Can Guineas be too fat?

[Ollycat]

We have two female Guineas (2.5 years old) and they're really quite podgy and I'm wondering if they are perhaps too podgy!

They live outside in a massive hutch with permanent access to an equally massive run so are hardly cooped up. They get fresh food (cabbage, cauliflower and the like), pellets, hay and obviously grass.

They're very active and can happily jump over the ridge to get from one part of the run to the other.

The reason I ask is we recently looked after some male Guineas and my girls were considerably larger both in length and girth!

Can guineas be too podgy? I asked my 3 hogs, their reply (through mouthfuls of grass ) was unprintable

Are your piggies Smooth coats?
IME the smooths do tend to run to fat (they claim they are the original and 'proper' cavies and all these Abbys,long haired, Skinnies and Rexes are just fakes)

They can get fat on veg -things like carrots parsnip beetroot are high in sugar.
They can also at 2.5yo get various lumps and bumps and are more prone to cysts and tumours (you'd only know by a scan really)

I had two middle aged smooths until early this year , one of them was a rounded squash shape, she had blood in her pee (vet appointments, antibiotics) it seemed to clear then re-occured. She never squealed when she peed , but looking back , I noticed one side seemed to deflate , so I'm wondering if she did have a cyst that 'popped' ?

At this time of year our hogs are grazing all day , grass can make little ponies very fat too . We cut ther fresh veg from twice a day to once , but give them unlimted hay , bowl of pellets, water at night .

The boars were probably just more rangey .
My DD has a Teddy who is slim, she had a Rex who was huge (solid muscle) both boars.
She has a long slender long haired........................and I have my tricolour smooth who has settled into middleage with a bit of a tum .

Looking at them I would say that they are Abby x smooth haired. One is much more rosette-y then tge other (she looks the fatter of the two).

They certainly are very happy squeaky pigs

Have you weighed them?

RandomMess now that's far too sensible idea which hadn't occurred to me - feel somewhat silly now

my childhood piggies were subject to ridiculous levels of weighing in, birthday cakes, self carrot selection, run of our house and cuddles!!

YY to weigh every week , my DH has a Spreadsheet online and a graph to chart them.

He says "Oh she's lost weight" and when I look , its 30g (which is an ounce and a bit^ ) they do waver a bit , but if its over a couple of ounces you need to monitor , if its over 4pz (100g) you need to investigate.
My little Abby boar loved root veg to fatten him in winter and cutted up fruit .

And you can gauge but handling them how well covered they are.
We have Summer Coat/Sleeker Bodies at the moment then suddenly the coats get thicker and they lay down their winter fat.
Because we starve them, obvs.
And they keep thinking about hibernating (but only for a couple of hours)

Well I've weighed them:

GP1 1200g
GP2 1420g

So the upper end of OK as far as I can work out - they are both v long - much longer then the male guest piggies we had staying.

Do you think their weight is ok? I will monitor weekly now.

They're perfectly respectable weights as far as my pigs are concerned. I weigh mine monthly and keep track - it does vary a bit but not too dramatically. All my pigs have been of the 'you can never be too hefty or have too many chins' philosophy.

It depends a lot on their shape - as you say your sows are long bodied.
If they are active, happy and eating/poohing keep weighing and monitoring.

My little Himmy girl varied from 1000g to 1066g (Battle of Hastings ) she was much smaller than her cagemates
GP3 was a Rex , he was 1.4kg of solid pig.

GP4/GP5 were ex breeders, GP7/GP8 have not had piglets.

Both our boys are around that weight.

According to my two, Guinea pig girls should plump and round. More Marilyn than Kate Moss 🐹
At the moment they are, they claim, 'bulking up in case of a really severe winter' as of course the EastMids has the potential to be cut off by snow drifts for months. currently they are eating the lush grass like there is no tomorrow (you never know when the next fresh veg delivery will get through)

Millie has an unusual pear shape but she is all water retention. Seriously she is a furry water bomb, has been since we got her as a rescue 4 years ago. She is an old lady pig of 6.5 years and wobbles

Our girls know I'm a soft touch and that if they shout at me I'll go and pick them dandelions (their favourite thing in the world) - we live in the countryside and have a plentiful supply.

I'm slightly worried that having got them for dd I have now committed us to a lifetime of Guinea ownership. Even dh is fond of them and accepting of the fact that his lawn will never be the same again!

Guineas as just so adorable, perhaps when the moggies and dog have deceased... I am allergic to hay though

Ollycat
DH was 'no, no, no we are not having guinea pigs' .. 'and I mean no!'

Mmmmmm I wobder who:
Sings to the girls when he is cleaning them out

Reads to them when sitting out in the garden

'discusses' cricket and football with them (the 3 of then watch Sky Sports together)

Greats Sadie with 'morning sweetheart, how are we today?'

Grows seedtrays full if parsley and fresh grass for days when they cannot play out

I could go on .. I am definitely low in the pecking order here

Have you ever been chirped at?

It is a weird sound, like a bird singing .
I have no idea why they do it, but the pigs I had as a child did the singing at 2am. Both singers were Mum Pigs (one was very pg which scared us)

We heard nothing from them until early this year when GP5 was ill (i had been at my parents and they have a very annoying BirdSong clock. Travelled back home overnight so knackered ) so when I was back home I heard a Chirping and thought it was the bloody clock...... but I was home. No idea who sang but it was the day I had to take GP5 to be PTS , we wonder if it was her Last Song?

About a month ago, GP6 (our boar) stood in the run singing at the top of his voice
No idea why. Nothing scared him, he's not ill. (and not a MumPig either)

Never had a singing pig 😞
These days Mollie shouts at us for attention - I wonder if she's going deaf in her old age!
Sadie doesn't give me the time of day if DH is about, steadfastly continues to ignore her name if I call her and generally acts as if I do not exist.
I have never before had a piggie solely and totally devoted to one person. She reacts to hearing his car door close and calls out when he walks through the door, squeaking with delight when he speaks to her.
She tolerates me giving her a cuddle but if off away from me as soon as she can, which has me 😂😂 at her antics.

We had a just under 2kg pig and the vet said he was a normal weight and looked like a piggy should, we thought he was overweight.

I want a singing pig!!! Mine just shout - loudly!!

Mine made all sorts of noises! Always waiting for dad as they knew the sound of the garage door!

I weighed my three yesterday:

B is now 407g, a 17.6% increase over 2 weeks (now 10 wks old)
F is now 383g, a 17.8% increase over the same time
H, a 4 yp ex breeder, is 1.33kg, and thinks she would be a lot more if the other two hadn't eaten so much food! (I mean, if you add the amount of poos the wee ones managed plus the 120g they've put on between them, thats a LOT of extra food that could have gone into her tummy!!!)

H says she is definitely not large, and, in fact, she is close to starvation, so is careful to do as little exercise as possible in order to preserve reserves. This does NOT equate to her being lazy, as I'm far too fond of saying!