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Stopping bladder sludge coming back

  • Thread starter Thread starter DMS260820
  • Start date Start date
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DMS260820

Now Dot has had her bladder flush, and I've got time on my hands, I want to try and stop this bladder sludge coming back.

I filter water.
I'm careful with calcium veg.
I feed limited grainless pellets daily (thinking of ways to stop altogether but I'm stuck with the vitamin d issue for indoor guinea pigs)

I feed a bunch of freshly picked grass daily, literally until they can't eat anymore, it sends them to sleep, I built this up gradually over time (no funky poos)

I feed diced cucumber around 3 times a day, scattered through the hay.

Could just be that dot is prone to sludge and il never fix that. Don't know
 
SkyPipDotBernie said:
Now Dot has had her bladder flush, and I've got time on my hands, I want to try and stop this bladder sludge coming back.

I filter water.
I'm careful with calcium veg.
I feed limited grainless pellets daily (thinking of ways to stop altogether but I'm stuck with the vitamin d issue for indoor guinea pigs)

I feed a bunch of freshly picked grass daily, literally until they can't eat anymore, it sends them to sleep, I built this up gradually over time (no funky poos)

I feed diced cucumber around 3 times a day, scattered through the hay.

Could just be that dot is prone to sludge and il never fix that. Don't know
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Hi!

The calcium absorption process is very complex.

What plays into the development of bladder stones or sludge are several factors:
- genetic disposition
- bad drinkers are more prone to stones
- a diet that is way too high in calcium or has the wrong calcium ratio
- something going wrong in the absorption processing process

In general, when you are dealing with piggies with persistent problems, you are more likely looking at a combination of factors of which you can only address one (the diet) and perhaps address the drinking with feeding more high water/low nutrition content veg. But you can't do anything about the other factors. You can fiddle around and see whether you can fine tune the diet to extend the intervals between bladder flushes.

Perhaps you can try and skip either the pellets for some dry or fresh forage or switch to bottled low calcium water instead of filtering in very persistent cases. Filtering doesn't remove all calcium; in many cases enough to keep piggies in a hard water area from developing nutritionally caused stones.
 
I have found that by giving the piggies a bowl of water, in addition to their bottle, they definitely drink very much more! You do need to clean out the bowl often, as they do seem to poop and pee in it too, but I have definitely found it encourages them to drink more!
 
I haven't been feeding the wet diet all that long. So maybe this could have been going on before this, and now it's finally got too much.

Do you think there is a chance this won't bother her ever again?
 
SkyPipDotBernie said:
I haven't been feeding the wet diet all that long. So maybe this could have been going on before this, and now it's finally got too much.

Do you think there is a chance this won't bother her ever again?
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Hopefully! You could cut the nuggets out completely.
 
I've just picked dot up and found white cream again. Only a little, but it's worrying me. So stressed with all this. Wish it would just do one
 
Try and relax about it a bit, Simon said the same to me about cutting out pellets with Rupert with his second tiny stone. I worried with two oldies, him and Jess, about losing weight but I worried and they both had a sprinkle (maybe a tablespoon between them of SS) and kept up their weight really. I feed even less now with three of the porkies 🙂
They have oats at night (Jess gets sweet potato with them a few nights a week as she’s mini and old) but I still have a chunky Luigi that eats about 8-10 SS pellets a day and has some oats at night. He definitely doesn’t need any extras!
 
SkyPipDotBernie said:
I've just picked dot up and found white cream again. Only a little, but it's worrying me. So stressed with all this. Wish it would just do one
Click to expand...
Jess gets the odd bit of dried stuff on hers, don’t worry, like Debbie says better out than in! She’s been here seven years, same diet, water etc and never had a problem but Rupert just did, same as Dot. Just keep an eye on her and you know us lot are around if you need us!
 
My plan is to cut down to a tablespoon each, every other day, and then gradually go to zero. If I see any problems il go back.

Bernie ignores pellets I still offer him them. he's chunky and healthy, as far as I know. He did get a check over by Kim not long ago and she couldn't see anything wrong apart from smegma that had gone inside his body somehow. Weird lad
 
SkyPipDotBernie said:
My plan is to cut down to a tablespoon each, every other day, and then gradually go to zero. If I see any problems il go back.

Bernie ignores pellets I still offer him them. he's chunky and healthy, as far as I know. He did get a check over by Kim not long ago and she couldn't see anything wrong apart from smegma that had gone inside his body somehow. Weird lad
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If he ignores them it sounds like Dot’s getting more then? So she’s maybe having twice the amount I mean.
Aliona really doesn’t like pellets either, well she came with Asda ones so she had some for a couple of weeks but barely eats them now, much prefers her nice hay! :love:She’s a perfect pig, weaned herself off the naughty stuff!
CB7B16D4-07F2-4FAA-BDEB-E8F70A2E8935.webp
Just so blooming cute! :love:
 
alpacasqueak said:
If he ignores them it sounds like Dot’s getting more then? So she’s maybe having twice the amount I mean.
Aliona really doesn’t like pellets either, well she came with Asda ones so she had some for a couple of weeks but barely eats them now, much prefers her nice hay! :love:She’s a perfect pig, weaned herself off the naughty stuff!
View attachment 140736
Just so blooming cute! :love:
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Yea good point. Dot has been getting more. I love Aliona She pretty 😍
 
I have noticed a possible symptom of bladder sludge, stones or grit now, and that was dot had small tear drop poos for quite a while and I just couldn't get to the bottom of why. I tried pro biotic, eliminating certain veg, feeding loads of grass. Nothing worked, now she's fine after a flush out
 
I've been doing some more research. And I'm wondering if bladder problems could actually be from not enough pellets, causing a vit d deficiency in guinea pigs that do not get sunlight because of being indoors
 
SkyPipDotBernie said:
I've been doing some more research. And I'm wondering if bladder problems could actually be from not enough pellets, causing a vit d deficiency in guinea pigs that do not get sunlight because of being indoors
Click to expand...
No, that doesn’t seem to be the case at all! I know a few people who have stopped pellets after their piggy had stones and no recurrence, and their guinea pigs are indoor.
 
furryfriends (TEAS) said:
Ask Simon to give you a recommended diet. He told he they were thinking of sending people home with an info sheet after bladder stone removal. Not sure it they’ve done that yet.
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He might have given me one il have a look.

Its literally only the vit d I'm hung up on. If it wasn't for that I'd be confident in stopping pellets. And I don't know if Simon knows my pigs are indoor or not
 
No Simon didn't give me any paper work like that. Do your friends who stopped them pellets do anything else like supplements or anything
 
furryfriends (TEAS) said:
No, they feed as normal, but just without pellets. They feed porridge oats instead. Simon presumes all piggies live indoors, as most do. Why don't you email him and ask him and tell him your concerns? He will be happy to help you!
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I have plain organic oats. Il see if they like them. Do they feed oats to get the vitamin d or incase of weight loss?

Il email Simon and ask. Might need you to pm me his email again. I won't bother until in the week.

I'm just thinking overly probably. But my thoughts are that if dot could get the sludge and stones in the first place, if I don't change how I'm feeding, it's going to come back. The grass I will be growing will be a good start though
 
furryfriends (TEAS) said:
Simon says to feed the oats if they’re dropping weight, without the pellets. If not, no need to feed them.
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Ok, I'm going to email and ask him. If I stop feeding pellets, where do my pigs get the vitamin d from and how important is it for indoor pigs 👍
 
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