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not eating :(

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piggydaisy

Hello

Am new here and although have been browsing for a while have never got round to registering, however now i am having troubles with my piggy and would like some advice/help if possible please.

Two weeks ago we got home to find one of our piggy’s really ill, limped over in the corner of the hutch gasping for air, diarrhea and looking really thin. We rushed her round to the emergency vet who put her on oxygen but unfortunately she didn’t make it.
The other piggy was on her feet and running round the hutch so we thought she would be okay. When we got home from the vet from having the first piggy put to sleep we found our other piggy had diarrhea but looked a little more chirpy. We rushed her round to the emergency vet who agreed she was still chirpy and gave her an antibiotic jab, and also a jab to clear her gut. We were then told to give her Critical Care twice a day, and an oral antibiotic medicine once a day in the evening and a probiotic powder to mix in with her Critical Care. We didn’t think she would make it.
Two weeks later though she is still with us, however she is refusing to eat her pellets, and will only pick at bits of hay and curly kale. She has very little interest in carrots or broccoli (she’ll nibble at it but nowhere near as much as she used to) and is starving by the time we get home in the evening from work and we give her Critical Care. She will literally open her mouth wide open for it where as when we first gave it to her it was a real struggle.

It appears from us she is addicted to the Critical Care, or has got lazy to being syringe fed. Has anyone encountered this before?

She was clicking her teeth a little at one point last week so we took her to the vet again who said that her molars are slightly hooked but not the worst they have seen and certainly not bad enough to put her through the stress of surgery and general anaesthetic. He also said if she is eating hay they can’t be disturbing her that much.

Please can someone help? We can’t keep syringe feeding her every night and we can’t afford to have her teeth done if it isn’t in fact her teeth and is more a psychological issue.
Does anyone have any idea what’s going on?

Cheers
Sandy
 
Welcome to the forum. :)p

So sorry for your loss and for the difficult time your pig is having. I don't have any suggestions but hopefully someone more experienced will be along soon. x
 
Piggies love to eat so for her not to be eating by herself is a cause for concern, the fact that she appears to be starving when you syringe her would indicate there is a problem as if she could eat by herself she would eat.

Try giving her 0.4ml childrens liquid nurofen as a painkiller, she may be hurting somewhere which is why she is not eating.

Check her tummy and see if she appears bloated or has tightness as it may be a problem with wind or bloat which can by very painful. Again there are childrens medicines you can use to help with this.

If she wont eat by herself you really do need to keep up the syringe feeding otherwise she will starve, it only takes a short amount of time without food for piggies to go into decline.

Is she drinking her normal amount? if she is not drinking as much try syringing her some water as well as food as dehydration can be a problem if she wont eat her fresh veggies.

How much weight has she lost?

Let us know once you have checked her tummy and we can give you some more advise.
 
Hi and so sorry to hear of you losing your little piggie. I have no advice, but have recently done the critical care feeding routine. I do know what you mean when you say she is starving come evening and is happy to be fed the made up feed. I am sorry I can't help though, but do hope that someone can and that you will be able to sort your piggie out. XX
 
forgot to ask has the diarhoea stopped?

How are her poops now?

Did the vet have any suggestions why both pigs had diarhoea?
 
wow thanks so much for all your replies.

absolutely no diarrhoea for the past two weeks since the day after we discovered it. Although she is eating her poop. I know this is fairly normal, but much more than she did before they got sick. Yesterday she started to poop loads (much more than usual) but it is solid, regular poop.

She doesn’t seem interested in her water bottle so we are also syringing water into her mouth.

At first i thought it was just because she was mourning her friend, so we got her a new friend at the weekend and they seem to be getting on absolutely fine. They are in the same hutch but i have divided it into two halves.

Is the childrens nurofen safe to give her? If so what should i look out for once i have given it to her? A temporary increase in the amount of solids being eaten?

Sandy
 
PLEASE dont take this as gospel as I am only giving you some advice that was given to me by Laura when one of my pigs wouldn't eat.

She advised 0.5ml of metatone tonic daily ( an appetite stimulant )
60ml of syringed food per day or more if possible ( I didn't have critical care so was soaking pellets in water so they could be syringed )
40ml of fluids per day

I'm sure Laura or someone as knowledgable will be along soon to give you better advice but thought I'd share what I had been told in the past until they come along

I was also using daktarin gel incase she had a sore mouth which was preventing her from eating. From getting in from work we would basically feed her all through the night, taking turns to sleep, until we had to leave for work in the morning so I know how hard it is.

I was also told that if a guinea pig stops eating for themselves they won't be wearing their teeth down and they can grow very quickly so if she hasn't been eating on her own for a couple of weeks her teeth may be causing her discomfort now.

Really hope she gets better soon x
 
Thanks so much for all your help so far. Massively appreciated. Never knew piggy's could take human medicines. I'm going to try the half mil of kiddos nurofen and see if that relieves the pain. Then I'll give the appetite stimulant a try but going down the nurofen route first as she has some appetite as she is starving come the evening. I want her to eat on her own so hoping the pain relief might helf and narrow down what the problem could be.

The more suggestions the merrier, I'm at a lose end with this now and just want her to get better!

Sandy
 
Burgess pellets especially the blackcurrant ones are great for syringe feeding they soften really easy and are easy to suck up, just soak in warm water for 15-20 mins and mush up, they cost a fraction of the crital care stuff, PAH sell them £3.99.Elvis has maintained his weight for 2 months with 3 feeds a day on these. You can also soften and put on a saucer in his cage and he might eat them that way Elvis won't but some do.

Teeth grow at an alarming rate my Elvis has his done every week now but luckily AP does them with no GA. Where are you? there might be someone you could go too to get his teeth done you don't need a GA for teeth you need someone who knows what they are doing unfortunatly they are few and far between:(

Do you know about the cambridge cavy trust you can ring them and they will advise on any decent guinea pig vets near[or not so near] to you, good luck.
 
Hey

Thanks for all your help

Last night we gave her crushed pellets and she absolutely loved it. She is actively looking for the syringe when she sits on my lap and i didn’t even have to hold her for her to take it. She opens her mouth! Crazy. Although I’m happier her doing this with the pellets rather than the Critical Care as at least this way she is getting a taste for them and will hopefully eat them by herself soon.

I also gave her a piece of cucumber last night which she loved and started eating straight away (she ate quite a fair bit of it) however i’m going to try the kids nurofen tonight and see if she eats more pellets on her own.

One thing – when i giver her meadow hay she seems to be picking certain parts of it, like one particular stalk of hay. Any idea what this is about?

Fingers crossed she is getting better, she just needs to start eating pellets.

Sandy
 
If she prefers the pellets then maybe you could try Ruths suggestion and put some of the mushed pellets in a saucer in her cage to see if she'll eat them whilst your not around.

Don't know about the Hay, sorry.

I would also strongly recommend weighing her regularly so you know whether she's losing or gaining weight. If ours are poorly we weigh them the same time daily, otherwise we do it once a week. Can't remember whether you said if you are doing this or not so I apologise if you already are.

Also you can cut the tip off the syringe to make feeding a bit quicker and so the solution goes through the syringe better, just obviously make sure the end isn't pointy or jagged.
 
Glad she seems to be picking up a bit

My boys are also fussy about what bit of hay they eat, they will grab some strands and throw them away and then some they will eat all the way from the bottom without stopping.

Must just be one of those things I guess.

With the liquid nurofen its 0.4ml and you can give it twice a day, I find morning then evening works well.

If it helps within a few days her weight should stabilise and then she should start gaining weight again. You will also notice her start to eat more hay and return to normal behaviour.

Once she is eating normally stop the nurofen and see how she is.

If she goes backward again you know the pain is still there and she should see a vet again.
 
I also tried, on top of the pellet mush, some organic, meat and dairy free baby food on a saucer (stage one) I got andapple and pear one and a veg mix but try to find one without potato as not sure if cooked potato was poisinous because i think raw potato is. or maybe get some piggies safe raw veggies and blitz them in a blender with some water. will be a bit chunky but might get the piggie using the teeth a little. child nurofen/calpol works well but if you get some metacalm from the vets is is honey flovoured and a bit more animal specific and i think and anti-inflamatory too.
 
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we're in Wimbledon, London. Near the tennis.

Very interested/excited to see what effect the Nurofen has.

I know this is random but she seems to be grooming herself excessively. Not 24/7 but a lot more than she used to do. She'd sit on our lap and get on her back feet, clean her face with her paws etc..
I can't see anything bothering her within her fur/on her skin and we gave her a bath over the weekend.

Could be completely random and non related...just these odd behaviors are so different to how she was before her sister passed.
 
Does her face get dirty after syringe feeding Elvis always cleans himself up if he gets a bit messy.You will need to keep her eating otherwise those teeth will become more of a problem.
I bet there are some guinea vets around you, the CCT will tell you
 
shes doing so much better today :)

we set up an area for her and her new friend yesterday (who is only 8 weeks old) and let them run around together, sniff, cuddle etc.. and daisy (the one who wasnt eating) ate nearly a full bowl of pellets by the evening, and ate loads of curly kale and hay. looks like things are on the up.

the new piggy (sweet pea, who is 8 weeks old was running around having the time of her life on the area we set up for them...popcorning, rolling over etc.. so fingers crossed Daisy is on the mend and they both get on together.

didnt get round to giving any medication but it seems as if a bit of exercise and a run about with a new friend has motivated daisy into starting eating again :)):)):))
 
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a pigture of the two of them :)

pigs.jpg



Daisy (the one who wasnt eating...a year old...on the left)

Sweet pea (the new one...8 weeks old...popcorning...on the right)
 
hello

an update here...

we had to leave her unfortunately on her own for most of the day...when we got back she had eaten all her curly kale, her dandelion stick, and best of all a whole bowl of pellets! she's also drunk half a bottle of water which is amazing as shes hardly been touching it for weeks.

however when we put her and her mate on a towel to run around, we have noticed that her urine is a faint orange/brown/tinted colour which is very odd. does anyone know what this could be? i'm assuming it isnt good and will probably cost me a few bob or two but would be good to rule out if its anything shes eating i.e carrot etc..

thanks
 
sorry to double post

just to add there is no pain signs or squealing when she pee's. all looks normal.
 
thank you.

this line has put my mind at ease;

gut infection whenever the immune system has been lowered and can colour the pee really strongly orange/rusty. It is quite frightening when it happens the first time!
Click to expand...

she had a gut infection, the vet gave her a jab for this and we are also giving her baytril oral susp to help her overcome this. it must just be a build up of rubbish which is finally coming out.

i'll monitor it.

thanks again for everyones help...piggy is doing very good :)
 
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