What and how much should I feed my guinea pigs?

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Megamon

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Hi everyone. I've been wondering what and how much I should feed my two guinea pigs (both of them are only a few months old). Right now they're getting 5-6 leaves of cabbage every day, half of a small sized cucumber, a handful of pellets and they have hay and water available 24/7. Is this enough? Should I give them more or less? I don't want to overfeed them nor feed them too little. Thank you!
 
There are some excellent feeding guides on the forum but less cabbage (it is high calcium but can also cause tummy bloat) and a greater variety of veg might be better. Have you tried red peppers or beansprouts? These are high vit C and low calcium and can be fed several times a week, many people including myself feed a slice of pepper daily. Coriander (cilantro) is also very good. Small amounts of root veg like carrots or beetroot once or twice a week. Cabbage should be a once or twice a week food and probably only 1 leaf per pig. Check out the forum guides though they are very helpful!
 
They should have mostly hay, 85/90% of their diet should be hay.
They should then have one cup measure of veg per pig per day and one tablespoon of pellets per pig per day.
Also, you shouldn’t feed cabbage daily as it can cause bloat. If you do give them cabbage it should only be a small amount. 5-6 leaves of cabbage and lettuce is too much. .Lettuce doesn’t contain many nutrients and is mostly water - one leaf a day would be enough.
On a daily basis my piggies get: fresh hay which I top up four times a day. Two tablespoons of pellets (one tablespoon each). For veg, they then get a half an inch of cucumber, a few sprigs of coriander, a few slices of bell pepper. I then rotate in some other veggies such as one green bean, one baby corn, an inch strip of spring greens, other herbs such as dill, a thin slice of courgette (if they will eat it which often they don’t!), a small piece of celery
There are some fantastic guides on here which show a sample daily veg serving. I can’t link it, but you will find it in the long term diet thread if you search for that,
 
PigglePuggle said:
There are some excellent feeding guides on the forum but less cabbage (it is high calcium but can also cause tummy bloat) and a greater variety of veg might be better. Have you tried red peppers or beansprouts? These are high vit C and low calcium and can be fed several times a week, many people including myself feed a slice of pepper daily. Coriander (cilantro) is also very good. Small amounts of root veg like carrots or beetroot once or twice a week. Cabbage should be a once or twice a week food and probably only 1 leaf per pig. Check out the forum guides though they are very helpful!
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Thank you so much, this is really helpful! But I meant to say lettuce, not cabbage. Is that still the case?
 
Depends what sort of lettuce, they cant have iceberg... but lettuce isnt very rich in nutrients and neither is cucumber they are both quite watery, maybe go with 1 or 2 lettuce leaves a day and introduce new veg with more vit C.
 
So I decided, after looking at the food list on this forum, to give my guinea pigs 1 leaf of green lettuce, 2 slices of pepper and 3 slices of cucumber daily and 2 slices of celery root every few days, 2 slices of carrot every week, 2 slices of apple every 3-4 days and 2 leaves of red cabbage every few days. What do you guys think?
 
You could add in some herbs as well. Parsley is an occasional food but dill is fine.
Mine will go through a packet of dill within seconds.
 
That sounds good. It is a good idea to rotate in a good variety of veg regularly. Don’t forget that lettuce and cucumber don’t contain much nutrition and are mostly water so on a daily basis they will only really be getting their vit c from the pepper so adding in other vit c rich veggies is a good idea, such as coriander. apples and carrots contain quite a lot of sugar so don’t feed them too often. They can have them but just keep an eye on the frequency. I personally choose to never give my two piggies fruit and they tend to only get carrot once a fortnight. I am a bit mean when it comes to those kinds of things though!
 
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