A great guinea pig rescue

WHEN little Meatball the guinea pig escaped from her home in Epsom she left a big hole in the hearts of her owners, the Kinross family.

But an unlikely rescue mission sparked by a Facebook post and complete with traps, thermal detecting gear and a determined 16-year-old stranger led to Meatball being reunited with her family two weeks ago.

Mum Renee Kinross said her family assumed they would never see their pet again when she escaped over four months ago.

“Meatball went missing something like 3 February I think we worked out and we just assumed that Meatball was gone, she was dead,” she said.

But on 5 June, a member of the public made a post to a popular Facebook group asking if anyone had lost guinea pigs around Epsom station near the family’s home.

“There was a post put on Bendigo Have Your Say 2.0 saying ‘has anyone lost a couple of guinea pigs? I’ve seen some at the train station just chilling out on the grass’,” Ms Kinross said.

“Then a few other people wrote comments saying, ‘I’ve seen them there’ and someone else added a photo and said ‘yep, they’ve been there for at least two or three weeks’.

“My husband showed me the photo and then added me to the group, and we were a bit shocked at how much one of them looked like Meatball and the other one looked like our other guinea pig who had been Meatball’s partner.”

Suspecting Meatball was pregnant at the time of her escape, the Kinross family sprang into action.

“We came over, couldn’t hear anything, couldn’t see anything so we decided to get some thermal detecting gear, came over with that and could see these two little red blobs light up so we put out some baby spinach.

“From there for the next week and a bit we continued the great guinea pig rescue and that’s when Tylah had decided to help.”

Sixteen-year-old Tylah Armato took it upon herself to travel to the rescue site from across town and attempt to catch both pets.

“I decided to get a trap and take it over there, get some carrots and a block of guinea pig and rabbit food and chuck it in some traps and hope for the best,” she said.

“I just felt like it would be a good thing to do for someone as I’ve lost some animals myself, they’ve gotten out and I felt horrible and I wish that someone would do that to my animal if they found it.”

On 10 June, Ms Armato’s efforts paid off.

“It shocked me when I saw the guinea pig in the cage because I didn’t have any chance, there’s so many bushes,” she said.

Realising the markings on the captured guinea pig were an exact match to the photos of Meatball sent to her by Ms Kinross, Ms Armato told her the good news.

Apprehensive to believe her tiny pet could’ve survived away from home, Ms Kinross wanted to be certain it was Meatball by searching for some key physical features when the family met with Ms Armato and the rescued guinea pig.

“She had these very distinctive markings like the lighter colour patch on one side that didn’t go the whole way around, she had a white front left paw and then she had three nipples which is not a common thing for guinea pigs,” she said.

“I don’t think I believed it. I was completely gobsmacked.”

Ms Kinross’ 10-year-old daughter Adaline was just as shocked.

“I was just speechless,” she said.

Last Sunday Ms Armato also managed to rescue the baby, Chomp, which now joins his mum and seven guinea pig siblings at the Kinross’ home.