Vet Discourages Pellets/muesli

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pigwigg

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Me and my vet were having a lengthy discussion on the use of pellets and muesli mixes sold by pet stores.
I have other animals and study their feeds well and don't just pick what I think is a pretty bag or what 'looks good' but with guinea pigs it is so hard to find what their pelleted mix should really contain.

He stated to me that most pellets are formulated to be tasty for the pigs by using sugars, salts and binders to entice the piggies in, he explained to me it's like eating Weetabix (which is healthy) but then throwing spoon fulls of sugar on top.

I'm now fearful that the pellets I am feeding aren't actually doing much good. He explained pigs need a diet consisting of long fibre which is commonly found in celery, kale, broccoli etc.

My boys have pellets daily, fresh hay twice a day, readigrass and mixed veg/fruit for breakfast. My veggie list is:

spinach, kale, parsley, coriander, celery, mixed peppers, bistro salad with mixed lettuce leaves (No iceberg), apple, tomato, little gem lettuce, carrots and baby corn.

Veggies are rotated so they don't get bored but every morning they are given 2/3/4 items off the above list along with a new hay pile, grass or readigrass and fresh water along with pellets. Pellets are then topped up in the evenings along with more fresh hay and water (from a brita filter) and a small amount of either spinach or kale in the evenings.

Should I minimise the pellets?

How much do you feed your pigs a day?
 
What brand of pellets do you feed?

I'm currently making the switch over to grain free, healthier pellets myself. I think it depends on what brands and ingredients are used.

I've read a lot into going pelletless and it looks quite difficult to maintain their weight so I personally decided against it. I just limit what the have.

I know there are one or two on here who don't feed pellets so they may be able to help?

I too keep a close eye on pet food as I have a cat so I totally get where you're coming from :D
 
They are on Harringtons as it's the only one they all agree on!
I've tried alsorts from Muesli's to Select Science (is that what it is called?)
My 8 are all so different, if one likes it I guarantee the other 7 won't haha!

What pellets are grain free? I'd obviously love them to have a better diet.
I was going to look into a pellet-free diet, I've heard of a few people who feed oats?

Animal nutrition is such a science but not much research goes into small-animal nutrition unfortunately :(
 
pigwigg said:
They are on Harringtons as it's the only one they all agree on!
I've tried alsorts from Muesli's to Select Science (is that what it is called?)
My 8 are all so different, if one likes it I guarantee the other 7 won't haha!

What pellets are grain free? I'd obviously love them to have a better diet.
I was going to look into a pellet-free diet, I've heard of a few people who feed oats?

Animal nutrition is such a science but not much research goes into small-animal nutrition unfortunately :(
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You're so right, we are very behind on nutrition for our animals. Even though we've had them for 100+ years!

They're only on Zooplus or Rosewood Grainless (it's nice and natural too, it stinks XD) that they sell in shops. The one I'll be trying on Zooplus is JR Grainless which looks very good ingredient wise and lower calcium I believe which is great.
 
Cavy Kung-Fu said:
You're so right, we are very behind on nutrition for our animals. Even though we've had them for 100+ years!

They're only on Zooplus or Rosewood Grainless (it's nice and natural too, it stinks XD) that they sell in shops. The one I'll be trying on Zooplus is JR Grainless which looks very good ingredient wise and lower calcium I believe which is great.
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Ooh are these in independent pet shops?
If not, I will have to scour the web to see if I can find some on there! It's definitely worth me looking at!

I can't actually believe how far behind we are in nutrition. It's a shame as dogs/horses/cats have such a wide and complex
variety of feed and supplements whereas poor piggies only have around 5 options! I guess it's because there are more pig owners out
there who just grab anything or the cheapest thing or don't know or understand a guinea pigs nutritional needs so the big feed companies wont
make profit from selling specific feeds and supplements.
 
pigwigg said:
Ooh are these in independent pet shops?
If not, I will have to scour the web to see if I can find some on there! It's definitely worth me looking at!

I can't actually believe how far behind we are in nutrition. It's a shame as dogs/horses/cats have such a wide and complex
variety of feed and supplements whereas poor piggies only have around 5 options! I guess it's because there are more pig owners out
there who just grab anything or the cheapest thing or don't know or understand a guinea pigs nutritional needs so the big feed companies wont
make profit from selling specific feeds and supplements.
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I'm not sure about independent ones, haven't seen them in any so far. I know Amazon has Rosewood but only Zooplus has things like JR Grainless.

Yep I don't feel like they care much, and if they do they don't bother to keep on top of nutrition knowledge or fund it themselves.

It doesn't help that there is no knowledge out there so people just don't know. My poor cat was fed on awful food because I just had no idea about nutrition and the ingredients as I was quite young. Now I know better I just feel so guilty for not knowing this sooner.

We need awareness for sure!
 
Cavy Kung-Fu said:
I'm not sure about independent ones, haven't seen them in any so far. I know Amazon has Rosewood but only Zooplus has things like JR Grainless.

Yep I don't feel like they care much, and if they do they don't bother to keep on top of nutrition knowledge or fund it themselves.

It doesn't help that there is no knowledge out there so people just don't know. My poor cat was fed on awful food because I just had no idea about nutrition and the ingredients as I was quite young. Now I know better I just feel so guilty for not knowing this sooner.

We need awareness for sure!
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I think we could all kick ourselves for the things our pets were fed at the beginning of our ownerships.
My first piggy boys were fed the typical P@H muesli which we soon switched from!

They definitely don't care enough :(
I know there are people out there who do private research to create healthy, correct feeds. But these people can never make it big as they
just don't have the funding which is such a shame.

I'm going to have a look at those you have suggested and maybe get a trial back and see if I can switch over nice and gently!x
 
Good luck! I've read that a lot of people struggle with nugget switching but my pigs have always had a mix of various different nuggets so it wasn't hard at all to switch Rosewood into rotation!
 
Cavy Kung-Fu said:
Good luck! I've read that a lot of people struggle with nugget switching but my pigs have always had a mix of various different nuggets so it wasn't hard at all to switch Rosewood into rotation!
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Ooh I'll make a very slow and steady transition into the pellet change.
Hopefully they take well to eating it! Some of boys are gannets and will literally eat ANYTHING.
Some of the others are more sensitive souls :xd:
I'll let you know how I get on!

Have you noticed any change to the piggies on the Rosewood?
 
pigwigg said:
Ooh I'll make a very slow and steady transition into the pellet change.
Hopefully they take well to eating it! Some of boys are gannets and will literally eat ANYTHING.
Some of the others are more sensitive souls :xd:
I'll let you know how I get on!

Have you noticed any change to the piggies on the Rosewood?
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They're not strictly on that so I haven't seen as much as I probably would have? I'm keeping a mixture and currently weaning off of Selective to JR and then probably Burgess onto Versele? So once we've got into those I'll probably see more than just a shiner coat! :D
 
Interesting ...

Mine will only eat harringtons. I have tried sooo many others. They just leave the grainless ones. They only get a small handful between the two of them.
 
If money is no object then for the ones that are grain free as they are the best options. They are pricey though when you have a large number of pigs and sometimes the pigs can be picky over the nuggets.
 
Mine are on Burgess Excel with mint. They really enjoy it. They have all been fed on muesli all their life (the older girls are 2+ years) so I was expecting them to turn their noses up at the pellets however they took to them immediately. I feed a small amount each evening.
 
I feed Harrington...Burgess...heygates...oxbow...rosewood and rotate them.so all piggies seem to eat what is put down....I only feed an 8th of a cup to each piggie.
 
even the best pellets are made of carbohydrates and weird flours, otherwise the pellet is impossible to be formed. Labels say the amount of proteins, fats, vitamins, but don't mention the amount of carbohydrates. Thisis very bad. Laws allow firms to not write a list of ingredients even when they are not healthy, if they keep under a certain percentage.
Anyway, everyone is free of feeding as he likes and also my grandmother ate in the wrongest way and lived 98 years (with very bad issues, of course).
A doctor should tell us his own opinion and we also should be free of not respicting his opinion. I also don't feed my daughters with cow milk and if official medicine does not agree, I simply do not care...

The best thing is studying a lot and then make our personal choices.
For example: pellets can be as wrong as a kale and an apple; my vet would never agree in feeding a piggie with kale. Piggies are herbivore, not vegetarian and this is something accepted by all the vets... therefore hay and grass are their main food.
I think your vet is very updated and free of not accepting presents by firms of food...
 
My 5 love Harringtons too. They would eat it all day if I let them! They get the daily allowance in the morning and the bowls empty pretty quickly! Then they wheak at me for more. They don't get any more though. I am such a cruel and heartless hooman slave! I make them eat hay for the rest of the day until veg time!
 
Bit late to this but my two don't get pellets.

I read a lot about different pellets and came to the conclusion that they're basically junk food for piggies (just my own opinion) then I read about not giving any at all so about 6 months ago I weaned them off. My vet is also very keen on piggies not being given pellets, or if they are then only about 5-10g a day. (Adult piggies of course)

I used to give P@H nuggets, about 20g each a day, I went down to 10g then 5g. Now I use them as a little treat. They get maybe 2 or 3 nuggets some days at the most. They both lost a very small amount of weight at first (due to not getting all the sugar from the nuggets I'd imagine) but after that their weights were stable. Their coats are so much more shiny since, and I've found they're eating far more hay.


Obviously this is just my own opinion and each to their own :D
 
Beans&Toast said:
Bit late to this but my two don't get pellets.

I read a lot about different pellets and came to the conclusion that they're basically junk food for piggies (just my own opinion) then I read about not giving any at all so about 6 months ago I weaned them off. My vet is also very keen on piggies not being given pellets, or if they are then only about 5-10g a day. (Adult piggies of course)

I used to give P@H nuggets, about 20g each a day, I went down to 10g then 5g. Now I use them as a little treat. They get maybe 2 or 3 nuggets some days at the most. They both lost a very small amount of weight at first (due to not getting all the sugar from the nuggets I'd imagine) but after that their weights were stable. Their coats are so much more shiny since, and I've found they're eating far more hay.


Obviously this is just my own opinion and each to their own :D
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well done and after reading your post I have realised that also my sows' fur is becoming shinier and shinier, and softer and longer... they have never been fed with more than a teaspoon of pellets, even at the rescue, even if one of them was underweight. Their former vet was very strict in diet subject and made efforts for teaching them to eat hay and vegs. My vet now is even stricter than his collegue and agrees with the fact that a dish of pellets gives to the piggie's liver what a Mc Donald's lunch gives to our liver (his words). But "my" vet (actually I am not customer of anybody and I prefer reading and listening to a lot of professional opinions) says "feel free of doing what you like... a lot of people every day eat fast-foods and live happily paying bills at the doctors..." The message is very clear... :roll:
 
rome_italy said:
well done and after reading your post I have realised that also my sows' fur is becoming shinier and shinier, and softer and longer... they have never been fed with more than a teaspoon of pellets, even at the rescue, even if one of them was underweight. Their former vet was very strict in diet subject and made efforts for teaching them to eat hay and vegs. My vet now is even stricter than his collegue and agrees with the fact that a dish of pellets gives to the piggie's liver what a Mc Donald's lunch gives to our liver (his words). But "my" vet (actually I am not customer of anybody and I prefer reading and listening to a lot of professional opinions) says "feel free of doing what you like... a lot of people every day eat fast-foods and live happily paying bills at the doctors..." The message is very clear... :roll:
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Yes I agree. My vet is very much of the opinion that 90-95% of their food should be hays and grasses, no nuggets or only a small amount of nuggets and a handful of veg
 
I have cut down considerably on the amount of pellets my piggies have. They are still nice and healthy and their coats are a lot shinier too. They are eating much more hay as a consequence of having less pellets. Purely through ignorance my family of 5 were going through around 2 kgs of pellets every 2-3 weeks now it is more like 5-6 weeks. I give them pellets for breakfast and veg for dinner and hay, hay and more hay during the day. If their food bowls are empty they do not get filled up until the following morning. If they squeak for more pellets they get more hay!
 
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