Smallpetselect pellets

[Siikibam]

Pellets are not likely to shorten a guinea pigs’ life. I don’t know that they can also be the cause of bloat.

I had one of my girls pass away suddenly at the end of February. She was 3. They were on burgess excel when I brought them home but moved them onto harringtons. My boys have been on harringtons for a long time and turned 5 this year.

Sometimes genetics plays a part. Other times it’s just that piggy. You have to remember that they hide their illness well. My girl was absolutely fine and her usual hungry self. Next day she was unresponsive. I don’t know what caused her death and that’s a tough pill to swallow (up to now).

Perhaps you still need to work through your grief for your lost piggy. Guilt and what-ifs are all part of that process. We try our hardest to give them what they need and that is all we can do for them.

 

[jess496]

Time for Paws and Zoo Plus often have Versele Laga on offer, although they don't have any at the moment. I don't find them to be any more expensive than other good quality pellets. I buy them when they are on offer and when I want other things so I can spend enough to get the free postage. I only feed about 10 - 12 pellets (split in 2 lots) each a day to my 6 piggies so a bag lasts ages. I treat pellets more as a daily treat than a food.

I've bought a small bag from Amazon now for them to try first in case they don't like it. Thank

Pellets are not likely to shorten a guinea pigs’ life. I don’t know that they can also be the cause of bloat.

I had one of my girls pass away suddenly at the end of February. She was 3. They were on burgess excel when I brought them home but moved them onto harringtons. My boys have been on harringtons for a long time and turned 5 this year.

Sometimes genetics plays a part. Other times it’s just that piggy. You have to remember that they hide their illness well. My girl was absolutely fine and her usual hungry self. Next day she was unresponsive. I don’t know what caused her death and that’s a tough pill to swallow (up to now).

Perhaps you still need to work through your grief for your lost piggy. Guilt and what-ifs are all part of that process. We try our hardest to give them what they need and that is all we can do for them.

I'm still trying to find answers 4 months later but I know I won't get answers, I just haven't accepted what has happened to him & it's very difficult to move forward because he looked perfectly fine then he went down hill. I blame myself because I didn't watch him carefully that week as I thought he was fine. Maybe he had acute bloat because he stopped eating due to medication, the vet said to me if I had syringed fed him it wouldn't have helped because I asked her if that would have made a difference as I see owners online who have managed to get their Guinea pigs through bloat by syringe feeding etc and I feel terrible that I let him down because I was too late, my guess is the medication made him go down hill even though everyone says that the medication wouldn't do this. I took to him to the vet 5 days before and the vet said he was fine, I should have pushed for some tests but at the time I did not want to stress him out which was probably a big mistake because I had 5 days to do something.
I'm sorry about your Guinea pig and I wish they didn't hide their illness.

 

[jess496]

Time for Paws and Zoo Plus often have Versele Laga on offer, although they don't have any at the moment. I don't find them to be any more expensive than other good quality pellets. I buy them when they are on offer and when I want other things so I can spend enough to get the free postage. I only feed about 10 - 12 pellets (split in 2 lots) each a day to my 6 piggies so a bag lasts ages. I treat pellets more as a daily treat than a food.

I have bought a small bag of Versele Laga from Amazon to try first and see how it goes. Thanks

 

[Piggies&buns]

I've bought a small bag from Amazon now for them to try first in case they don't like it. Thank
I'm still trying to find answers 4 months later but I know I won't get answers, I just haven't accepted what has happened to him & it's very difficult to move forward because he looked perfectly fine then he went down hill. I blame myself because I didn't watch him carefully that week as I thought he was fine. Maybe he had acute bloat because he stopped eating due to medication, the vet said to me if I had syringed fed him it wouldn't have helped because I asked her if that would have made a difference as I see owners online who have managed to get their Guinea pigs through bloat by syringe feeding etc and I feel terrible that I let him down because I was too late, my guess is the medication made him go down hill even though everyone says that the medication wouldn't do this. I took to him to the vet 5 days before and the vet said he was fine, I should have pushed for some tests but at the time I did not want to stress him out which was probably a big mistake because I had 5 days to do something.
I'm sorry about your Guinea pig and I wish they didn't hide their illness.

Please don’t blame yourself.
I have just looked through your previous post about his passing and can only reiterate everything that was said on that post. Your piggy was unwell and he suffered with bloat. Bloat is a very serious illness and cannot always be cured. You did not cause it by giving him pellets (of any brand). The medication was given to help him, it didnt cause his death. His body was simply unable to cope with the illness.

 

[jess496]

Please don’t blame yourself.
I have just looked through your previous post about his passing and can only reiterate everything that was said on that post. Your piggy was unwell and he suffered with bloat. Bloat is a very serious illness and cannot always be cured. You did not cause it by giving him pellets (of any brand). The medication was given to help him, it didnt cause his death. His body was simply unable to cope with the illness.

I do blame myself because there were signs that he wasn't well for a while and I stupidly didn't think anything of it because I didn't know about the signs until I found out more as I've been doing alot of research after he passed and I wish I had known about these things.
Thankyou for replying.

 

[Piggies&buns]

I do blame myself because there were signs that he wasn't well for a while and I stupidly didn't think anything of it because I didn't know about the signs until I found out more as I've been doing alot of research after he passed and I wish I had known about these things.
Thankyou for replying.

This doesn’t make it your fault - you can’t solve what you didn’t know at the time and even if you did know what the signs were, it doesn’t mean the outcome would have been any different. Bloat can be fatal within hours and sometimes even the most prompt of vet treatment can’t solve it.
Researching afterwards will mean you know what to do if a similar situation was to occur again.
We all have these thoughts when we’ve lost our animals. It’s a very normal part of grieving.
There are places which can help you cope with the loss of a pet

Human Bereavement: Grieving, Coping and Support Links for Guinea Pig Owners and Their Children

 

[Eriathwen]

Most of us have been where you are, guilt is a very normal part of grief. I lost my most precious piggy a few years back due to my own bad judgement of a bladder issue brought on by a change of pellet I thought would be safe but turned out not to be.
The only way I have found to get past these mistakes, is to learn from them to ensure they don't happen again to your future piggies so their death meant something. This new knowledge does create guilt, but we can only do the best we can, with the knowledge we have at the time. Looking back over the years, knowing what I know now, I could have saved quite a few other piggies, but I didn't know any better.

I have only ever lost 1 pig to bloat, it took me all night to bring her out of the first episode, and took her to the vet. She was booked in for xrays and scans, where they found a mass in her abdomen, she went immediately for surgery to see if this mass could be removed, but it was around the neck of her stomach, which was also massively inflamed, nothing could be done but keep her comfortable for the time she had left.

I had her home for all of 10 minutes before she bloated again and went into convulsions, she died on the way back to the vet.

I guess what I'm trying to say is, to paraphrase one of my favourite quotes, sometimes you can do everything right and still lose, unfortunately that's life. He may still have passed even if you took him to the best vet in the world the second symptoms started. Bloat is dangerous, and all too often there is nothing you can do no matter how quickly you act, similarly with most symptoms. You've almost got to have a 6th sense about these animals before things progress too far and that only comes with experience, failure and/or loss most of the time.

I'm sorry you're still hurting from the loss of your piggy ❤

 

[jess496]

Most of us have been where you are, guilt is a very normal part of grief. I lost my most precious piggy a few years back due to my own bad judgement of a bladder issue brought on by a change of pellet I thought would be safe but turned out not to be.
The only way I have found to get past these mistakes, is to learn from them to ensure they don't happen again to your future piggies so their death meant something. This new knowledge does create guilt, but we can only do the best we can, with the knowledge we have at the time. Looking back over the years, knowing what I know now, I could have saved quite a few other piggies, but I didn't know any better.

I have only ever lost 1 pig to bloat, it took me all night to bring her out of the first episode, and took her to the vet. She was booked in for xrays and scans, where they found a mass in her abdomen, she went immediately for surgery to see if this mass could be removed, but it was around the neck of her stomach, which was also massively inflamed, nothing could be done but keep her comfortable for the time she had left.

I had her home for all of 10 minutes before she bloated again and went into convulsions, she died on the way back to the vet.

I guess what I'm trying to say is, to paraphrase one of my favourite quotes, sometimes you can do everything right and still lose, unfortunately that's life. He may still have passed even if you took him to the best vet in the world the second symptoms started. Bloat is dangerous, and all too often there is nothing you can do no matter how quickly you act, similarly with most symptoms. You've almost got to have a 6th sense about these animals before things progress too far and that only comes with experience, failure and/or loss most of the time.

I'm sorry you're still hurting from the loss of your piggy ❤

I wished I did my research on everything when my first two Guinea pigs were alive but I stupidly didn't think they would ever get ill and I didn't realise how fragile they were.
You are right about learning from your mistakes but it makes you feel awful that it could have been prevented. It's not the same without him anymore even though I have 3 boys left but there was something different about him. I still haven't removed his bed and his companion doesn't go in it.
I'm sorry about your Guinea pigs, it's so sad.

 

[piggieminder]

I am sorry you are feeling guilty, you really shouldn't, you are obviously a very caring piggy carer. I do understand though I've been there a few times myself over things I've missed or decisions I've made for my piggies that turned out to be the wrong decision. None of us can know or see it all.