Is This Diet Healthy?

[Dom R]

Hello Everyone,

My second thread on this forums, more or less just to check that my piggies' diet is good and healthy. I must say, I have had no issues in the past with diet's such as this, but my other piggies preferred different things to the ones I have currently.

So basically, their day is quite simple, and people tend to differ on opinions for feeding times.

My piggies have all-day access to hay, and it may not be the 'Best hay' such as Timothy Hay etc, but my piggies do really enjoy it, and go through a 3KG bag quite frequently, and I have to top up both of their hay barrels every few days.

They also have all-day access to nuggets, which is recommended over the pellets mixed with pea flakes etc. They do not eat these frequently and I do change their food once or twice a week after freshly cleaning their cage, as they seem to kick half of the bedding and saw dust into the bowl. They also enjoy the nuggets provided, although, again; may not be the best.

When it comes to my, preferred, daily feeding of vegetables and greens it's something along the lines of this:

They get a small chunk of carrot, approx the width of my left index finger, which is about 1.5cm in width. This is a daily routine, and I would personally not say this is over-feeding. As we used to feed my old piggies quite large chunks, and never had an issue with too much Vitamin A, or anything that; too much is bad for piggies (Which I believe is Vit A).

Also, they occasionally, as a small treat get half a cherry tomato, which is relatively tiny and barely does anything to them.

They get around 1/8 of a large pepper (Mostly Green/Yellow) daily, and approximately 50-100g (Or a large handful) of Green curly Kale daily, which takes up the large portion of their diet when it comes to greens/vegetables and small portions of fruit.

Neither of my piggies are overweight, and both are still young and growing. My older piggie, which I got in October is around 1100g, and my newer one is around 800g, and still growing. The older piggie has slowed down in growth, whereas my newer one, which I've had for just over a month, is still gaining weight healthily.

I just wanted your opinion on this, and also; what other green foods, as a change, that can replace pepper and the kale, as they seem to be getting bored of the daily peppers, and changing their diet every so often will help them keep eating it. I would prefer if it could be bought as a relatively similar price and still last around 4 days.

Also note, that the above is for each guineapig, except the kale, which is shared.

Thanks to anyone who replies, I'm sure my piggies will appreciate different foods every so often.

 

[Swissgreys]

Welcome to the Forum - you sound like a really experienced owner.


There is an excellent guide to a balanced diet here:
Recommendations For A Balanced General Guinea Pig Diet
It includes photos which I find helps a lot (but that might just be me!).

As for your specific diet I would say you don't need to feed carrot every day - once or twice a week at most, as it is quite high in sugar and too much at an early age can cause problems like diabetes later in life.

The daily pepper is great as this contains a lot of Vit C which is vital for guinea pigs.

A large handful of kale daily might also be too much. Kale is very high in calcium which can cause bladder issues. Piggies do need kale for the magnesium content, but a small piece daily is enough. I tend to only feed it 3 - 4 times a week, and in strict moderation.

I hope that helps - we would love to see pics of your piggies.

 

[sport_billy]

Hello, welcome to the forum

I would switch around the kale from daily to once a week and change it for Coriander or Lettuce as these foods are lower in calcium

We feed ours this roughly
Morning:
Cucumber
Celery
1/6th of Red/Green/Yellow Bell Pepper (de-seeded)

Evening:
Cucumber
Two Little Gem Lettuce leaves or 10 sprigs Coriander. Twice a week we will swap in a cabbage/kale or parsley

We also add in to the above diet carrot, sweet potato, celery leaves, green beans and a few other things occasionally

 

[Swissgreys]

Hello, welcome to the forum

I would switch around the kale from daily to once a week and change it for Coriander or Lettuce as these foods are lower in calcium

We feed ours this roughly
Morning:
Cucumber
Celery
1/6th of Red/Green/Yellow Bell Pepper (de-seeded)

Evening:
Cucumber
Two Little Gem Lettuce leaves or 10 sprigs Coriander. Twice a week we will swap in a cabbage/kale or parsley

We also add in to the above diet carrot, sweet potato, celery leaves, green beans and a few other things occasionally

Stupid question, but do yours just eat the sweet potato raw @sport_billy
I haven't tried that, but we eat a lot of sweet potato so might have to give it a go.
I did recently discover that all of mine love fennel though.

 

[sport_billy]

Stupid question, but do yours just eat the sweet potato raw @sport_billy
I haven't tried that, but we eat a lot of sweet potato so might have to give it a go.
I did recently discover that all of mine love fennel though.

Oh God no, it is purely a token gesture on my part.

Fennel, that got rumbled at by Cookie and treacle we haven't tried it since....

x

 

[Dom R]

Welcome to the Forum - you sound like a really experienced owner.


There is an excellent guide to a balanced diet here:
Recommendations For A Balanced General Guinea Pig Diet
It includes photos which I find helps a lot (but that might just be me!).

As for your specific diet I would say you don't need to feed carrot every day - once or twice a week at most, as it is quite high in sugar and too much at an early age can cause problems like diabetes later in life.

The daily pepper is great as this contains a lot of Vit C which is vital for guinea pigs.

A large handful of kale daily might also be too much. Kale is very high in calcium which can cause bladder issues. Piggies do need kale for the magnesium content, but a small piece daily is enough. I tend to only feed it 3 - 4 times a week, and in strict moderation.

I hope that helps - we would love to see pics of your piggies.

Good thing I asked, I didn't realise that Kale had a lot of calcium, I just saw it recommended elsewhere so I thought I'd try it.

Is something along the lines of cress any good, as that can be grown in large amounts and would be much fresher and not sprayed with pesticides/herbicides, and a quick wash when ready would be good enough for it. I'll try and follow that guide, but I can't really follow things by reading, it's not really my strong point and tends to go in one ear and out the other.

The daily carrot however, as you can most likely guess, my piggies love this. And it is an extremely small amount and they have a large cage which they do run around a lot in, have wooden objects to gnaw on, and a nice tunnel that they seem to chase each other through, so they more or less wear it off quite quickly.

Also, I wouldn't really say I'm experienced, it was more my parents who looked after the piggies, but I cleaned their cage and occasionally fed them beforehand. These are the first piggies I have had that are 100% mine. I have also uploaded a photo of the two I have now. I must say, I have not had an easy job with these two. One unfortunately passed away from a stomach abscess bursting. Was definitely not a pleasant sight to see. I have uploaded a photo of him too.

Thanks for the information, I appreciate it


This is the two that are alive, the grey one being the new, more or less 'Emergency' from a pet store. As Peanut, the larger one, got really depressed of Fudge's passing. Note, he looks really chunky/fat but that's just his fur, I can feel his ribs easily so he is normal weight.



This is my favourite picture of Fudge, I even printed it out and put it on my cupboard next to my computer. He had a good 6 months with me, managed to squeeze an extra month out of him while he was on antibiotics, which seemed to help him, but we took him off as the abscess would become immune to it.

 

[Dom R]

Hello, welcome to the forum

I would switch around the kale from daily to once a week and change it for Coriander or Lettuce as these foods are lower in calcium

We feed ours this roughly
Morning:
Cucumber
Celery
1/6th of Red/Green/Yellow Bell Pepper (de-seeded)

Evening:
Cucumber
Two Little Gem Lettuce leaves or 10 sprigs Coriander. Twice a week we will swap in a cabbage/kale or parsley

We also add in to the above diet carrot, sweet potato, celery leaves, green beans and a few other things occasionally

Coriander, I'll have to get a bag of these to try my piggies on them. They've had lettuce before but they really aren't sure about it, ends up me picking it up and throwing it away.

I forgot to mention, that they also have daily cucumber, normally around 4 sliced chunks of it. Ash is picky though, eats the crunchy bit and leaves the squidgy inner bit to Peanut.

I'll try them on this and see what they think.

As said above, I greatly appreciate the information.

 

[Deleted member 114675]

You mentioned about growing cress. Mine have never bothered about cress. Maybe try growing a few herbs? Coriander is particularly good - and maybe some parsley and /or basil too?

 

[Dom R]

You mentioned about growing cress. Mine have never bothered about cress. Maybe try growing a few herbs? Coriander is particularly good - and maybe some parsley and /or basil too?

I might try that in the upcoming weeks, need to go down to the shop to see what seeds they do and decide from there.

I like to try different things with my piggies.

I also forgot to mention, when it is nice weather they get to go outside for a few hours to munch on some grass, so that can be a large portion of their diet some days too.

 

[sport_billy]

Coriander, I'll have to get a bag of these to try my piggies on them. They've had lettuce before but they really aren't sure about it, ends up me picking it up and throwing it away.

I forgot to mention, that they also have daily cucumber, normally around 4 sliced chunks of it. Ash is picky though, eats the crunchy bit and leaves the squidgy inner bit to Peanut.

I'll try them on this and see what they think.

As said above, I greatly appreciate the information.

I should add Little gem lettuce not Iceberg as it has no nutritional value and can cause wet poo..

Cucumber is a great food. Your piggies are gorgeous by the way

 

[Dom R]

I should add Little gem lettuce not Iceberg as it has no nutritional value and can cause wet poo..

Cucumber is a great food. Your piggies are gorgeous by the way

Not sure which lettuce it was, but I'll keep that in mind.

Peanut's fur is amazing, it goes blond brown blond, its really interesting

Ash is my first grey guineapig, and he is by far, the softest piggy I've had.

 

[sport_billy]

I am sorry you lost Fudge, it is always hard to lose a pet, he was gorgeous, a lovely photo to keep of him - they are such a bigpart of the family.

Pleased that Peanut has found a new friend

 

[Dom R]

I am sorry you lost Fudge, it is always hard to lose a pet, he was gorgeous, a lovely photo to keep of him - they are such a bigpart of the family.

Pleased that Peanut has found a new friend

I'm pleased too, Ash just needs to learn that Peanut is the dominant one, but he keeps trying to take over, and it's most likely never going to happen as Peanut is extremely stubborn

But yeah, Fudge is in a better place now, and not in any pain. Only had him from October last year to March this year, but I fell in love with him. He had a personality similar to mine.

 

[Dom R]

Update:

I managed to get some coriander and my piggies seem to like this change. Hopefully this will last. I will give them kale occasionally or as a mix for a couple of days to get them used to the coriander, as I'm guessing its quite a different taste compared to kale.

Thanks all for the assistance

 

[Dom R]

Update:

I managed to get some coriander and my piggies seem to like this change. Hopefully this will last. I will give them kale occasionally or as a mix for a couple of days to get them used to the coriander, as I'm guessing its quite a different taste compared to kale.

Thanks all for the assistance

Just another quick update, apologies for the post after each other, read the rules and it is not stated that it is against the rules I don't believe.

But I think Peanut has a slight issue passing urine, he seems to breath quite heavy when doing so, his urine is the regular white/clear colour, which I read is normal. There's no signs of him being in pain, but I'm going to keep an eye on him, as he does seem to breath quite loud regularly and it being quite normal. If it doesn't seem to get worse then I'm sure it'll be fine. But I'll cut him out/down on carrot, although both piggies only get around 5g of carrot a day, which is really minimal.

Extending on that, the amount of veg I give them is within the 50-100g limit, at approximately 60g each. I did give them a mix of coriander and kale today, and will slowly work the kale down to nothing except every few days.

They got around 40g in Kale/Coriander, and around 80g of Pepper, Cucumber, one small cherry tomato and around 10-15g of carrot (Half for values for each piggy).

They definitely love the coriander though, they just ignored the kale and went straight for it. That's a good sign

 

[sport_billy]

Just another quick update, apologies for the post after each other, read the rules and it is not stated that it is against the rules I don't believe.

But I think Peanut has a slight issue passing urine, he seems to breath quite heavy when doing so, his urine is the regular white/clear colour, which I read is normal. There's no signs of him being in pain, but I'm going to keep an eye on him, as he does seem to breath quite loud regularly and it being quite normal. If it doesn't seem to get worse then I'm sure it'll be fine. But I'll cut him out/down on carrot, although both piggies only get around 5g of carrot a day, which is really minimal.

Extending on that, the amount of veg I give them is within the 50-100g limit, at approximately 60g each. I did give them a mix of coriander and kale today, and will slowly work the kale down to nothing except every few days.

They got around 40g in Kale/Coriander, and around 80g of Pepper, Cucumber, one small cherry tomato and around 10-15g of carrot (Half for values for each piggy).

They definitely love the coriander though, they just ignored the kale and went straight for it. That's a good sign

It's not against the rules at all

No crying when passing urine? and it is coming out okay? He isn't arching or straining is he?

Coriander is loved by piggies, it is low calcium for a herb and we feed it as a staple. yet to meet a piggy not like it.

 

[Dom R]

It's not against the rules at all

No crying when passing urine? and it is coming out okay? He isn't arching or straining is he?

Coriander is loved by piggies, it is low calcium for a herb and we feed it as a staple. yet to meet a piggy not like it.

Good to know, some forums don't allow it so I like to check and apologise if it is.

There's no crying at all, and it comes out easily. In fact he pees everywhere he wants to, we tend to try and get it on a clean tea towel, but sometimes he runes off and does it on a cushion or something. The only movement I see that may be straining is the general squatting/moving at the back end. There just seems to only be heavy breathing, it happened before where he squeaked, but it wasn't a pain or struggle one, I was previously stroking him and he squeaks for a while afterwards, he's a really happy pig.

 

[Dom R]

It's not against the rules at all

No crying when passing urine? and it is coming out okay? He isn't arching or straining is he?

Coriander is loved by piggies, it is low calcium for a herb and we feed it as a staple. yet to meet a piggy not like it.

Right, another update. I just gave them their daily veggies, and cut Peanut and Ash off of the carrot, I did want to do this eventually as I slowly reduced the amount. But about Peanuts urinating...

He did urinate, as usual. He normally does this but today he did squeak a little. So I am going to leave him off of the carrot for a while, see if it stops.

You may think he might be getting a UTI (I think that is what it is) but just note this. It is the largest urination that he does while he is out that he seems to be struggling with, he does urinate a few times after but doesn't show any pain or struggle with it. Which leads me to believe it may not be that, but he may just struggle urinating when he is more full up, if you get what I mean. I am no vet so I cannot confirm this. But if it carries on I will have to go to the vet to get a urine sample done.

I do also need to get Ash booked in for the general health checkup, as it is free with the pet store. So it may be worth getting a joint appointment if possible, and if it doesn't stop. I do check them myself and know what to look for. But they will feel his organs and things to get a deeper picture.

Do you have any advice for me? It really is nothing major, as he is still eating, running around, showing signs of life. But I know what piggies can be like, fine one minute and the next they're on their last legs. Do you think it's best to wait a couple of days and check on him more. Maybe get him out and wait for him to urinate?

Could it also be the towel I place him on changing his comfort? He doesn't show any discomfort anywhere else other than on one of the towels that I place him on.