Piggles13
Junior Guinea Pig
- Joined
- Dec 11, 2013
- Messages
- 51
- Reaction score
- 31
- Points
- 205
- Location
- Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
Hey guys just wanting some advice...
Last week I lost 5 of my guinea pigs on the same day and I am still puzzled as to what went wrong.
I put them outside in a large xpen to have a play on the grass and some exercise (also left my baby dwarf rabbit and older dwarf bunny in there). The guinea pigs had adequate shade and water.
I went outside to check on them to find all of them lying on the ground - 3 dead and 3 still alive just. I rushed them inside and called my vet who guided me over the phone to treat them as I couldn't afford to waste any time. One died soon after. Then the other 2 settled down but a few hours later one of the two started screaming non stop so I took her to the animal hospital. The vet told me her body temperature was so low he couldn't get a reading. And her heart rate was only about a third of what it should have been. He told me he could put her on a drop overnight but he said she was very ill and didn't think she would survive. So we made the decision to have her euthanised. He said her symptoms indicated organ failure. She was 4 years old. But I explained the situation to the vet and I asked him could it have been heat stroke, it wasn't a hot day and he said in his opinion also that temperature shouldn't have killed them. It was 23 degrees. I've had my piggies for years and have done the same thing every week and they have never shown sign of illness ever. I'm absolutely heart broken and I also feel bad because I am not sure if I could have prevented this. The vet couldn't give me a definite answer either and he said it could have been they ate something poisonous which also I find hard to believe as we never use weed spray etc. Or they may have been sick and even though it wasn't hot it was enough to effect them. One guinea pig survived and she is fine except she was lonely after losing her buddies. The vet also said it was too acute to be caused by the rabbits. He said rabbits usually cause injuries... But this was not caused by the bunnies - and they are the same size as the piggies, and were fine.
Has anyone ever had anything like this happen? Your thoughts would be greatly appreciated.
Last week I lost 5 of my guinea pigs on the same day and I am still puzzled as to what went wrong.
I put them outside in a large xpen to have a play on the grass and some exercise (also left my baby dwarf rabbit and older dwarf bunny in there). The guinea pigs had adequate shade and water.
I went outside to check on them to find all of them lying on the ground - 3 dead and 3 still alive just. I rushed them inside and called my vet who guided me over the phone to treat them as I couldn't afford to waste any time. One died soon after. Then the other 2 settled down but a few hours later one of the two started screaming non stop so I took her to the animal hospital. The vet told me her body temperature was so low he couldn't get a reading. And her heart rate was only about a third of what it should have been. He told me he could put her on a drop overnight but he said she was very ill and didn't think she would survive. So we made the decision to have her euthanised. He said her symptoms indicated organ failure. She was 4 years old. But I explained the situation to the vet and I asked him could it have been heat stroke, it wasn't a hot day and he said in his opinion also that temperature shouldn't have killed them. It was 23 degrees. I've had my piggies for years and have done the same thing every week and they have never shown sign of illness ever. I'm absolutely heart broken and I also feel bad because I am not sure if I could have prevented this. The vet couldn't give me a definite answer either and he said it could have been they ate something poisonous which also I find hard to believe as we never use weed spray etc. Or they may have been sick and even though it wasn't hot it was enough to effect them. One guinea pig survived and she is fine except she was lonely after losing her buddies. The vet also said it was too acute to be caused by the rabbits. He said rabbits usually cause injuries... But this was not caused by the bunnies - and they are the same size as the piggies, and were fine.
Has anyone ever had anything like this happen? Your thoughts would be greatly appreciated.