A ‘tail’ as old as time is that of the two unlikely best friends in the animal kingdom with popular pairings including The Fox and The Hound, Timone and Pumba, Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck.
In Fermoy, that tale is of Pudsy and Coco, a 12-year-old red setter dog and his 4-year-old guinea-pig best friend.
Recently, the pair went viral on the social media app TikTok after local woman Sabrina McDonald shared footage of the cute pair cuddled up together.
“Guinea pigs are quite fearful animals, but they’ve been friends for years now. We’ve had lots of lovely comments from people on the videos, people saying it made their day to see them,” she said.
Posting under the username @animallover.zx123, snippets of Pudsy and Coco’s day can be seen, with the majority of videos receiving thousands of views each.
One such video has now amassed around 5 million views online and has been seen all over the world.
While Sabrina has five guinea pigs altogether, Coco and Pudsy seem to share a special bond in particular.
“After I got Coco, I was cleaning out the guinea pigs, and one of them went off on his own and when I looked over, there he was sitting with the dog. I grabbed him back straight away, but every morning when I let them out, he goes straight over to Pudsy now.
“It’s funny the bond he has with the dog. Guinea pigs are fearful animals but their bond is unreal,” Sabrina added.
