AbiS
Adult Guinea Pig
- Joined
- Jul 20, 2013
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- 3,706
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- Location
- Chester le Street, Durham
Some of you may know that Toby and Barney have been to see the vet recently. Firstly because of Barney's cyst and then because both boys have an ear infection. The vet advised me that they both really need to lose a bit of weight as they are a 'little' (*ahem) on the podgy side. So I have decided to start this thread documenting their weight loss.
5 weeks ago Barney was approximately 1485g and Toby would have been about 100g less at 1385g - I don't remember the exact weights. At that point I started scattering their pellets and fresh veg around, instead of just putting it in a bowl, so that they had to work a little bit harder for it. I had them both at the vet on Tuesday and Barney weighed 1435g, Toby was not weighed at this time. The vet laughed at poor Barney and said 'yup - far too big'. As I have to go back in a fortnight I thought we should take this diet seriously so I have very slightly reduced their evening romaine to 40g between them, I have not adjusted their breakfast veg amount. As for their nuggets I used to give them just under 1.5handfuls a day between them. I have since started to weigh the nuggets out and so they started with 20g twice a day between them and have been reducing this by 1g per meal everyday since then. Today they had 17g at each meal.
They were weighed today and have both done really well - Toby weighs 1336g and Barney is 1411g.
After tonight's antics I think I have going to have to postpone reducing the nuggets any further for a while - Barney is such a good boy that he has lost weight but his skinny self is now being really really naughty! He will not leave poor Toby alone - rumblestrutting, wheelbarrowing, ear biting. He is either feeling really perky as he is now more streamlined or alternatively he is just hangry (hungry + angry). He does seem to be doing lots of zoomies and popcorning though which is really fun to watch. It could also be that he is feeling better if the ear drops are starting to work on the ear infection.
I am not really sure what they should weigh but I am going to gauge it on ribs/spine and the little fatty lumps on their sides. I did see a thread by @Wiebke that recommended they have 10-20g nuggets per piggy per day so my aim at the moment is to give them 2 lots of 15g between them and see what happens.
5 weeks ago Barney was approximately 1485g and Toby would have been about 100g less at 1385g - I don't remember the exact weights. At that point I started scattering their pellets and fresh veg around, instead of just putting it in a bowl, so that they had to work a little bit harder for it. I had them both at the vet on Tuesday and Barney weighed 1435g, Toby was not weighed at this time. The vet laughed at poor Barney and said 'yup - far too big'. As I have to go back in a fortnight I thought we should take this diet seriously so I have very slightly reduced their evening romaine to 40g between them, I have not adjusted their breakfast veg amount. As for their nuggets I used to give them just under 1.5handfuls a day between them. I have since started to weigh the nuggets out and so they started with 20g twice a day between them and have been reducing this by 1g per meal everyday since then. Today they had 17g at each meal.
They were weighed today and have both done really well - Toby weighs 1336g and Barney is 1411g.
After tonight's antics I think I have going to have to postpone reducing the nuggets any further for a while - Barney is such a good boy that he has lost weight but his skinny self is now being really really naughty! He will not leave poor Toby alone - rumblestrutting, wheelbarrowing, ear biting. He is either feeling really perky as he is now more streamlined or alternatively he is just hangry (hungry + angry). He does seem to be doing lots of zoomies and popcorning though which is really fun to watch. It could also be that he is feeling better if the ear drops are starting to work on the ear infection.
I am not really sure what they should weigh but I am going to gauge it on ribs/spine and the little fatty lumps on their sides. I did see a thread by @Wiebke that recommended they have 10-20g nuggets per piggy per day so my aim at the moment is to give them 2 lots of 15g between them and see what happens.