Can they eat greens? And other Qs!

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KookyK

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I've tried searching on whether piggies can eat 'greens' but searches keep returning things like celery greens or green plants from the garden. I can't find anything on the thing you buy from the supermarket that is just called 'greens!' Is it ok for them?

Also, how often and how much fresh food do you give your piggies? It was my 1st day with my 2 boys. I put in half a carrot and large slice of cucumber early on, then later noticed the carrot was gone and gave some parsley (wolfed down!), red pepper and basil. I don't know if I should give it all in 1 go, and how much to give them. Should I be guided by them, or should I leave gaps of no fresh food during the day so they want to eat the dried food? It doesn't look like they've had much/any of it.
 
My piggies love "greens" from the supermarket!
 
Thanks, guys. I did look at that thread Sandra and all of the 'greens' had a word in front like 'collard greens' or 'dandelion greens' hence me being unsure if just ordinary 'greens' was ok! It's a great source of other info though will add to my favourites. Glad to hear they can have them, will pop some in tomorrow!
 
I buy bags of greens from Tesco. Sometimes they're called spring greens. My girls also love sweetheart cabbage.
If you're not sure what veg your pigs have had before then introduce new foods slowly so not to upset their tummies.
Guinea pigs should mostly be eating hay (80%), then veg, then dry food. I give veg twice a day, and if I'm home some cucumber at lunchtime, and finally a piece of bedtime carrot. But giving veg just once a day is also fine it all depends on your own routine (and often the number of pigs you have). I tend to think along the lines that each pig needs a cup of veg a day, so I just spread this out over the whole day. This means they eat all the mealtime veg in about 10-20 minutes then move onto hay. I realised recently that I was giving too much veg as they were leaving a lot and then grazing later, now that I've found a better balance they are eating a lot more hay and their coats are much shinier.
If you have young pigs they can have unlimited pellets for now. My 3 girls get a big handful between them over the course of the day. My pigs are in the living room though so it's easy for me to top up during the day.

:)
 
Thanks Flip that's useful.

When do I stop giving unlimited pellets?

I think I need to give my boys more of a feeding routine. cos I got them mid morning I'm out of synch! I put in about a cup of greens and some parsley about 8am and it's gone. But now I realise they'll go onto hay/pellets I'll hold off putting more in til later, and will give something gentle on the tum like carrot later on.

They now know I'm 'food lady' as they popped out when I came to see them and spot clean and hung around! The more chilled out fellow even let me stroke him!
 
They certainly seem to be settling in well. :) I started cutting pellets down when they got to about 6 months old.
 
I've been giving my boys rainbow stir fry from asda which consists of peppers, carrots, beansprouts, sweetcorn, red and green cabbabe. They like that. They love broccolli and tomato but they particulary love curly kale. I give them a little bit of that in the evening.

When the time comes to cut down on the pellets what is the amount that should be fed to them, also, how do you know that one pig isn't eating more than the other?
 
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