Molars

mls18

mls18

Teenage Guinea Pig
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Hi! this might be a stupid question but how long does it take for guinea pig molars to grow? I ran out of the hay i usually get so i had to go to the store and get a small bag of oxbow hay. The strands are so small(not dust but small) so it doesn't get to their molars. Ive ordered their hay and its going to come in about a week. If they don't wear down their molars for a week will it do anything? Or does it take much longer for their molars to grow out.
 
Hay is the most important part of their diet for gut and dental health, as long as they have unlimited hay, even thin hay they should be ok for he week x
 
The hay doesn't need to be long enough to immediately reach their molars, they just need to be able to pick it up and they will pull it to their molars to chew
 
Your piggies still need to chew the thin hay. It is the silica in the hay and grass that abrades their molars and that they have evolved against. But even the bad quality timothy hay should do the trick - as should any meadow or orchard hay; don't fall over your feet by just focussing on the timothy and nothing else! At the worst, some dog-pee free fresh grass will also do the trick although I would introduce it slowly in order to not cause a tummy upset. Any mix of all of these will also work.

Guinea pig teeth grow about 1.3 mm in a week; together with their larger cousins, the cabybaras, they have the fastest tooth growth rate of all rodents but teeth do not overgrow as quickly as you fear; it still takes several weeks. ;)
 
Lady Kelly said:
The hay doesn't need to be long enough to immediately reach their molars, they just need to be able to pick it up and they will pull it to their molars to chew
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ohh ok, that makes sense, thank you!
 
Wiebke said:
Your piggies still need to chew the thin hay. It is the silica in the hay and grass that abrades their molars and that they have evolved against. But even the bad quality timothy hay should do the trick - as should any meadow or orchard hay; don't fall over your feet by just focussing on the timothy and nothing else! At the worst, some dog-pee free fresh grass will also do the trick although I would introduce it slowly in order to not cause a tummy upset. Any mix of all of these will also work.

Guinea pig teeth grow about 1.3 mm in a week; together with their larger cousins, the cabybaras, they have the fastest tooth growth rate of all rodents but teeth do not overgrow as quickly as you fear; it still takes several weeks. ;)
Click to expand...
Ok, thank you so much! i always wondered how long it took for their teeth to grow, now i know!
 
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