What can fatten up a guinea pig?

[pauliesilvio]

Hi everyone, my piggie Silvio has a lump under his neck and they are going to be doing a CT scan on him. The vet says there are risks to the scan since he will have to be put under anesthesia, and extra risk since he is underweight.

We have been feeding him double takes of Emeraid but are desperate to make him gain more weight as that will give him a better fighting chance with the anesthesia.

Please can you recommend some foods/snacks to fatten up a very skinny piggy?'

PS. Please send good thoughts, I am so scared, I love my little Silvio with all my heart.

 

[Piggies&buns]

Lots of independently eating hay and syringe feeding of emeraid is the way he is going to gain weight.
You can give a few plain porridge oats each day as they are high calorie, but you can’t give many.
However, gaining weight is not a quick thing. They can lose a lot of weight within 24 hours but can take considerable weeks to put it back on and you should not attempt to make him gain any weight by feeding unhealthy snacks such as fruit.
All weight gained from unhealthy snacks will simply fall straight back off of him when said snacks stop being given. There can be other health ramifications from feeding too much of items such as fruit or corn so it’s not necessarily worth the risk

 

[Merab]

All I can offer is support

 

[munchmonster]

I cannot comment on weight gain but I send you and Silvio loads of love and best wishes for a good outcome x

 

[Freela]

Is he underweight because of this acute issue that you're doing the testing for? Or has it been an ongoing problem? Was he eating normally before he was sick? Really the best thing you can do is to give him as much support food as he will take- it's made to help put weight on sick animals. All the best and hoping everything goes well for Silvio at his scan!