Foul smell in mouth

DarylandMurle · Post » Sat Nov 25, 2017 11:45 am

I had my 4 year old boar (Daryl) to the vets on Thursday as he wasn’t eating, they trimmed his molars at the left as there were sharp spurs which had formed and his mouth/gums was bleeding.

We syringe fed him Friday and gave him painkillers plus a motility medicine. This morning I’ve noticed a foul smell from his mouth, like a sickly smell. What could be causing this?
He’s a bit sleepy, I don’t think he’s come out for food at all overnight or today, the only food he gets is through syringe feeding. I wondered if there was some food left in his mouth last night? We give him water through syringe which he takes well but the syringe feeding (of mushed dual care pellets) is not taken very well, he just does a couple of chews at a time... then when we give water the food in his mouth starts to come out. He’s not chewing the food hardly.

Could he be on too high a dose of metacam he’s on 0.25ml twice daily. And emeprid 0.47ml once a day (motility).

He’s also not passed any stools since yesterday, no bloat or swelling observed or discomfort.
He’s lost 16grams today.

bpatters · Post » Sat Nov 25, 2017 12:01 pm

He's not eating the food because you're not getting it far enough back in his mouth for him to chew and swallow it. You have to get it back to the molars, else he'll just spit it out, as you've discovered. And it's critical that he eats regularly. Guinea pigs continually secrete stomach acid, and if food isn't regularly going through, they can develop painful, even fatal, stomach ulcers as well as bloat. A pig that's not eating anything else needs 100+ cc of Critical Care or pellet slurry for every kilogram it weighs, every day, divided into 6-8 feedings around the clock. Adjust up or down according to his weigh, and down if he's eating any food on his own. See https://www.guinealynx.info/handfeeding.html for some tips on handfeeding.

The odor could be from a mixture of food and medicine, or from infection.

We'd have to know how much he weighs and the strength of the medicines to know if he's getting too much.