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As mentioned in a previous post Steve has been quite sick for most of this year.

So what happened to Steve?

The poor little man has had a really bad start to the year after getting attacked by another pig. While being on antibiotics to fight the infection his appetite diminished and dropped quite a bit of weight. Before the attack Steve was approx 1100 grams and by the times his wounds were healed he was down to 780 grams.

With the large body weight loss Steve then got pneumonia, he was given a cortisone shot followed by another antibiotic treatment. During this time Steve had moved into our bedroom so we can keep an eye on him and he is being hand fed twice a day with Critical Care.

The lowest Steve got down to was 615 grams and was so skinny and felt so fragile with his bones poking out all over his body. The vet explained to us that our little man would most likely be with us for too much longer, especially as he was also suffering from pneumonia again.

Don’t worry this is a good story and here is my list for the road to recovery for a underwieght Guinea pig:

• A friend, we got Steve a girl to keep him company. It’s important to make sure that the new friend is a good match and does not cause any more stress.
• Vitamin C. Guinea pigs do not produce vitamin C but this does not mean that they don’t need it. I would crush half a daily Vitamin C tablet nice and fine and mix it up with his water each day (this water needs to be replaced with a fresh mix everyday). Also look into foods that are high in Vitamin C, some good choices are parsley, cabbage, green capiscum and broccoli.
• Try different foods until you find foods that your pig really wants to eat. I found for Steve he really liked dried food with dried fruit in it, and for his fresh stuff he loved grapes and corn. But keep trying things until you find something that they just cannot resist eating.
• Buy a good digital scale and weigh your pig daily so you can closely monitor and improvements. It is best to weigh before food in the morning and keep track of the daily weights. It is also a good idea to regularly weigh your healthy pigs as a part of a regular health check.
• Critical Care made by Oxbow, this stuff is Guinea Pig gold. every morning I fix up 2-3 teaspoons with some warm water and make it into a nice thin paste. I have two syringes that I use, a large 60ml one that I fill which is his daily food and a smaller 10ml one that I use for his feeding sessions to squirt the food into his mouth. We have one feed session in the morning and one in the evening but as long as all of the food is eaten it does not matter how many sessions it take you. remember in between feeds to keep the made up food in the fridge and make a new batch everyday and store the bag of Critical care in the freezer.

Steve has been on his Critical care diet for 5 months and it is a slow process but we are currently weighing in at 950 grams and he is back to being a happy little pig.

Information about Critical Care -> Here

This stuff can be hard to find in Australia but if you have any trouble let me know and I might be able to point you in the right direction.