2-year-old female guinea pig with recurrent soft stools after antibiotics – looking for advice/similar experiences

[WayneZ]

2-year-old female guinea pig with recurrent soft stools after antibiotics – looking for advice/similar experiences​

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Hi everyone, I’m looking for advice or similar experiences regarding my guinea pig ​

Before this started, Puff had blood in her urine and was treated with enrofloxacin for around 20 days under veterinary supervision. After the prolonged antibiotic course, she developed persistent soft stools.

Her stools fluctuate quite a lot. Occasionally she produces a few normal, firm pellets, but they then become soft again. At the moment, I would estimate that around 80–90% of her stools are soft or misshapen, with only about 10–20% looking normal. I’ve attached some photos of what they currently look like.

Fortunately, she is still eating hay well, producing a good amount of stool, and generally seems bright and active.

Last Saturday (3 October 2026), she briefly developed more watery diarrhoea and lost some weight, so we took her back to the exotic vet. Since then, the treatment plan has changed to:

• Metronidazole twice daily for 5 days, from Saturday until this Wednesday.
• Gabapentin for abdominal discomfort/pain over the same period.
• Fresh faecal slurry twice daily, starting last Saturday. We use freshly produced stools from our other healthy female guinea pig, crush them and mix them with recovery/Critical Care formula before syringe-feeding Puff.
• A probiotic for additional gut support.
• Unlimited hay and close monitoring of her appetite, weight, stool output and behaviour.

So the current treatment has only been in place since Saturday, but her stools are still fluctuating and there has not yet been a clear sustained improvement.

Has anyone had a guinea pig with persistent or recurrent soft stools after a prolonged course of antibiotics? How long did it take before the stools became consistently normal again? Did the recovery fluctuate like this for several weeks?

I would also be very interested to hear whether metronidazole, probiotics or fresh faecal slurry helped in similar cases, and whether anyone eventually needed further faecal testing such as PCR.

I would really appreciate hearing from anyone who has dealt with antibiotic-associated dysbiosis/long-lasting soft stools in a guinea pig:

How long did it take before the stools became consistently normal again?
Did recovery fluctuate like this for several weeks?
Did metronidazole or faecal transfer help in your case?
And if the soft stools persisted, did your vet eventually recommend further testing such as PCR?

We are continuing to work closely with our exotic vet, but I would be very interested to hear about similar cases and what eventually helped

Many thanks!

 

[WayneZ]

 

[Truffolo]

Changing or stopping the vegetables in her diet might help. The poop soup is a very good thing. It has to be really fresh. I hope your piggy gets better soon

 

[WayneZ]

Changing or stopping the vegetables in her diet might help. The poop soup is a very good thing. It has to be really fresh. I hope your piggy gets better soon

Thank you so much! We actually stopped all vegetables and fruit about 10 days ago, so at the moment she is mainly having hay.

We suspect her gut flora may still be quite badly disrupted after the antibiotics, so we are really hoping the fresh poop soup and time will help everything gradually return to normal. Fingers crossed she improves soon

 

[weepweeps]

Sending her healing vibes for a speedy recovery.