Concerned About Weight In Adult Pig

[Hank288]

I have 5 girls each with varying weights. Not concerned about 3 of my pigs. One worries me a little and the other worries me quite a lot.
I weigh them every 2 weeks and keep an eye on their food intake. They all eat really well and love veg hay and pellets. One of my girls Maya who is around 1yr 8 months weighs 917g, not so worried as she is quite pudgy and you can't feel any of her bones or anything like that, so figure she must just be small (she was the runt of the litter of 6).
But Tina who is 1yr 6 months only weighs 890g. Am I right in thinking that this is really small? Only problem is when I handle her (though she is so difficult to handle) I can feel her hip and back bones quite prominently. I have been watching her eat and she eats her veg every day and loves her pellets and hay. I do also suspect that she may be blind though I am not sure if this would affect her weight or not.
What can I do to help her get a bit more weight or get bigger? I brought some oats (kind you eat for breakfast) as I read somewhere that this may help. Do I just offer her them in a bowl or is there a specific way she has to eat them?
Any other help would be great. I am just concerned she is so small.
Thanks

 

[sport_billy]

Are their weights differing from when you weigh them? Do you record the weights in a book?

 

[Wiebke]

I have 5 girls each with varying weights. Not concerned about 3 of my pigs. One worries me a little and the other worries me quite a lot.
I weigh them every 2 weeks and keep an eye on their food intake. They all eat really well and love veg hay and pellets. One of my girls Maya who is around 1yr 8 months weighs 917g, not so worried as she is quite pudgy and you can't feel any of her bones or anything like that, so figure she must just be small (she was the runt of the litter of 6).
But Tina who is 1yr 6 months only weighs 890g. Am I right in thinking that this is really small? Only problem is when I handle her (though she is so difficult to handle) I can feel her hip and back bones quite prominently. I have been watching her eat and she eats her veg every day and loves her pellets and hay. I do also suspect that she may be blind though I am not sure if this would affect her weight or not.
What can I do to help her get a bit more weight or get bigger? I brought some oats (kind you eat for breakfast) as I read somewhere that this may help. Do I just offer her them in a bowl or is there a specific way she has to eat them?
Any other help would be great. I am just concerned she is so small.
Thanks

Hi! Please do not feed any grain; it is not good for guinea pigs.

If she is blind, it can well be that she is at the bottom of the hierarchy and is getting less to eat overall as all the other have precedence. The bottom piggy of a group is always a bit thinner/lighter for her size that the top piggies. You have to kind of balance it out with what you feed to keep the top brass from becoming too fat and the bottom from becoming to skinny; the bigger the group, the larger the spread, generally. The weight in itself is not dangerously low; it is just at the bottom end of the weight range covers about 80% of pet piggies; piggies can be lower than that and be perfectly healthy. Feel around the ribcage.

What you can do to minimise food hogging:
- feed pellets and veg in small portions that can be eaten at once 2-3 times a day in one bowl each. If you can, space the bowls apart so it is not so easy to physically dominate them. If there is quite a bit of dominance pushing, have a spare bowl ready for the underpiggy once the others are busy munching. Remove the bowls between meals.
- Around 80% of the daily food intake should be unlimited hay. Make sure that access cannot be blocked and ideally have two places, so it is easier to access by the underpiggies.
- please do not feed a group piggy other things than the group. They will smell it on her mouth and mob her for it. You always need to give at least a tiny amount of what you feed extra to the others to keep the peace.

If you look closely, there are a few spare bowls hanging around to make sure that all Tribe piggies get a fair share!

 

[Hank288]

Her weight has remained pretty much constant now for 6 weeks. She did actually put 10g on in the last 2 weeks to now weigh 900g. I do record the weights on paper so I can compare them.

I am not so sure she is at the bottom of the pecking order, she rumble struts all the time and put the other pigs in their place. Especially if they creep up behind her, they get a nasty kick. She also argues about where she sits to eat her veg in the hutch. She is a bossy little madam. I was just really worried as although her weight isn't too bad she is so bony and I feel like her bones stick out more than they should. I can't feel the hip bones stick out on any of my other pigs.
Should I just offer her a portion of veg in the morning so that she basically gets an extra feed?