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calcium in wee, what food to give to reduce this?

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sharonS

sharonS

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Hi guys, My girl Pinkie has recently had a stone removed from her Urethra, She still has an infection, which the vet has given her Septrin for. Her wee is full of calcium and obviously I would like to reduce this to prevent this from happening again, I have been giving them P@H nuggets for a week and she is not impressed with them at all. So I gave her back her P@H museli and she dived straight in the bowl. My vet said that the museli isn't very good, and to try her on the nuggets. Does anyone have any advice also as to what food is lower in calcium that I may be able to try?:{:{
 
I would reduce carrots, anything high in calcium, cabbage etc. But again its everything in moderation.

Can you mix the museli with the pellets so she gets used to it? :)
 
Yeah, my piggies used to be on the pets at home museli but I switched them over to nuggets by slowing mixing them together over about a week until its all nuggets!
 
Some muesli's are said to irritate the linings of the bladders of some rodents, so switching to a plain pellet is a wise idea.

An example of a good varied, low calcium diet would be staples of different lettuces, coriander, peppers and cucumber. Avoid most other herbs - parsley, dill, mint, basil etc. - as these tend to be high or very high in calcium. Carrots, cabbage, kale and spinach are the others to steer clear of.

Also, do you live in a hard water area? Filtering the water, or using bottled water, can also make a huge difference.
 
I do live in a hard water area, I think I will try the bottled water. Iceland do a bottled water 5Ltrs for £1, may give that a try. Didn't know that about the museli. I was wondering if the Oxbow cavy cuisine was lower in calcium? Have not experienced these problems with any of my other guineas before so any advice is welcomed.
 
Yep, Oxbow Cavy Cuisine is ideal for piggies on a low calcium diet, as it is made with Timothy hay. It is much more expensive though.

I've not had issues with bladder stones, though I did have a sow who was prone to UTIs and developed a stone in her urethra, which was removed just over a year ago. She never had any bladder/calcium problems after that. I've kept all my pigs on a low calcium diet for the past few years (the staple foods I recommended earlier) and never have any white patches in the cage from chalky urine.
 
Pinkie had the stone removed from her urethra back in november, she had had it for quite a few weeks before it was removed, I think this has left her with the infection due to partial blockage and back up of urine. The wee was and still is very smelly, she has been on the septrin since christmas eve. I think it will take some time to clear up. Maybe this is why her wee is very white, not sure though. Hard to tell how much she drinks as she is in with a cage mate, Going to up her greens some now, but try to cut down on the high calcium ones. Thanks for your advice so far.
 
CCC4 said:
Some muesli's are said to irritate the linings of the bladders of some rodents, so switching to a plain pellet is a wise idea.

An example of a good varied, low calcium diet would be staples of different lettuces, coriander, peppers and cucumber. Avoid most other herbs - parsley, dill, mint, basil etc. - as these tend to be high or very high in calcium. Carrots, cabbage, kale and spinach are the others to steer clear of.

Also, do you live in a hard water area? Filtering the water, or using bottled water, can also make a huge difference.
Click to expand...

Our piggies get daily carrot and grass (I have a mini meadow!), I am wondering if I should take them off carrot? They like lettuce and cucumber but I never tried them with peppers, what type should I buy and how much should they have? Are they OK to have some everyday?

Thanks, Martin
 
what food

Hi, I tried mine with pepper the other day, an orange coloured one, they had a nibble but were not to keen. I will try them with the other colours, just a taste to see if they like them. I think carrot is ok to feed in small amounts, I am going to have to cut back on the high calcium vegs, to try and bring back some sort of balance into my guinea pigs system. If you go on to guinea pig lynx site you can print off a chart that gives you some idea of which veggies are high in calcium:phosphorus.
 
grindrod said:
Our piggies get daily carrot and grass (I have a mini meadow!), I am wondering if I should take them off carrot? They like lettuce and cucumber but I never tried them with peppers, what type should I buy and how much should they have? Are they OK to have some everyday?

Thanks, Martin
Click to expand...

Baby carrots are preferable to regular large carrots, a little lower in calcium I think. A small chunk of carrot a day is fine for pigs who are not prone to bladder problems.

Peppers are otherwise known as bell peppers or sweet peppers; usually in the UK they are just "peppers".
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bell_pepper
You can feed peppers daily. I find the pigs who have been fed peppers from an early age take to it a lot better than older pigs. It took a year of intermittent attempts for my adult pigs to like peppers! They are one of my staples, along with coriander, as they make up the most nutritional part of my pigs veggie diet. Lettuce and cucumber are good for variety and for water.
 
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