Intro and questions
Hi! Although this is my first post, I've long been a reader of these forums, and your collective wisdom helped me provide good care to my most recent sow, who lived to the ripe old age of 7.5 years. After losing her, I adopted a baby boar from a rescue at 3 weeks old, when he had to be separated from his mom and sister. Pumbaa is beautiful and healthy and growing like a weed...but he's getting so big so quickly that I'm concerned. He will be 3 months old on Feb 20th, and this morning he weighed in at 760 grams! I've checked the archives and articles here about weight, and that's higher than the biggest male pig on the chart I saw here. I've always had sows before, so I know that a bigger male is likely to seem huge to me, but...
Pumbaa gets unlimited Oxbow Essentials Young Guinea Pig food and unlimited Oxbow Alfalfa hay, as well as bell pepper chunks and various greens daily, with the occasional apple slice or baby carrot as an extra treat. He popcorns and makes zoomies in his cage frequently, and he gets 45 min. to an hour of floor time most days. My plan for the near future is to spring for a cage that's big enough for 2 and adopt him a friend.
Thoughts on whether I should be scaling back on any of his food? Thanks in advance.
Pumbaa gets unlimited Oxbow Essentials Young Guinea Pig food and unlimited Oxbow Alfalfa hay, as well as bell pepper chunks and various greens daily, with the occasional apple slice or baby carrot as an extra treat. He popcorns and makes zoomies in his cage frequently, and he gets 45 min. to an hour of floor time most days. My plan for the near future is to spring for a cage that's big enough for 2 and adopt him a friend.
Thoughts on whether I should be scaling back on any of his food? Thanks in advance.
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- And got the T-shirt
No, don't scale back. A lot of those charts and scales are based on lab animals, not pets, and I'd like to see most, if not all, of them redacted!
It's VERY hard for a guinea pig to be overweight, not least because they're herbivores. Usually the ones that are overweight are fed unlimited pellets as adults, or have some sort of mobility problems. I've only ever had one guinea pig that was less than three pounds as a adult, and none of them were overweight.
It's VERY hard for a guinea pig to be overweight, not least because they're herbivores. Usually the ones that are overweight are fed unlimited pellets as adults, or have some sort of mobility problems. I've only ever had one guinea pig that was less than three pounds as a adult, and none of them were overweight.
Our biggest girl Chunkita was 990g at the point we started weighing her, which was about 3 months after we got her. We were told she was 3 months old whe we got her so she would have been about 6 months then.
Nala, the next biggest, was 675g at the age of about 4-5 months.
Not that I am any sort of expert but given that Boars are heavier than Sows that doesn't look too excessive to me but those with more knowledge than me will be able to give you better info.
For what it is worth Chunkita was up to 1186g at one point but since we have been letting them out to run more (all day pretty much) she has dropped to 1136g. So more exercise/run time may help.
Nala, the next biggest, was 675g at the age of about 4-5 months.
Not that I am any sort of expert but given that Boars are heavier than Sows that doesn't look too excessive to me but those with more knowledge than me will be able to give you better info.
For what it is worth Chunkita was up to 1186g at one point but since we have been letting them out to run more (all day pretty much) she has dropped to 1136g. So more exercise/run time may help.
- Sef
- I dissent.
Just my $.02. I don't think that's fat, but I have never fed unlimited pellets (all of ours have been males over the years), even for our younger guys. Most of their diet is hay, with roughly 1/8 cup of pellets twice a day and maybe 1/2 cup of veggies twice a day. I also wouldn't feed alfalfa hay exclusively. It's good for baby guinea pigs, but around 3 months old I start introducing timothy.