thing, with a funny looking feathery part poking out of one end. It kind of looks like a long skinny carrot, although it isn’t orange like a carrot (and trust me, it doesn’t taste like one either!)
Anyway, Ceico has been learning this new trick for a couple weeks now, but the silly human didn’t let me try it out! I can paint too, just like Ceico can!
Plus, the human knows I like to put my own spin on tricks, and there is just so much I can do with this trick! I started to think maybe there was a reason why she doesn’t want to teach me this trick, although I can’t imagine what it may be…..
*Above* A couple of Ceico’s finished masterpieces.
Anyway, the human gave in eventually and finally introduced me to the skinny carrot. As I mentioned previously, “the paintbrush” thing tasted nothing like carrots! How disappointing.
However, there was still a lot of stuff I could do with this trick. Of course the next obvious thing to try was the feathery bristles on the end! I learned quickly that the human definitely didn’t want me to chew on the feathery end.
I, of course, thought she was wrong. Those feathers look edible for sure! But it turned out that the feathers aren’t actually made of hay, and they’re pretty boring and tasteless. So okay, I guess the human was right this time; eating this new toy was out of the question.
So I resorted to picking up the paintbrush. That seemed to work, since the human offered food every time I picked it up.
So…. it was time to have a little fun. I tried picking up the paintbrush again, and put some extra energy into it, throwing the brush as far as I could. No treat. Huh. Not being one to give up so easily, I kept trying of course, thinking the human would change her mind (because throwing the paintbrush is kind of fun!)
My new toy, aka “The Paintbrush.”
We ended up kind of meeting in the middle. I learned that I could pick up the brush with my usual enthusiasm, but the feathery part at the end had to touch the white paper that was sitting beside me.
I still threw in an extra toss here and there to see if the human was paying attention, but she seemed pretty adamant that the brush was not supposed to be thrown across the room.
We practiced picking up the paintbrush and throwing it at the paper for a few days (pretty boring, I know!) Until one day the human decided to try something different (finally!)
This time, she seemed slightly hesitant to give me the paintbrush for some reason, but as soon as she did, I made sure to inspect the new changes thoroughly. The feathery part on the end was blue instead of its usual beige color. I got a little closer for a quick sniff, and it definitely smelled different too! Not like food exactly, but it sure was interesting!
Anyway, the human seemed to want me to keep touching the paper like we had been practicing, so I humored her a couple of times. She seemed surprisingly happy (and sort of relieved?) that I was doing the same thing we had practiced.
Then she dipped the feathers into something, and the interesting smell became even stronger! As soon as she set the brush down on the floor, I knew I only had one chance.
Snatching the brush, I turned and ran as fast as I could, looking for a place where I could inspect this new smell in privacy. The paintbrush was a lot bigger than I expected though. It didn’t quite fit through all the spaces I could, so I might have dropped it and hit it against a few more things than I intended to. After a few tries, I finally managed to get it under the table into my secret den.
The human’s eyes grew wide as she exclaimed, “No, Acey!” Seeing as the damage was already done, she surveyed the room, not looking surprised, but not too thrilled, either. Then, sighing, she retrieved my brush from under the table and ruffled my fur, saying something about “needing to cover the whole room in paper for me.”
Not going to lie, that sounds like even more fun!
My painting so far! I think the human still wants to try and finish it (after the room is covered in paper, of course!)
Thanks for reading my latest adventure!
~Ace
P.S. Stay tuned for an update when I finally finish my painting, to see how the rest of my painting experience turns out. 🙂
