Serious vs non-serious fighting

[mkish]

Yesterday my oldest degu turned 7 so I had a little "birthday party" for her. I have 2 pairs of goos that I am still trying to introduce. I took both pairs out of their cages for the party and just put up a net barrier so they could interact but not actually reach each other. They ignored each other the entire time so I thought it was a good sign to introduce a pair. 

My pairs are, Pair 1: Cinnamon (7 yrs old) and Coco (Almost 2). Pair 2: Honey and Peanut (Turning 1 in 24 days) All are female.

I introduced Coco and Honey because Coco has been getting along with everyone unlike Cinnamon who just starts fights. Peanut and Coco were getting along really well but Peanut has been moody and aggressive for the past week so I just did Honey and Coco. I can't tell if it went well or not. I introduced them in my bath tub and it was a mix of grooming, humping, and fighting. But, I can't tell if the fighting was serious or not. It'd be like Honey humping Coco and Coco would turn around a push her. Then there was also jumping at each other with a loud squeak like boxing kind of? But, it didn't last long then they would just go back to running around. 

Could anyone help me understand the difference of serious fighting and non serious, or if what happened was serious or not? 

[bouncy]

In my experience, the boxing style is perfectly natural and "fun". Sausage and Spud have never had a fallout since day one (they'll be five this year), but they will box very happily every evening outside of the cage for at least 20 minutes. It sometimes looks a little scary when they do flying kicks and spin across the floor, but it's perfectly fine.

The next stage up is the "stop bugging me and get lost". It's usually after one has been following the other around, bum stuck up in the air to prevent being mounted. it could also be the early attempts of trying to step up the hierarchy. Put upon goo will suddenly turn, often with a loud squeak, and attack to make them go away. It lasts a fraction of a second, and usually ends up with the other running away or backing off. I don't intervene up to this point.

Your problem starts when this attack continues. There may or may not be noise, and they will continue to engage even if they're on their backs! This occasionally happens here, because Sneaky keeps trying to challenge Spud. When I shout, my lot know it's time to stop but, if they continue, I'll put something like my sudoku book between them until one walks away. I'll try and film a bit next time it happens. These are the ones you have to stop!

[mkish]

Okay gotcha thank you so much!! Anytime they fought that I wasn't sure if it was serious or not I would use my hand to guide one away from the other for a second before they would forget about it. I didn't step in for any mounting because I know that's normal, I was just unsure about the rest.

[savvy]

Be very careful when using your hands to separate a fight, even low a level fight. You don't want to get bitten in the cross fire.

[deguconvert]

You really do not want to be bitten in the crossfire! Bites that happen during a fight are usually pretty fierce and they will go down to the bone. I've even had a degu that bit so hard, his teeth were temporarily stuck in the bone of my finger. Best to use heavy leather gloves, or a good sized piece of cardboard that you can slip between them.

[Xellie]

When mine fight, the serious fights are silent. The non serious fighting is usually very vocal boxing, but the serious stuff is silent boxing, swishing tails, teeth grinding.

my girls are humping each other a lot at the moment, but it's all good, they're trying to establish the top goo! I don't see my boys mounting each other when it's serious either (because the other one won't let him, he sticks his bum REALLY high in the air)

The humping and boxing is just part of them establishing a hierarchy.

Bites are scary! Make sure you have something to separate them if it does go bad.