Help! Pigs won't eat new nuggets

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Guinea girls

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Hi, I would really appreciate some help and possibly reassurance.

My two girls, Betty and Ellie, were on Harrington feed when I collected them from the breeder. Since then they have been perfectly happy with the nuggets from Wilko, which were more affordable. Betty is now 16 months and Ellie is 13 months.
My latest order of 6 bags arrived last week and the blessed things have changed colour shape, smell and presumably taste.

The girls fled! Betty the Brave came back and tried one reluctantly, to please me, but no. They are both shunning them. They have unlimited hay and controlled access to the fridge and fruit bowl so they are not starving. But they are deeply distressed and adamant that these slug shaped things are not food.

I gave in and bought a large bag of Harrington's, and I am getting the same response because they are identical to the spurned slugs from the wilko order.

I'm drowning in nuggets ( I do have someone I can donate to), the girls are hurting. We still have a half bag of the old style nuggets so are now eking them out.

Can anyone help, please?
 
I would try mixing the new with the old and see if they start to realize they aren’t poisonous!

Otherwise, if they are going to flatly refuse them then you may not get them to change their mind.
Pellets are the least important part and they should have just one tablespoon per pig per day - so not eating then isn’t a disaster in terms of their health.
 
Thank you, this is reassuring and down to earth. I have already been mixing old and new today with no results so far.

It's mainly to do with habits and ensuring that they get a completely balanced diet. They look forward to nuggets in their evening bowl and in their treat dispenser in their day quarters. It's shaped like a big circus ball with a few star shaped holes. Once they figured it out they were thrilled, the same with the light bulb shaped one.

They cheerfully eat/scatter hay all over the place and break the land speed record when vegetables enter the room. So, again, thank you for your help and support.
 
My boys only get pellets about three times a week, the other days they get dried forage instead. I give them a variety of forages, changing them most days, so although they don’t get many pellets, they get a variety of nutrients from the forage. (They also get fresh forage and are on the lawn during summer)
Perhaps forage (fresh and dried) is something you might be able to try if you can’t get them to eat their pellets
 
My girls were on burgess excel (with blackcurrant I think) when I brought them home. I wanted to move them over to harringtons (same with the boys) and started mixing them when I got close to finishing the second bag. They would only eat the ones they wanted but I persisted. Luckily they did eventually move over to them.

They can be quite pig-headed so just be ready to not change their minds!
 
If the are flat out refusing to eat them then they may not be as hungry as they sound ;)
When my kids come home from school and they ask for a biscuit but I offer them a banana, I don't immediately assume they are starving if they turn down the fruit.
 
Swissgreys said:
If the are flat out refusing to eat them then they may not be as hungry as they sound ;)
When my kids come home from school and they ask for a biscuit but I offer them a banana, I don't immediately assume they are starving if they turn down the fruit.
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True. I hadn't looked at it that way 😂. I suppose I was as taken aback as they were. There certainly wasn't too much hay left when I got them up this morning.
 
Siikibam said:
My girls were on burgess excel (with blackcurrant I think) when I brought them home. I wanted to move them over to harringtons (same with the boys) and started mixing them when I got close to finishing the second bag. They would only eat the ones they wanted but I persisted. Luckily they did eventually move over to them.

They can be quite pig-headed so just be ready to not change their minds!
Click to expand...
Thanks for this. Brand new situation for me so perhaps I didn't have the correct reaction. All the replies have been so supportive and helpful. This is a great group.
 
Guinea girls said:
Hi, I would really appreciate some help and possibly reassurance.

My two girls, Betty and Ellie, were on Harrington feed when I collected them from the breeder. Since then they have been perfectly happy with the nuggets from Wilko, which were more affordable. Betty is now 16 months and Ellie is 13 months.
My latest order of 6 bags arrived last week and the blessed things have changed colour shape, smell and presumably taste.

The girls fled! Betty the Brave came back and tried one reluctantly, to please me, but no. They are both shunning them. They have unlimited hay and controlled access to the fridge and fruit bowl so they are not starving. But they are deeply distressed and adamant that these slug shaped things are not food.

I gave in and bought a large bag of Harrington's, and I am getting the same response because they are identical to the spurned slugs from the wilko order.

I'm drowning in nuggets ( I do have someone I can donate to), the girls are hurting. We still have a half bag of the old style nuggets so are now eking them out.

Can anyone help, please?
Click to expand...


sorry can’t help you out here but my new girls are also avoiding their new food i have given them in with the old lot lol. they where on a mixed food with bits of hay and things in and i’ve bought them excell mint nuggets, they are just ignoring the new nuggets and eating the old lol! from research it seems over time they will get used to it and eat when they are hungry lol. i’ve seen some people even say go cold turkey on old food (after a while if they still aren’t eating the new) and eventually they will start to eat the new nuggets - their diet, if i remember correctly, should only be 10/15% nuggets (again, this may not be correct) so its not actually a lot of what they need!
 
piggiemummy03x said:
sorry can’t help you out here but my new girls are also avoiding their new food i have given them in with the old lot lol. they where on a mixed food with bits of hay and things in and i’ve bought them excell mint nuggets, they are just ignoring the new nuggets and eating the old lol! from research it seems over time they will get used to it and eat when they are hungry lol. i’ve seen some people even say go cold turkey on old food (after a while if they still aren’t eating the new) and eventually they will start to eat the new nuggets - their diet, if i remember correctly, should only be 10/15% nuggets (again, this may not be correct) so its not actually a lot of what they need!
Click to expand...

5% nuggets. Just one tablespoon per pig per day
Veg is 15%
 
Thanks, we are trying this approach of mixed nuggets in their treat dispenser but are running out as the girls are very adept at winkling out the ones they want. They are cold turkey at night. They never really had so many, it was more of their comfort routine when they got back to their night quarters.

It all started with our first guy, Bert, from the rescue centre where I taught a college class one morning a week. Due to lack of space and accommodation, he was in a bottom hutch in a corner. He lived alone and was very nervous. Funding ran to muesli and hay. We were warned he was elderly and he had a fantastic time here with room to roam around free while teaching us he loved herbs, carrots and broccoli. And sunbathing. Unfortunately, his teeth were very overgrown and he did not survive the anaesthetic for filling his back teeth.

When we adopted two girls, Penny and Amy, we vowed unlimited hay, fresh not processed as much as possible and have continued this.

I think that, essentially, various guinea pigs adopted us to teach us.
 
Piggies are very much like toddlers - suspicious of new foods, changes and anything unfamiliar. You can keep mixing the new pellets with the old, gradually decreasing the percentage of their old ones and increasing the percentage of new ones until you are fully changed over. If in doubt, weigh the food bowls before putting into the cage and after removing to see if they are eating at least some. I’m not too worried when pigs don’t eat pellets - hay is far more important to them, so in the short term it’s not an issue, and they will generally get used to the new pellets. However, having said that, when I moved my pigs onto grain free pellets we had some outright flat refusals before we finally decided on the 2 brands I currently use. And I ended up giving bag loads away to owners of less fussy creatures.
 
I originally had my first two on pah nuggets but introduced burgess gradually, they prefer the blackcurrant ones and not the mint. My other two boars were on burgess mint but added a few blackcurrant ones in over time and they also prefer blackcurrant, my 3 rescue girls I put straight on burgess as they didn’t have anything cuz barn with dirty and no hay, no nuggets and the two girls I adopted yesterday are now on burgess blackcurrant, not sure what they were having, but all my babies have loads of hay, main ingredient, veggies too but not too much. Good luck I hope you find ones that they like 👍
 
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