Went to Vet Piggies slightly bloated

[zuda]

Hi all,

These are my first guinea pigs.

I rescued 2 piggies on Saturday who needed to be rehomed. I got cage and accessories with them but their water bottles had fungus in them so not great, luckily I had new clear ones to rpelace them, anyways booked them into vet and got there today.

Piggie 1 is 2 years old and weighs 950 grammes bright eyed but little bit bloated
Piggie 2 is 1 1/2 years old and weighs 900 grammes is also bright eyed and little bloated.


Vet said to feed mostly hay which I was doing, hold back the pellets they are a scam apparently and give fresh veggies, which I was doing.

Vet suggested giving only 8 pellets a day thereabouts.

They both also have dry skin and scratching so vet treated them with ivermectin spot on.

SInce Saturday they have been given hay, small amounts of veggies daily which included kale, gem lettuce, basil, fennel, cabbage leaves, carrot, green and red bell pepper.

SO THE QUESTIONS

Vet said to ensure they are pooing re bloat, should I look out for aything else?

Vet also said re skin if sunny get them outside and for a week give them Vit C in water bottles daily for a week. Any other advice?


All help welcome

 

[Piggies&buns]

Please don’t put vitamin c in their water bottles. It is not recommended thing to do at all. Adding Vit c to drinking water will change the taste and can stop piggies drinking water at all. Also, as the water intake varies widely from piggy to piggy and you cannot control their consumption of vit c in the water, then there is a chance they simply won’t get any of the additional vit c anyway so you’re wasting your time and money adding it!

Yes hay must be the majority of their daily diet. They get all they need vitamin c wise from hay, veggies and fortified pellets so healthy guinea pigs with a varied and balanced diet do not need supplementary vitamin c. Pellets do need to be kept limited but they can have one tablespoon per pig per day. They serve a purpose in the diet but aren’t essential and do need to be kept limited.
They can have one cup of vegetables per day, including a vitamin c rich vegetable.

Kale is too high in calcium and should not be fed daily. They can be given a tiny amount once a week only.
Carrot is too high in sugar and should be regarded as a small treat. No more than once per week.
Cabbage can cause bloat. I personally do not feed it at all. If you are going to give it, I would give a very thin slice no more than once per week.

Too much calcium in their diet isn’t good for them and can lead to bladder problems (stone formation). Keep high calcium items such as kale, parsley and spinach limited to small amounts once per week only.
Pellets and tap water contain more calcium than the veg though so ensuring their drinking water is filtered and pellets kept limited is the only thing we can do as owners to keep calcium intake down (although you cannot and should not remove calcium altogether).

If they are indoor piggies, then they cannot go outside until it is much warmer - at least 15 degrees. The guide is if you can stand on the grass with bare feet without feeling cold and wet, then they can go out. You must introduce grass into their diet slowly so as to not cause them tummy problems.

Please ensure you weigh your piggies every week as part of routine care. You cannot judge hay intake by eye so their weight checks are the only way to know they are getting enough hay.
When they are ill, such as now they are suffering with gas, then please switch to weighing them daily so you can closely monitor their hay intake. This enables you to step in and syringe feed if their weight drops due to reduced food intake.

Please read the guides below as they go Into more detail.

Bloat is a very serious issue, so please do keep a close eye on them and read the guide below

Digestive Disorders: Diarrhea - Bloat - GI Stasis (No Gut Movement) And Not Eating

Long Term Balanced General And Special Needs Guinea Pig Diets
Edible And Forbidden Veg And Fruit List With Vitamin C Grading
Feeding Grass And Preparing Your Piggies For Lawn Time
All About Drinking And Bottles
Weight - Monitoring and Management

 

[VickiA]

With the advice from @Piggies&buns. Great advice given and links to all our most useful guides. If your piggies are slightly bloated I would actually take them off fresh veggies for a couple of days and feed just hay and pellets. Then when you reintroduce the veggies, keep to a small amount of non gassy veg as detailed in our guides. Cabbages , broccoli etc can cause piggies to create extra gas just as they do in humans.

 

[Wiebke]

Hi and welcome

with @Piggies&buns .

Please take the time to read our in-depth information links, which should hopefully answer most questions. You can go pellet-free by supplementing with suitable dry forage but as the pellets are generally fortified with vitamin C, 1 tablespoon per piggy per day does have a role in their diet. Around 80% of the daily food intake should be hay or fresh grass (which needs to be introduced carefully but if you have access to fresh grown dog pee free grass, it is naturally high in vitamin c and the reason why guinea pigs never had the need to make their own. Guinea pigs have evolved in thick undergrowth in grass lands; they will supplement their grass/hay diet with some forage (but please do not overfeed veg, especially not high sugar, starch or fat ones) for extra vitamins and trace elements but their tooth growth and their digestive system is fully laid out for chewing the silica rich, abrasive grass fibre and for breaking the tough fibre down in two runs through the gut.
With mild diarrhea/bloating, it is always best to take a piggy off any fresh food in order to let the overgrowth of the wrong kind of bacteria settle down and for the gut microbiome that is responsible for the digestive process to rebalance again.



Please be aware that new veg can cause bloating or diarrhea and that

 

[zuda]

Thanks for the advice, reading through it all. Stomachs soft and normal poo but will keep v good eye on them