Hair loss and weight loss

[Louisecarlan]

Hi all,

We currently have 6 piggies, 2 females and 4 males.

We currently have a male called Harold on his own, always been on his own as he doesn’t like other piggies. Over the last couple weeks we’ve noticed quite a lot of hair loss round his legs and sides mainly. No sore or bloody patches, no itching or scabs. He’s eating well , fresh fruit and veggies twice a day, plenty of hay, dry food and water. He has lost weight despite constantly eating, he was over 1200g now is just touching 1000g.

Has anyone got any clues on what this could be? He’s 4 still perky in himself. Eyes are bright, nose isn’t running or anything.

Thank you

Louise

 

[Cavy Kung-Fu]

Sorry to hear he’s not been well! It’s definitely worth a vet check, could be anything from mites to fungal so it’s hard to judge on appearance as each case is different. As he’s lost quite a bit of weight that suggests he’s in pain (they hide it remarkably well) so vet may talk about metacam. It could also be joint pain if it’s around legs/hips (this can cause them to chew) as he’s an older fella, again it’s something the vet will be able to pick up on

It would be worth supplementing his feeding by syringing critical care, there are fab sticky threads on this in the Health & Illness section. You can get critical care from vets or amazon, I put in a little wheat grass powder & mix with nuggets as they adore it. Mine will even eat it from a little plastic spoon!

Wishing you both the best at the vets, there’s a great vet locator on here that shows piggy savvy vets if you need it I saw 5 normal vets til I found one that actually knew what they were doing haha. Fingers crossed for your sweet boy and a good recovery!