K
KatsCavies
I thought I would post this for everyone. Its from Peter Gurney's site and it explains the process of death in guinea pigs. I know its upsetting when you lose a piggy but after reading this you will feel a bit better knowing that they don't die in pain. It would be nice if this could be made a sticky as its useful information on a subject that every piggy owner is going to experience at some point.
DYING
Of course we all hope that our guinea pigs will die of old age and I look upon this as a natural process rather than an illness, as so many human beings seem to regard it. O.K. so the death is usually caused by renal, respiratory or cardiac failure when the age factor is the cause, which I guess can be regarded as illness. However, since in many cases this is neither a traumatic or particularly painful process, in the main I prefer to let nature take its course.
The symptoms are usually the loss of appetite, sometimes over the course of a few days, at other times overnight. By this time, like in the case of old age in humans, there is loss of body tone, weight and a general frailty. The guinea pig will withdraw from the pack by finding a quiet spot, and usually turning its back on the hurly-burly of pack life by sticking its head in a corner. One of the strange things I have noticed about the act of preparing for death is that the majority seem to always stand on all fours and cease lying down in the resting positions. It’s as though there is a conscious decision to meet death standing up.
I will offer water but never force the guinea pig to drink and not offer food unless it shows an interest when I put the fresh food or dry feed in for the pack as usual. The last thing a guinea pig or any other animal, the human one included, needs when it is in the process of slipping off this mortal coil is someone trying to make it eat.
It can take between one and three days for a guinea pig to die, and though it is important to carefully monitor them during this period, handling is not necessary. The reason you monitor them is because sometimes they may have a Nazareth-like turn around and pick up again by showing interest in what is going on and their demeanour becomes more alert. With these cases you should then certainly treat them in the same way as you would convalescing guinea pigs and syringe feed if necessary. In some of these cases the animal may pick up and have another two to six months of good quality of life to live, and has the right to have that life fought for by its owner.
The approach to the end of a guinea pig’s life may look traumatic and be distressing for the owner but I always urge a hands-off policy, for the animal is not aware of what is going on. The guinea pig will usually be on its side, and a series of what look like electric shocks can go through the body. This is its nervous system doing what hospital defibrillators do when the heart begins to fail. Many also begin to have rapid leg movement, which looks like, and my fanciful mind tells, is it having its last run around in this world before leaving it. The running movement is usually very frantic and seems to upset owners more than the shocks that go through the body and this is when owners want to take it to a vet to have it put down. Many times people have phoned me at this juncture and I have asked them to get a torch and shine it close into the guinea pig’s eyes and told them before they do, just what they will see. The iris remains wide upon to the light, indicating what I have told the owner that the guinea pig is totally unconscious and will die very soon, oblivious to all sensation.
After sixteen years of experiencing this process very many times, I have never known a guinea survive once the ‘running’ before death has occurred.
Kat
DYING
Of course we all hope that our guinea pigs will die of old age and I look upon this as a natural process rather than an illness, as so many human beings seem to regard it. O.K. so the death is usually caused by renal, respiratory or cardiac failure when the age factor is the cause, which I guess can be regarded as illness. However, since in many cases this is neither a traumatic or particularly painful process, in the main I prefer to let nature take its course.
The symptoms are usually the loss of appetite, sometimes over the course of a few days, at other times overnight. By this time, like in the case of old age in humans, there is loss of body tone, weight and a general frailty. The guinea pig will withdraw from the pack by finding a quiet spot, and usually turning its back on the hurly-burly of pack life by sticking its head in a corner. One of the strange things I have noticed about the act of preparing for death is that the majority seem to always stand on all fours and cease lying down in the resting positions. It’s as though there is a conscious decision to meet death standing up.
I will offer water but never force the guinea pig to drink and not offer food unless it shows an interest when I put the fresh food or dry feed in for the pack as usual. The last thing a guinea pig or any other animal, the human one included, needs when it is in the process of slipping off this mortal coil is someone trying to make it eat.
It can take between one and three days for a guinea pig to die, and though it is important to carefully monitor them during this period, handling is not necessary. The reason you monitor them is because sometimes they may have a Nazareth-like turn around and pick up again by showing interest in what is going on and their demeanour becomes more alert. With these cases you should then certainly treat them in the same way as you would convalescing guinea pigs and syringe feed if necessary. In some of these cases the animal may pick up and have another two to six months of good quality of life to live, and has the right to have that life fought for by its owner.
The approach to the end of a guinea pig’s life may look traumatic and be distressing for the owner but I always urge a hands-off policy, for the animal is not aware of what is going on. The guinea pig will usually be on its side, and a series of what look like electric shocks can go through the body. This is its nervous system doing what hospital defibrillators do when the heart begins to fail. Many also begin to have rapid leg movement, which looks like, and my fanciful mind tells, is it having its last run around in this world before leaving it. The running movement is usually very frantic and seems to upset owners more than the shocks that go through the body and this is when owners want to take it to a vet to have it put down. Many times people have phoned me at this juncture and I have asked them to get a torch and shine it close into the guinea pig’s eyes and told them before they do, just what they will see. The iris remains wide upon to the light, indicating what I have told the owner that the guinea pig is totally unconscious and will die very soon, oblivious to all sensation.
After sixteen years of experiencing this process very many times, I have never known a guinea survive once the ‘running’ before death has occurred.
Kat
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