Guinea pig hogging pellets

[Pohtaytur]

So, my pigs went to the vet today (in beautiful shape according to her). The main issue was that Henrietta was getting fat. Apparently Harold losing weight was because he had too many treats from the sanctuary, so his weight is good now, but Henrietta needs to lose weight since she takes most of the pellets. The vet suggested separating them but they started a riot when I tried, so I can't separate the cage.

Any pointers so she stops eating all the pellets? I saw online that I could go for a pelletless diet, but asides from worrying if I'm giving the proper nutrition, it would take a while and I'm worried she would get overweight during that time.

 

[Piggies&buns]

There are a couple of methods you could use -

1. - don’t use food bowls and instead scatter feed veg and pellets in big loose piles of hay on the cage floor. That way they have to forage which will hopefully mean she cant get to them all given they have to search
2. - use pellets as more of a treat and hand feed their pellets to them. That way you can exactly ensure each piggy is only getting their allotted portion.

Whichever way you choose, make sure pellets are kept strictly to one tablespoon per pig only.
You could go pelletless and replace the pellets with forage.

My boys only have pellets three times a week and instead they are given a mixture of forages (dried and fresh)

 

[Pohtaytur]

So, for now I'm trying to make use of Henrietta's personality and keeping her away from Harold's bowl while they feed in the evening with my hand since she doesn't like pets. So far it seems to be somewhat effective since they have two bowls so I'm able to keep them apart when they eat. She has no problems coming up to sniff my hand though.

After doing that, I realized just how slow he eats his pellets even though he scarfs down veggies! No wonder Henrietta was eating so many pellets! I was told that Harold was the one that was such a piggy, so it never crossed my mind that she was such a smart little opportunist. There's just some things you only notice when you're aware of what's going on after all.

Speaking of things that I noticed, Harold gets lazy so he wants to drag the food bowl over to the water bottle, but only does it a drag at a time in between his eating. His butt is really cute when he walks over to the bottle so I'm not putting them next to each other haha!

 

[Free Ranger]

I put my bowls very close to the water bottles because my pigs drink when they are eating the pellets - a very dry food. Here's my fattest girl Louise in a demo pic! Louise is 1.36kg, Flora (top sow, who has food priority), is 1.27kg, Old George is about 1.3kg.

Many people worry about their pigs not getting enough hydration because it can be a trigger factor for bladder stones. Pigs absorb all the calcium they eat and pee out the excess so if they don't get enough water to balance out their dry foods like pellets and hay the urine gets very concentrated and there is more chance of grit, sludge and calcium stones forming. So my water bottles are dotted about near the bowls, near the hay pile, near the hideys where they sleep (so they don't have to come out at night to get a drink if they feel scared) and I hope this will keep everything flushing through! We personally use low calcium bottled water for the piggies as like much of the UK our tap water is high in calcium, leaving a very scummy kettle! We limit our pellets as they are a source of calcium. We soak/wash our veggies to try and increase water uptake.

So I'd take the hint from Harold and put that pellet bowl near the bottle where he wants it!

 

[Princess Dustmop]

I'd let him put his bowl where he wants it. He'll walk around other times for you to watch his rump.
I let my guinea pigs do their own cage decoration unless they've created a problematic situation (hide should not lean precariously or block the water bottle, but she can do what she wants with it otherwise; wooden objects and hay 'toys' don't go under the water bottle for their own longevity, etc.). It did take me a bit to figure out that she was flipping her bendy bridge intentionally, though, .
If they want to put their bowls in a hide or shove things across their cage, that's fine; if they want to put it *under* the water bottle, I'll move it just far enough so it won't get dripped in while there are pellets in it. (It's much harder to clean if the piggy makes pellet slurry and lets it dry to the bowl ... I had one girl who enjoyed putting her bowl under her bottle then wouldn't eat any slurried pellets/pellet bits because it was messy.)

 

[Pohtaytur]

Haha yeah, I'll put it next to the bottle next time then! I can look at his butt any other time.