Using calcium/phosphorus calculator

[2 OinkingPigs]

Hello,
I’m confused and hoping someone can help me. When I look up low calcium diet (my guinea pigs have had urinary infections and 1 had twisted gut) they show 1 slice of bell pepper, 1 green bean, 1 spring of cilantro, 1 leaf of lettuce. When I use the calculator I have to add a lot of food to get to the calcium ratio 1.33/1. What am I missing?

Thank you in advance!

 

[Bill & Ted]

Oh sorry much too complicated for me but hopefully someone might have used it and understands how it works. I believe a water filter is great for removing calcium

 

[Piggies&buns]

Pellets and unfiltered drinking water contribute most calcium to the diet. If you are using a calculator and only adding veg then it isn’t accurate in any event.

Calcium absorption is complicated but all we as owners can do is -

keep pellets limited to one tablespoon per day, ideally feeding low calcium/grain free pellets
filter the drinking water.
(these two things alone will keep calcium down)
Then feeding low calcium veggies and ensuring high calcium veg (kale, spinach, parsley amongst the highest) are either not fed at all or only fed one small amount once per week only

Long Term Balanced General And Special Needs Guinea Pig Diets

 

[VickiA]

We don’t advise on the Ca:pH ratio here on the forum as there are too many variables that are unknown.
But following our low calcium diet as per the diet guides along with filtering water is a good way to prevent calcium based issues in piggies in our experience.

 

[Free Ranger]

I'm a big fan of the bell pepper and also a chunk of watery cucumber. We don't give green beans here unless it's summer when they are in season. We've also had to restrict lettuce as my poor George gets impacted even more! But we give a little cauliflower leaf or broccoli stem - not everypig can eat brassicas without bloating but mine seem to be OK. We are in the season for fresh grass now - with a little added dandelion leaf - so actually the amount of veg they get has dropped right off. They get daily pepper and cuc but not daily anything else. As long as they get the grass they don't care!

1. Check the calcium in your bottled water - depending on the source some are higher in Ca than others. For example, "mineral water" is often high calcium (and other minerals!) but "spring water" is usually lower. I use a bottled water too so I've seen quite a bit of variation. Under 60 parts per million (ppm) is 'soft' water. My tap water is pushing 300 - very hard - my bottled water is about 3. Now I just have to hit that pellet target...

2. I'm pretty sure I read recently that the Ca ratio diets are actually higher in calcium than many people are comfortable with - but this might be a UK thing where a lot of our tap water is high calcium... I don't know how it is in the States.

3. Monitor the pee as you have been doing. Piggies absorb all the Ca in their gut and naturally pee out the excess so cloudy pee is 'natural' - although if you've had UTIs and (heaven forbid) stones it makes a person very nervous. George did a massive wee outside today and the cloudiness made me shudder but then I thought that he's obviously drinking tons and flushing everything through with no problems. If you see sludge try dropping the pellets right down - even if just for a day or two - and see if that makes a difference. And remember, just because you've been unlucky with one bout of UTIs doesn't mean there will be another x

 

[2 OinkingPigs]

Thank you everyone! Yes it’s very stressful trying to still figure out the food portions so they don’t get sick anymore. Ok so I’m not going to use the calculator anymore. I have dropped the amount of Oxbow pellets from 1/8 to 1 tablespoon. I use spring bottled water and lots of Timothy Hay and mixed grass w/hay-all products from Oxbow.