What fruit n veggies can guinea pigs eat?

[Alambil]

are there any no-no's?

They've got apple and cucumber tonight...

Apparently, they shouldn't have potato or crisps. According to Charlie & Lola anyway. No reason to suspect they're wrong!

I've heard that celery should be cut up so there are no long strings, but pretty much everyuthign else is ok.

My Gps love Romaine lettuce, cabbage, celery, carrot,apple, melon,cucumber, green beans, and in the summer dandelion leaves are their absolute faves!

No potatoes, no rhubarb leaves and no avocado apparently - I hadn't heard the latter until a thread on here a few weeks ago.

Mine likes lettuce, curly kale, carrots, apple in limited quantities, banana (tiny portions very occasionally because too soft for his teeth),fresh basil (did I say that he is a little spoilt?), melon with the rind on, dandelion but not broccoli, parsnip or cucumber! And, of course, he eats hay and Timothy grass by the bushelful!

IME, all guinea pigs like slightly different things so you need to experiment a little. Also, the previous GP we had had food fads (no other way to describe it) - he would eat broccoli, then go off broccoli, then after a few months back on the broccoli again, ditto with carrots....

No potatoes, no onion, no mushrooms and not iceberg lettuce (all other lettuce is ok)

Iceberg lettuce isn't good for them, rhubarb is poisonous and fruits should only be given in moderation because of their high sugar content. Our GP and rabbits get some baby spinach and carrots every day, with cucumber and the odd bit of apple in the summer. Cucumber is the GP's favourite, she'd happily eat one whole if you let her! They get curly kale if there's no spinach, but they don't seem to enjoy it as much. They also enjoy dried raisins too.

Isn't it funny how their tastes differ? Mine will eat curly kale by the handful but won't touch cucumber!

here

Well you learn something new every day!

We've just taken our GP to the vet to get treated for ear mites (caught them from the rabbit, no idea where he got them!) and I asked what greens she should be eating. Shockingly, the vet said that spinach, brocolli and curly kale were all no-no's! Apparently they can cause bladder stones, and spinach is particularly bad. I was a bit shocked, seen as ours has been eating it daily for the last four years! She said even a small amount every week can kill them, and asked us to stop giving it to her. Although she did say after four years, we'd know by now if it was causing a problem. So I think I'll just stick with it - I think if I took her spinach away, she'd drop dead on the spot in protest!

I've never seen spinach or curly kale on the bad list, so I'm really suprised. She said cauliflower leaves and cabbage were fine - whereas I'd always read that you should never feed these, because they can cause bloat!

mites come from the hay you use we had to stop buying it straight from farm and buying dust extracted hay instead as less chance of getting mites from it

mine love spinach too lol

heck - mine have also eaten white cabbage, kale and cauli for about 3 years and love it - i do give lettuce in moderation as i had read can give the trots.

Mine have had the occasional iceberg leal.

And we were told no apples.

Bubblagirl we get all our bedding from PAH in shrink wrapped dust-extracted bales, and they're stored like that in the warehouse for weeks or even months before they hit the shelves. The vet says the mites can only survive for up to 3 weeks in the environment (less in winter), so we're really puzzled how he's got them - anything in the bedding should have been long dead. We don't have any wild rabbits around here either, so it's a mystery

We emptied out their hutch and run on sunday and sprayed it with mite killer and growth regulator to kill the eggs, and will keep doing it every week until we're sure they've gone. Luckily we lined their hutch with perspex when it was built, so there's no chance of them burrowing in and infesting the wood. Such a pain to get rid of!

Ours live on broccoli in the winter! Leaves as much as heads though. They also like scraps such as cooked potato skins and cooked pasta in small quantities and, strangely, banana skins. But they won't touch bramble leaves, which the rabbit used to love. Pity - they are so succulent and soft in the spring and so easy to find.

Ours love parsley - which is good because parsley is practically the only thing we car grow!

I think Parsley also has very high levels of calcium and can cause bladder stones . Ours love it too, but I am rationing it now to twice a week .The website Rodents with Attitude is useful and has lists of which foods they can eat freely and which should be limited.

Eeeek! I'll go and look, thanks!

Mine love celery! they practically snatch it out of my hand!

As far as I know you should limit fruit as the acid can make their bums sore.

Onions and iceberg lettuce is also a no no.