Hi Monika.. Which grass do u give them? Is it green fresh or dried?
My guinea just got her lower teeth trimmed & she is not eating anything evem after that. Giving her milk homey mixture 3-4 times a day as suggested by vet.
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Dental Guinea pig not eating after teeth trimming
- Thread starter BlackyPig
- Start date
My guinea just got her lower teeth trimmed & she is not eating anything evem after that. Giving her milk homey mixture 3-4 times a day as suggested by vet.
Please do not give a milk/honey mixture. This is not suitable for a guinea pig at all. They need a fibre rich recovery feed to replace hay intake.
Do you have access to a recovery feed such as Oxbow Critical Care.
Does your piggy eat a guinea pig pellet which can be mushed with water and syringe fed as a replacement?
A fresh dig pee free grass is fine to give
This guide explains more about syringe feeding and the necessary daily weight checks
All About Syringe Feeding and Medicating Guinea Pigs with Videos and Pictures
Actually she is alone as she lost her paartner a year back. So can not giv her pellets.. Are they available in the market? And can we give dry grass?
Siikibam
Forum Donator 2022/23
When you say you cannot give her pellets, is it because they are not available where you are?
Dry grass is essentially hay, which they should have access to 24/7. Is there anywhere you would be able to cut some fresh (green) grass that is free from dog urine?
Do have a read of the guides that have been linked above. It’s really important that you top her up if she’s not eating much herself. This will be shown by her losing weight daily. You will need to weigh her once a day for now - preferably morning time. Try and see if you can get any of the recovery food anywhere.
Lastly, it is always better for you to start your own thread. This member has not been on the forum since February. If you reply to someone else’s thread/an old thread, it can sometimes be missed.
Let us know how you get on.
I'm talking about a commercial guinea pig food, not poop from a companion.
Yes you can give dry grass ie hay but if she isn’t eating for herself then you need to syringe a fibre rich recovery feed or mushed guinea pig pellets
Free Ranger
Forum Donator 2023/24
When mine had teeth trimmed the vet gave painkillers for a week as she said the mouth would be tender. We metacam (twice a day) had powdered recovery food that you mix into a slurry and offer with a syringe (only max 0.5ml at a time for the little sore mouth... maybe even less at first) and my piggy who could not eat anything else would have about 40ml per day. She liked the taste but was not happy to eat more than 8 ml at a time - I assume that was her stomach capacity. My pig also had antibiotics in case the lack of chewing hay (which caused the overgrown teeth) was maybe because of the pain of an infection. But in some places the powdered recovery food is not available and so you can use the food pellets/nuggets that you usually give. So either soak the pellets to make very soft and then mash down, or grind into powder and then add the water. It should be a bit like sloppy food that you might feed to a baby! Then they can swallow without so much chewing. Sometimes they are very hungry and will eat the sloppy food from a bowl or a spoon! And if the mouth is not too sore fresh grass is so tempting for them (but not from the roadside or from anywhere a dog might have peed because that is toxic to them).
With piggies the most urgent thing in these cases is to keep the guts moving - so honey/milk might be high calorie and sweet but it is not the natural part of diet for any piggie and that makes it a risk - the piggie's gut doesn't know what to do with this food. The long, thin guinea pig gut is looking for fibre (like hay or grass) to keep moving, moving, moving all the time. They are actually built so most of what they eat will go straight through! You can give them enough energy but without enough fibre the guts will just stop - piggie will stop pooping and then stop eating and that will be that.
One last thing. Sometimes the teeth overgrow for some genetic problem, sometimes it is because they have not had enough hay to chew on (there should always be LOTS - even so you are thinking, "well she just pees on it, it is a waste!" but that's what they do and it is never a waste if it makes them happy and healthy) but sometimes it is an underlying illness that is hiding from the owner that causes some pain or discomfort. This might cause eating to slow down suddenly or maybe only a little bit over the longer term... this is why we encourage weekly weighing to spot weight loss and daily weighing when they are poorly. If there is an underlying problem the teeth can be corrected to give piggy a chance to eat again but they may not if they have a hidden dental abscess or a nasty growth somewhere, or low level respiratory infection. Good luck getting your girl to eat again! I hope your issue was straightforward - we will be thinking of you x
With piggies the most urgent thing in these cases is to keep the guts moving - so honey/milk might be high calorie and sweet but it is not the natural part of diet for any piggie and that makes it a risk - the piggie's gut doesn't know what to do with this food. The long, thin guinea pig gut is looking for fibre (like hay or grass) to keep moving, moving, moving all the time. They are actually built so most of what they eat will go straight through! You can give them enough energy but without enough fibre the guts will just stop - piggie will stop pooping and then stop eating and that will be that.
One last thing. Sometimes the teeth overgrow for some genetic problem, sometimes it is because they have not had enough hay to chew on (there should always be LOTS - even so you are thinking, "well she just pees on it, it is a waste!" but that's what they do and it is never a waste if it makes them happy and healthy) but sometimes it is an underlying illness that is hiding from the owner that causes some pain or discomfort. This might cause eating to slow down suddenly or maybe only a little bit over the longer term... this is why we encourage weekly weighing to spot weight loss and daily weighing when they are poorly. If there is an underlying problem the teeth can be corrected to give piggy a chance to eat again but they may not if they have a hidden dental abscess or a nasty growth somewhere, or low level respiratory infection. Good luck getting your girl to eat again! I hope your issue was straightforward - we will be thinking of you x