Oh Ruby by The Boring Big Slave

Swissgreys

Swissgreys

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Yesterday during her health check Ruby had lost 32 grams.
This isn't in any way alarming, as although her weight is fairly stable, it does fluctuate by anywhere up to 40 grams each week.
But as it was a loss I did give her a slightly more thorough check than usual.
All seemed in order so I popped her back into her cage with her fresh vegetables.
This is a pointless thing I have done almost every week for the past 5 years in a vain attempt to have her associate her weekly health check with a positive reward, and refrain from trying to bite me. It hasn't really helped - I have just got better at avoiding the nips!

Anyway I came back later to top up hay for the evening, and noticed she had barley touched her veg which is simply unheard of.
So I dragged a very grumpy Ruby back out of her cage to look at her again.
Ruby was not pleased.
The bad news is she has snapped both of her top teeth off at the gum line.
The good news is that this makes it harder for her to nip me!

So I got her veg out of her cage and chopped it into various shapes and sizes and sat down with Ruby on the sofa to work out what she can and can't manage.

Apparently for the next few days we will be having all of our vegetable served in fine julienne strips, and nothing else will do.
We will also having our pellets soaked.
And endless piles of hay all over the cage because Ruby still seems to be eating hay without problems and I know how critical this is.
Plus I am hoping it might compensate for the now daily weighings she has to have.

I never thought I would be saying this, but I really hope her teeth come back soon.

IMG_6699.webp
 
what! you mean you weren't feeding her julienne strips before? :yikes:
oh naughty slave!:whistle:

Healing vibes to Ruby & wishing her a speedy regrowth of those nipping gnashers- just hope she learns to not use them on hooman hands when they come back!

Well spotted!
Speedy recovery - love the girls & I xx
 
Dear Ruby,

We hope your teeth feel better soon and grow back sharper than ever! We have heard that it is possible to bite humans quite hard even when you only have gums, so don't worry you can probably still nip your slave if she insists on this weighing business. Enjoy your julienne veggies and get well soon.

Love from Trudy and Hazelnut
 
Oh Ruby... what were you doing?! You bite the hoomans who are squishy, not things that could hurt your teethies!
I always worry Puggle will do this, Puggle is our cute little ginger biscuit psycho who almost bit her own foot off trying to savage me during nail trims... and she has a really aggressive bar biting obsession while I'm serving dinner, never at any other time but for 5 minutes every meal time soon as veg is spotted she yanks and grinds at the bars like mad so much that even when her dinner is served right next to her I have to tap her on the ears and snap her out of her metal gnashing trance and direct her to the food!
Hope Ruby's teeth regrow without incident x
 
Oh no Ruby! Have you been nibbling something you shouldn’t? Hopefully those theethies will be back soon and you can get back to munching your food and your slave now problems!
 
Dear Ruby
We hear that you have snapped your teeth. That was a bit silly of you now you can't nip your big boring slave. We now want our veg cut into precise Julienne strips and need our slave to personally feed us each one. We know this is never gonna happen but we can dream!

Hope your mouth needles grow back soon.
Lots of wheeky wheeks
Betsy, Meg and Patsy
 
Hope your teeth grow back soon so you can use them as they’re intended. Just be aware that the julienne veg may stop when they’re back.

Love and healing wheeks,
Toff, Fudgy boy, Chani and Kinene (Coco)
 
Oh Ruby, what have you been doing to break your teeth. Please stick to biting the hoomans as they are all squishy. Hope your teeth grow back soon but for now you can maul your hooman with your gums just to keep in practice.😃
 
Dear Ruby,
That was silly! How are you going to bite your slave now? We hope your teeth grow back quickly with no problems but I'm sure you'll find a way to attack the slave in the meantime. Eddie says having all your veg cut up especially for you is great fun because you get all the attention (Elvis disagrees but he's just angry he's never needed that so don't listen to him).
Healing wheeky wheeks from Eddie and Elvis xx
 
Sadly Ruby has always been a bit of a manic bar biter.
It started as cage aggression when she was separated from the others, but would fly at the shared grid shrieking and biting the bars and chattering her teeth.
But even after that delightful behaviour stopped (and she just started trying to sneakily nip them through the bars) she has always been a biter.

She doesn't even do it for food - mostly attention for her favourite slave. My daughter literally has to walk into the room and say 3 words and Ruby is hurling herself at the bars and biting them. She usually only stops when my daughter goes over and pats her or picks her up - I really should video the whole thing sometime as it is totally ridiculous. And naturally I suppose we have rewarded this by paying attention to her and now we are part of the problem.
 
Dear Ruby, we are very sorry to hear about your teeth but it’s good to know that your slave is making sure your veggies are properly served.
We think you should insist this kind of service is maintained in flute.
We do not recommend bar biting again, stick to slave biting.
We hope your teeth grow back quickly.
Love from Phoebe, Priscilla and Micah
 
I just wanted to come back and do a final update on this thread.
Exactly 10 days ago Ruby snapped both of her top front teeth off below the gum line.
Sadly this sin't the first time, although this was definitely the worst one, as her mouth was clearly very sore and her teeth were totally gone.

We fed mashed pellets and food cut into strips for around - 5 - 6 days.
The first teeth nubs were visible again after 3 days.
Now, 10 days later her teeth are back and thankfully perfectly aligned.
She is eating normally and her weight is stable.
Actually her weight has gone up a bit due to overcompensation by a certain young slave.

Hopefully this will be useful to anyone who faces a similar issue with their guinea pig at some point in the future - that person will probably be me.
We love you Ruby.
 
Dear Ruby,

We're glad to hear your teeth are back. Give your big silly hooman slave a nip for us!

WHEEKS,

💖 Clover and Stella 💖
 
Adelyn said:
Oh, I'm so sorry. I didn't know 😭

Rest In Peace, Ruby.
Click to expand...
@Adelyn please do not apologise.
It was actually quite nice to see one of her posts pop up again.
We miss her terribly - Ruby was a very special pig - but even after all this time she would love that people remember her.
 
Ruby was such a forum legend, and still is- we all remember Ruby's posts, Piggle says Ruby was and still is a true inspiration, especially with the biting the hoomans, and the gaslighting the chewed up fearful hoomans by being a sweetie-pie at the vets and for visitors... a huge personality, I bet even over the rainbow bridge she's savaged a fair few angels for not having enough piggy snacks lol :)
 
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