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Pro-biotics and vitamin c

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maharvey83

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So my two female guinea pigs are on anti-biotics since Saturday - I’ve posted about this on a previous post. We have Been weighing daily as they were off their food. Snowy’s weight has been fluctuating by about 8g a day. Cookie’s weight has been declining each day - nothing alarming as of yet. Only by 28g on total since Saturday.
Today we’ve noticed Cookie sniffing round snowy’s bum a lot and making snowy really cross. I have researched just thinking she was in season but then came across a post saying she may be trying to eat snowy’s poo to replenish vitamin c etc.
What vitamin c and pro-biotics are best to give? I ideally want something that I know they have taken. I worry about putting it in water as they won’t drink it and still not consistently eating veggies or pellets so can’t mix it in wit that either (and wouldn’t know how much to give)
Any recommendations and useful tips about how to give it and how much would be brilliant

TIA
 
Guinea pigs instinctively know that eating poops of another piggy can help settle their tummies and replenish gut bacteria.

Don’t put anything in their drinking water bottle.

Fibreplex or Pro-c are commonly given given.
Fibreplex comes in a large syringe and all you do is syringe a small amount directly to the piggies.
Pro-c is a powder. It can be sprinkled on food in powder form, mixed in with syringe feed if your piggy is being support fed, or you can put a pinch in a tiny amount of water (not even half a ml of water) and then syringe that directly to your piggies. You must be very careful syringing water to piggies though.

Give it 1-2 hours either before or after an antibiotic dose - not at the same time as an antibiotic dose

Probiotics, Recovery Foods And Vitamin C: Overview With Product Links
 
Piggies&buns said:
Guinea pigs instinctively know that eating poops of another piggy can help settle their tummies and replenish gut bacteria.

Don’t put anything in their drinking water bottle.

Fibreplex or Pro-c are commonly given given.
Fibreplex comes in a large syringe and all you do is syringe a small amount directly to the piggies.
Pro-c is a powder. It can be sprinkled on food in powder form, mixed in with syringe feed if your piggy is being support fed, or you can put a pinch in a tiny amount of water (not even half a ml of water) and then syringe that directly to your piggies. You must be very careful syringing water to piggies though.

Give it 1-2 hours either before or after an antibiotic dose - not at the same time as an antibiotic dose

Probiotics, Recovery Foods And Vitamin C: Overview With Product Links
Click to expand...
Thank you. Do they need vitamin c as well or is that included in the pro-biotics
 
Vit c is contained in Pro-c, but if they are still eating some veggies and hay then they will still be getting some vit c. It would be a good idea to ensure you give high vit c veg such as bell pepper or coriander.
 
maharvey83 said:
So my two female guinea pigs are on anti-biotics since Saturday - I’ve posted about this on a previous post. We have Been weighing daily as they were off their food. Snowy’s weight has been fluctuating by about 8g a day. Cookie’s weight has been declining each day - nothing alarming as of yet. Only by 28g on total since Saturday.
Today we’ve noticed Cookie sniffing round snowy’s bum a lot and making snowy really cross. I have researched just thinking she was in season but then came across a post saying she may be trying to eat snowy’s poo to replenish vitamin c etc.
What vitamin c and pro-biotics are best to give? I ideally want something that I know they have taken. I worry about putting it in water as they won’t drink it and still not consistently eating veggies or pellets so can’t mix it in wit that either (and wouldn’t know how much to give)
Any recommendations and useful tips about how to give it and how much would be brilliant

TIA
Click to expand...

Hi

The body weight swings around 30-40g over the course of 24 hours; just the difference between a full and an empty bladder can be 10g, not to mention the difference between a full or empty belly! That is why we are speaking about weight loss only from 50g or more.

Digging for digestive poos from a companion is natural behaviour in recovering guinea pigs because those poos contain plenty of healthy gut bacteria/microbiome which the antibiotic can affect as much as the 'bad' bacteria it is used against. You can use probiotics to help counter it and/or make totally fresh 'poo soup' (i.e. live healthy gut microbiome transfer) from a healthy piggy. While a littly (but not too badly) gross, poo soup - the water in which just dropped poos have been shortly soaked - mimics the bum digging and makes use of its benefits.

A 2-3 weeks vitamin C booster helps to strengthen the immune system in an ill piggy. I would not recommend to give high vitamin C doses all the time because the body accustoms to those high levels and can then react with scurvy symptoms even though the actual level is still above normal.
A booster will do the trick whenever needed; they rest is down to a good grass/hay based diet with just a modicum of preferably green veg and herbs (fruit and root veg at the most as an occasional treat). Please be aware that most probiotics and any recovery formula is already reinforced with vitamin C these days so if you give probiotics, you automatically give a vitamin C booster.

More detailed information on probiotics, how to make poo soup so that live microbiome is really reaching the gut and vitamin C boosters in this link here: Probiotics, Recovery Foods And Vitamin C: Overview With Product Links

Long Term Balanced General And Special Needs Guinea Pig Diets

Can I please ask you to keep any questions on an ongoing case to just on thread. Since we are all doing this for free in our own free time, none of us can be around all the time and is able to read every thread. Since we are jumping between lots of different threads whenever we are on here, this means that you cannot count on us knowing what your piggy is being treated for and what has been recommended previously.

You can always bookmark your thread link or pick it up again via the Find Thread/Your threads button on the top bar (use the three horizontal lines icon to access all top far functions) when you come on. Unlike social media, we can let a support thread run for as long as needed and give you personalised support but we can only do that if you help us by keeping all information on an ongoing case to one single support thread. Thank you.
 
So I thought some pro c biotic powder las night. I sprinkled some on their veg this morning and they won’t touch it. Any further tips?
 
maharvey83 said:
So I thought some pro c biotic powder las night. I sprinkled some on their veg this morning and they won’t touch it. Any further tips?
Click to expand...

Mush up a few pellets with warm water, put the pro c powder in the mushed pellet mix and syringe it to them
 
Can you give too much of it? The measures are one scoop for 300g of food which is way more than mine will eat so I just took a pinch when I sprinkled earlier
 
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