Sad day - RIP Honey pig

[madoldbat]

Just had horrid time. 17 GPs in shed with infra red lamps outside their hutches attached to wire. Because of fire risk, hay had been restricted. All coming in regularly for a play and to beat up the dog. Honey and her sister Toffee came in on Thursday and business as usual, all fine. Saturday came in, thin, bloated tum, listless, no balance, "stary" coat. Rang vet but she died at the vets two hours later. She was only 3. Vet said it may have been bloat which can be brought on by a lack of fibre - hay.

DD inconsolable thinking she was responsible by not giving them enough hay so I asked the vet to do a mini post mortem. Got the result today which showed she had an ovarian cyst that burst so wasn't our fault.

All v especially Toffee who is now pining

I think of myself as being a fairly knowledgeable gp mummy but I didn't realise how vital hay is. Needless to say, hutches now stuffed full of hay (away from lamps) and will continue to be so.

sorry to hear this

Sorry to hear about your wee guinea pig.

I also know hay is vital, but didn't know about bloat and I have had dozens of piggies in the past. You were trying to protect them. Please do not feel bad.

Aw - I am sorry

Why would you have 17 Guinea Pigs ??

aw how awful i am so sorry RIP Honey

Long story E. Had 8 (enough but not unreasonable) Went to get more food. DD saw mother and daughter on their own at pet stores. Been there a while, no-one going to buy them etc etc. Turns out Ma pig with child again and produced 5 bouncing baby pigs on DDs birthday last year. DD employed suitable emotional blackmail which resulted in them being kept. 2 girls and ma and auntie in one hutch, 3 boys in the other (as sexed by so called expert vet, ha!) Except they weren't and the two boys were obviously gang banging to their hearts content until it became blatently obvious that their sister (euck) was also with child and along came another two, and hey, as it's only two we may as well keep them.

Males now neutered (no entire males in our house )and the shed is completely given over to GPs. We will NOT be getting any more...

"Why would you have 17 Guinea Pigs ??"

Why not?!

So sorry to hear about your poor piglet, what an awful thing to happen. I also didn't know about bloat - I knew they needed to munch constant hay/grass to keep their digestive system moving, but I didn't know that they could get bloat. It's always something I watch out for with the dogs, so now I'll know to keep an eye on the piggy too. Ours eating a tonne of dried grass at the moment. She has a hay rack that hangs on the door, which is quite good. It needs topping up twice a day at the moment, but it stops the grass getting scattered on the floor so there's less waste, and it would maybe pose less of a fire risk with the lamps? Failing that, even an old shoe box filled with some grass or hay would work.

Sorry again

Thanks all, just had burial ceremony. V poignant, especially since DH appears to have done his back digging the hole.