Cardboard Barriers

I've gotten such a kick watching and hearing Wedgwood run full tilt under the couch.  However, Mabel and Wedgwood were spending too much time under there during floor time.  As I was thinking about how best to solve this, I saw these wonderful long boxes at the library.  Ooh - they looked perfect for what I wanted.  The librarians were curious why I wanted their discarded cardboard.  Guinea pig barriers!  I was pleased the long box just fit into the car, from dashboard all the way to the hatchback.

I've made cardboard barriers before with cut apart boxes and lots of duct tape.  The long box appealed to me because it was right height and length to fit under the couch with very little modification.  And I was right! 

Turned out the box was longer than the couch.  It was in two pieces - a top and a bottom.  I flipped them over so they looked like two massive trays.  I idea was to slide them under the couch.  Each side was so large, I needed to cut them in half, which made them easier to handle.  I slid each piece under the ends of the couch, and the cardboard overlapped by about a foot.

So now the bottom of the couch is hemmed in with this cardboard wall all around.  Luckily neither Wedgwood nor Mabel are very pushy when it comes to barriers.  I've had some pigs that would have either shoved these out of the way or squeezed themselves through the narrow gap between the edges of cardboard and couch.  But for these two, it's enough of a deterrent to force them to do laps around the couch.  Not bad for 10 minutes of effort on my part.