Sludge, stones, flushes and now blood 😭

[Lymaine]

My Freddie is around 4.5/5 years old. He has had issues with his bladder for his whole life and has been on baytril several times. He has passed a stone by himself a few years ago and had sludge on and off which has been treated well with baytril.
We took him in for yet another X-ray around 3 weeks ago as he was backing up with poop.
Discovered his bladder was bright white and full of crystals. He had a bladder flush a few days later and we brought him home.. he recovered very quickly, was running about and scoffing everything in sight.
After a few days the pain started again.. long story short, he ended up on baytril, urine and vit c supplements, probiotics and painkiller which got doubled in dose. He has gone very up and down over the last two weeks.. we’ve had a bit of dirrehea then back to healthy poops.. last night he seemed really happy again, no squeaks and shouting for his food.. from 3am this morning crying and this morning he started passing blood. He was booked in for an X-ray on Monday but I’ve called the vets and moved it to tomorrow.
I don’t know why else to do. We’ve spent £350 in 3 weeks and he’s no better. I don’t want to put him to sleep but I don’t want him to suffer. I don’t think surgery would be fair on him… I’m just devastated. Is there something I’m missing? Some magic cure? He is the sweetest pig and his cage mate would miss him so much.

I go for walks before work and I just cried the whole way this morning. He’s dropped 60g in 3 days even though he is eating constantly. I don’t know what to do.

 

[Lymaine]

Forgot to mention.. he is on 0.3ml loxicom twice a day, 1ml vet pro urinary tract function (mixed with water to make 1ml) once a day- this is glucosamine… taken him off baytril now as he has been on it two solid weeks twice a day. Also give him pro c or fibreplex twice a day.. moved onto pro c as he doesn’t mind it on his food.
He is on high quality pellets and a mix of high quality Timothy and oat hay (the oat to try and up his weight). His veggies are shared with his cage mate and are usually mixed lettuce, half a bell pepper, 1 cherry tomato, cucumber and either coriander or basil. Sometimes he’ll get green or string beans, celery, carrot, parsnip but the mixed lettuce and pepper is every day.. I interchange the others. Sometimes he also gets fresh mint.

Please someone help! Any advice at all? I am so stuck. I’m so worried.. I don’t want to lose him

 

[Piggies&buns]

I think moving the x ray to tomorrow is definitely a good thing. Hopefully itll give some answers as to what is going on.

In terms of stones and sludge, ensuring pellets are kept strictly limited to one tablespoon per pig per day as even low calcium pellets contain a lot of calcium (perhaps even cutting them out completely or reducing how many times they are given in a week if he is prone to bladder problems), ensuring water is filtered to reduce calcium.
I would cut out the tomato, they are very acidic and should only be given very occasionally. Also cutting out the carrots and parsnips as root veg isn’t good for bladder prone piggies.

This guide gives advice on how to feed bladder piggies.
Long Term Balanced General And Special Needs Guinea Pig Diets

 

[Piggies&buns]

And to add, if he is losing weight then his hay intake has likely reduced. It would be a good idea to supplement him with some critical care to stop the weight loss.

 

[Lymaine]

Ok thank you for the reply I didn’t know that about the root veg or the pellets!

 

[Lymaine]

Yes I have some critical care which he was on but he HATES it and I worried all the syringe feeding might be putting him off eating altogether so I stopped it but like I say it’s dropped so I’ll start it again.

 

[Piggies&buns]

Syringe feeding won’t prevent them from eating but instead if replaces the hay they aren’t eating for themselves and will help stop weight loss.
There are other recovery feeds if he doesn’t like critical care.

Probiotics, Recovery Foods And Vitamin C: Overview With Product Links

Yes, pellets and water are the main contributors of calcium so they are they are the first things to check. One of the lowest calcium pellets is science selective grain free. You are ideally wanting to give a timothy based pellet with no grain based fillers.
It doesn’t sound like you feed the highest calcium veggies (spinach, parsley, kale) as they should be kept limited to once per week

 

[Lymaine]

Oh yes I avoid those like the plague!

 

[Piggies&buns]

Oh yes I avoid those like the plague!

You obviously need to find out what is causing his issues, but going forward, keeping a close eye on pellets and water might help the formation of further stones and sludge. Even low calcium pellets contain more calcium than the highest calcium veg. Ensuring he has good water intake can also keep help the bladder flushed - wetting the vegetables, giving cucumber, giving fresh grass can all help with that

 

[Lymaine]

Thank you so much for your help

 

[Wiebke]

Oh yes I avoid those like the plague!

Hi

The problem is that most owners (and many vets) are not aware that more calcium in the diet comes via the water intake (the UK is mainly a hard water country, so filtering can really make a difference and switching to low calcium bottled water for the worst cases) and that even no calcium added pellets still contain more calcium weight by weight than kale, the veg highest in it; which is why we recommend to feed just 1 tablespoon per piggy per day.
There are also several food groups that should not be fed, or only as a very occasional treat, like grain products and root veg (especially carrots); they can also contribute to the formation of stones (high in oxalates and sugars). We also recommend to be careful when feeding tomatoes or fruit.

There is a sweet spot in the diet but as it varies with local conditions it is not quite as easy to give a precise recipe. Too much and too little calcium can both cause an imbalance and contribute to the formation of stones in combination with other contributing factors which are pretty much out of our control. Unless your diet seriously calcium overladen, most piggies with issues have got some contributing factors. But just concentrating on the veg and only on the calcium content means unfortunately that you are missing a lot of the bigger picture.

Please be aware that dietary changes take several weeks to be fully processed through the body. The same goes for any glucosamine support for the urinary tract in order to support the beleaguered natural coating that prevents highly corrosive urine from coming into painful contact with raw tissue either from stones/sludge being banged into the walls with every pee (trauma) or from infection, which can affect the coating specifically.

Please take the time to read our diet link (both the general diet and the relevant special diet chapter). Our advice has worked with our own piggies over the course of years and stones/sludge has become a very rare problem with our own piggies. Long Term Balanced General And Special Needs Guinea Pig Diets

 

[Lymaine]

Oh wow I just read all that and I feel like a terrible piggy mama! I thought I had it right! They’ve been having root veg, tomato several times a week and far too much! I thought I’d got it all right

 

[Wiebke]

Oh wow I just read all that and I feel like a terrible piggy mama! I thought I had it right! They’ve been having root veg, tomato several times a week and far too much! I thought I’d got it all right

Hi!

Please don't feel bad; you cannot know what you have never come across. It doesn't make you a bad owner - just gives you the opportunity to become an even better one!

There is sadly not necessarily a lot of awareness in both the wider public and in many vets about just how much our understanding has moved on over recent years; you certainly don't get a lot of good information in any pet shop! The problem with online information is that it doesn't come with a quality grading (so it is very hit and miss to find the fairly few good places) and that guinea pigs fall very much into the gap of being classed as an exotic and not featuring much in a general vet's curriculum but being too pedestrian and common for the real exotics buffs (although guinea pig research has finally started to take off a bit more, it is still way behind other pet species).
We are all still on journey of constantly learning more and are constantly adapting our information and advice accordingly.

Just see our friendly and supportive community on here as well as our information resource as a chance to learn more and to become an even better piggy owner. We are here to help you on your own journey as a fellow pilgrim and not here to dispense our wisdom from a lofty tower of saintly perfection.
Please keep in mind that most of what we know and have learned has come by learning the hard way from our own mistakes and losses over the decades. It is usually the regrets that are the biggest spur in improving what we know and how we keep our piggies. Our love for our pets and our desire to the best we can at any time has always been the same.

PS: You may however find our information resource both helpful and often rather fascinating. It is a great one for bookmarking, browsing, reading and re-reading at need since you will get different things at different levels of knowledge out of some guides since our knowledge has made massive strides in all sorts of areas especially in the last decade and is continuing to do so.
The full and even wider resource laid out in thematical order can be accessed via the guides shortcut on the top bar. It is one of the most extensive information resources currently around.
This the access link to the most important information: Getting Started - New Owners' Most Helpful Guides

 

[Free Ranger]

Right at the start you mentioned that little Freddie has had trouble with his bladder all his life.
I've had a few pigs with stones in bladder or urethra with various outcomes: passed by themselves unaided (and unexpected!), passed by themselves with heavy painkiller and sub-cut fluids, manually extracted with forceps (yikes), or requiring surgery (sadly unsuccessful). Since I joined the forum and made some dietary changes to fewer pellets and soft water we've not seen a stone (yet... nature doesn't make promises) but what I can say is that all the past piggies concerned were all over 3-4 years old when these problems appeared. They had no issues when they were younger. This makes me think that Freddie is a very special little guy who may well have had bladder problems whatever he was eating or drinking and you've been doing great handling them so far and keeping him happy

 

[Lymaine]

Right at the start you mentioned that little Freddie has had trouble with his bladder all his life.
I've had a few pigs with stones in bladder or urethra with various outcomes: passed by themselves unaided (and unexpected!), passed by themselves with heavy painkiller and sub-cut fluids, manually extracted with forceps (yikes), or requiring surgery (sadly unsuccessful). Since I joined the forum and made some dietary changes to fewer pellets and soft water we've not seen a stone (yet... nature doesn't make promises) but what I can say is that all the past piggies concerned were all over 3-4 years old when these problems appeared. They had no issues when they were younger. This makes me think that Freddie is a very special little guy who may well have had bladder problems whatever he was eating or drinking and you've been doing great handling them so far and keeping him happy

Thank you so much that made me feel a lot better. Yes since he was about a year old he has had these issues. He is such a sweetie and so good at taking his meds even though he hates it! His cage mate has never had any trouble until about a year ago he developed a stone.. but it has never caused him any problems other than a bit of weight loss which we got stabilised and he is absolutely fine. They’re on the same diet and same routine of course.