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Losing a little weight

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lilmisscavy

lilmisscavy

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Hey,

I've noticed Megan's been losing a bit of weight recently. She's always been a slim pig all her adult life, since she had a pup quite young.

She's still eating and drinking fine, and acting totally normal so only wondering if I take her into the vets, what on earth do I ask for them to do if there's nothing obvious that's wrong with her? I'm guessing a blood test would help?

Thanks for any advice :)
 
Are you weighing her, or is it just a visual loss of weight?
Is a constant weight loss (weekly or daily) or does her weight fluctuate?
 
Miami Mice said:
Are you weighing her, or is it just a visual loss of weight?
Is a constant weight loss (weekly or daily) or does her weight fluctuate?
Click to expand...

I don't weigh my pigs, no need because I just judge by handling them, always have.

She had this last year, around the same time of year actually, but she was very sluggish before, she's not like that this time.

Like I said though, she's always been slim so not quite sure what to suggest to the vet or whether to just keep her and another pig she's with in another hutch for the time being to feed her up. I know she's quite low in pecking order so she may not be getting enough food.

Confusing!
 
Please weigh her daily to get a more accurate picture of whether she is losing at a steady rate or not. Supermarket kitchen scales don't cost a lot! I always do the moment I suspect anything is not right; your feel can do only so much.

Possible reasons for loss of weight/appetite: http://www.guinealynx.info/anorexia.html
 
Wiebke said:
Please weigh her daily to get a more accurate picture of whether she is losing at a steady rate or not. Supermarket kitchen scales don't cost a lot! I always do the moment I suspect anything is not right; your feel can do only so much.

Possible reasons for loss of weight/appetite: http://www.guinealynx.info/anorexia.html
Click to expand...

I can buy scales on Saturday if needs be but all I was asking was what I should ask a vet to check for.
 
The vet will feel for any obvious lumps and also check breathing and listen to chest, also a teeth check should be done. As Wiebke says weighing is really important and useful, weight loss often a first indication of illness.

Hope everything will be ok for Megan
 
sport_billy said:
The vet will feel for any obvious lumps and also check breathing and listen to chest, also a teeth check should be done. As Wiebke says weighing is really important and useful, weight loss often a first indication of illness.

Hope everything will be ok for Megan
Click to expand...

She'd had a rattly chest over winter, and also last year when this happened before, but right now she doesn't have anything like that.

I could check her teeth in a minute but because her appetite is the same as the others, I'm not overly concerned about her teeth right now. There's no other symptoms that would indicate that.

A while ago I found the area her '****oris' would be (hope its ok to say that word on here, change to something appropriate if needed), which the other girls do have obviously, just not as pronounced. It's not swollen or tender, but I've been making sure she's not producing any discharge from there, and there hasn't been anything.

I'll try to weigh her on our kitchen scales but I don't know how accurate it would be.
 
If you weigh her on the same scales you will have a starting weight to begin with. We have these scales from argos http://www.argos.co.uk/static/Product/partNumber/8422996/Trail/searchtext>SCALES.htm they are quite good and cheap.

One thing I have learnt with piggies is to always trust your intuition. If you are concerned get her to the vets and hopefully they'll check her over and put your mind at rest, but weighing is the best advice we ever had regarding piggies and has caught a few of our piggies illnesses and dental problems very early on several occasions.

Let us know how you get on with Megan.
 
Ok that didn't allow me to say half of it lol, but I've just weighed all 4 girls in that herd.

Megan, Erin and Penny are just a smidgen over 1kg, and Daisy is about 1.2kg, by our scales reckoning.

And that set of scales sport_billy, will get one ordered tomorrow, thanks for the recommendation :) how big is it by the way? In inches/cm?
 
lilmisscavy said:
Ok that didn't allow me to say half of it lol, but I've just weighed all 4 girls in that herd.

Megan, Erin and Penny are just a smidgen over 1kg, and Daisy is about 1.2kg, by our scales reckoning.

And that set of scales sport_billy, will get one ordered tomorrow, thanks for the recommendation :) how big is it by the way? In inches/cm?
Click to expand...

Off top of my head scales are around 7 inches by 7 inches (don't hold me to that though) we pop of piggies in an tupperware and take the weight off that to get piggles weight. The tupperware keeps 'them form wandering off rolleyes
 
sport_billy said:
Off top of my head scales are around 7 inches by 7 inches (don't hold me to that though) we pop of piggies in an tupperware and take the weight off that to get piggles weight. The tupperware keeps 'them form wandering off rolleyes
Click to expand...

Lol yea that wouldn't be helpful *plonk the pig on the scale... proceed to chase your pig across the worktop* :))

That's quite small isn't it? It's big enough though because pigs are bigger than that, or is that also why you add a container to put them in?

I've reserved to pick one up tomorrow so I can have a look at it before deciding to buy it :)
 
We used to do it like this -

P3220591.jpg


Now they are bigger we pop them in tupper on top then subtract weight of tupper to get pig weight...
 
Ah I see :)

Well I'm unable to go out to get it tomorrow so my mum is for me so I've told her to have a check of it before she buys it because I told her what you said about the size etc :p
 
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