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I'm accidentally overfeeding my pig

Bourbon

Junior Guinea Pig
Joined
Oct 11, 2020
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Location
Greece
I'm a new owner (2 months now) and till last week i only had a single sow! According to many articles on the internet the proper amount of fresh veggies per day is 1 cup, a cup Is around 130g so i was feeding my pig 130-150g of fresh veggies per day.
How bad is that and what am i doing now? Do i instantly change it to a 50g diet or do it over time to avoid shocking my girl?
 
It should be 50g a day each. How much do they weigh and how much were they in the past? You should be weighing them weekly as part of their lifelong health monitoring.
Pellets should be kept to a tablespoon each per day and no more.
 
It should be 50g a day each. How much do they weigh and how much were they in the past? You should be weighing them weekly as part of their lifelong health monitoring.
Pellets should be kept to a tablespoon each per day and no more.
Grams are not mentioned in any guide i red (besides yours) and 1 cup can be really confusing as it can be from 50 to 250gr, my sow is 550gr at almost 4 months old and previous measurements dont count cause she was pregnant the whole time i had her, for the first weeks i didnt weight her at all so first measurement was 650gr and she peaked at 720gr in like a month, i really hope i didnt create any problems for my piggy.....should i change her diet immediately or over time though? Cause i cut her night meal in half just now and she didnt like it a bit.....also I'm feeding her (and her babies 3 times a day, is it bad? Is it more preferable to feed them twice?
 
Grams are not mentioned in any guide i red (besides yours) and 1 cup can be really confusing as it can be from 50 to 250gr, my sow is 550gr at almost 4 months old and previous measurements dont count cause she was pregnant the whole time i had her, for the first weeks i didnt weight her at all so first measurement was 650gr and she peaked at 720gr in like a month, i really hope i didnt create any problems for my piggy.....should i change her diet immediately or over time though? Cause i cut her night meal in half just now and she didnt like it a bit.....also I'm feeding her (and her babies 3 times a day, is it bad? Is it more preferable to feed them twice?

how often you feed them is up to you but what you need to do is split the recommended amount into however many meals you want. 50 grams of veg per piggy and one tablespoon of pellets (which amounts to roughly 6g depending on the brand) per piggy (you can then split that in half and feed twice, or split it three ways and feed three times). They won’t go hungry because hay is their main food source and needs to be constantly available To them.

my feeding routine is
morning - one tablespoon of pellets per pig, hay
hay topped up throughout the day as required
evening - veggies for each pig, another top up of hay
just before I go to bed - another top up of hay
 
how often you feed them is up to you but what you need to do is split the recommended amount into however many meals you want. 50 grams of veg per piggy and one tablespoon of pellets (which amounts to roughly 6g depending on the brand) per piggy (you can then split that in half and feed twice, or split it three ways and feed three times). They won’t go hungry because hay is their main food source and needs to be constantly available To them.

my feeding routine is
morning - one tablespoon of pellets per pig, hay
hay topped up throughout the day as required
evening - veggies for each pig, another top up of hay
just before I go to bed - another top up of hay
50gr is a big difference comparing to what i was feeding and my piggies are not going to like it but i will change it asap! The Good thing is that the craving veggies almost the whole day now so they are way friendlier and they accept evey kind of peting without any complaints😜
 
They won’t crave veg. They should have hay available throughout the day. How old are the pups? If they are still nursing then please make sure to read the guide below regarding a nursing mum. May I ask how you came to have a pregnant sow?
https://www.theguineapigforum.co.uk/threads/pregnancy-and-nursing-diet.109377/
I bought my pig from a pet shop ( we dont have rescue centers to adopt in Greece) and she was already pregnant.....i was lucky to have an excellent birth without any issues! They gave me a 200€ cage after a fight we had and aslo offered to buy my babies But ofc i will NOT give my boy to a petshop that cant even figure out sex correctly! I dont think it was on purpose like some incidences in the US as its not a very popular pet in Greece! Anyway back to my question😁i tried to cut the portions i give her down to 50-60gr a day split in 3 times a day and so far she is not yelling or anything but she doesnt stop following me around the house and try to climb on me (i used to give her veggies almost exclusively in her lap times so she tries to climb on me😜) She is so adorable but i guess she will stop doing it after she get used to her new feeding portions, right?
 
I was just about to ask that myself as I was wondering too.
Bought It from a petshop As we dont have rescue centers in Greece and she was already pregnant....thanks to this forum i learned my right and some legal stuff so after some “threats” they gave me a cage and some other small stuff like hay and pellets (total worth around 200€)💪
 
Does she have lots of hay available to eat? How old are the babies?
 
Does she have lots of hay available to eat? How old are the babies?
They have unlimited hay which is a mix of like 20% alfa alfa (none seems to like it not even the babies) and 80% of freshgrass hay, refreshed twice a day but now i change it several times a day cause babies poo and pee in their hay bowl (should have bought a hay rack) babies are 8 days old and the mother is almost 4 months
 
They have unlimited hay which is a mix of like 20% alfa alfa (none seems to like it not even the babies) and 80% of freshgrass hay, refreshed twice a day but now i change it several times a day cause babies poo and pee in their hay bowl (should have bought a hay rack) babies are 8 days old and the mother is almost 4 months

alfalfa should be kept limited, one small handful per day i believe the pregnancy and nursing diet guide states. Obviously percentages are hard to gauge as we don’t know the actual quantity piggies are eating but alfalfa isn’t a grass hay and while it can be used for new babies and nursing sows, it still needs to be kept very limited due to its high calcium content.

hay waste is part and parcel of piggy keeping. I don’t use hayracks and I just throw their hay in piles on the ground as they get a lot of pleasure from running through it and I also find they eat so much more hay without it being in racks
 
My piggies used to be bedded on hay before I changed to fleece. It doesn't harm them if they eat hay with added flavouring of wee and poo. Mine preferred hay with the extra "seasoning".
 
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