4 year old female is squeaking when urinating

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bpatters
And got the T-shirt

Post   » Fri May 04, 2018 10:30 am


I personally would NOT recommend using Sherwood, especially for a stone pig. They're alfalfa based, and higher in calcium than either Oxbow or KMS Hayloft.

There's lots of anecdotal buzz about Sherwood, but no scientific studies, and I'm not particularly impressed with what I see about the founder of them. He makes lots of assertions but without much data to back them up.

kailaeve1271

Post   » Fri May 04, 2018 10:42 am


I’ve had pigs with lots of sludge and when they’ve been x rayed nothing was seen. We have very little calcium deposits now and they all feel very fine. I think it really is up to what the owner decides. Yeah the alfalfa is questionable, but there have been many people including myself who have seen positive things. I haven’t heard of any negative results yet

Like I said it’s up to the owner if they want to test/risk it with their pig.

duskern

Post   » Fri May 04, 2018 11:44 am


Does anyone care to comment on this:

I think my girl Abigail might have a bladder stone, so I'd like to take that into account, and start to change the diet accordingly. There's no harm in doing that for the others, even though they probably don't have stones, right?

I would really like to do what's best for Abigail, and hopefully what's best for her is also fine for the other two. What would you recommend? No pellets? Any specific vegetables to give or avoid?

Changes in diet is something that should come slowly if I remember correctly.

kailaeve1271

Post   » Fri May 04, 2018 12:28 pm


I’m going to have no comment as far as pellets are concerned. Everyone knows where I stand and if you’d like to see what Sherwood pellets do for pigs there is a forum on it. No need for arguing over personal opinions :) I respect everyone and if you prefer other brands over what I like than I fully support those on that

Now if you don’t want to do that brand I’ve let my pigs have oxbow in very small amounts. It’s not necessarily known to cause stones and is lower in calcium than most pellets! I loved them when I was one them but I switched because it didn’t work with my piggies personal health.

I also recommend a low calcium diet when it comes to veggies. My pigs are on one: leaf lettuce, cucumber, bell pepper and cherry tomato. There are many other variations of this too that you could probably find on this forum. I based mine off of the one on the guinealynx diet page that was listed earlier.

Some people have decided to switch to no pellets. You’d have to make up the nutrients they lose from this. I personally have never done it so I hope someone who has more experience with that will comment for you.

Both oxbow and Sherwood have urinary tablets that may help with calcium as well. I don’t know if any other brands but I’m sure there is more.

You are correct, most switches should be done slowly :)

If one of your pigs is having problems it may be genetics but it may also be the diet. I would think about switching all your pigs especially if you see them showing signs of problems

Phantomhorse

Post   » Fri May 04, 2018 2:46 pm


I have to agree with Bpatters on Sherwood Pellets - we tried it for a little bit and my boys developed grit in their pee (never have had that issue with them). After I switched to KMS Hayloft, they returned to normal.

However, I can speak highly about their tablets. I have used various tablets over the years for different purposes, and I've never had a problem with them. Maybe you could show the ingredients/nutrition label to your vet and see if they approve of trying it for her?

duskern

Post   » Wed May 16, 2018 9:37 am


So totally unrelated we had one of our other girls, Nellie, get sick the other day. Had her to the vet, and it turns out she had a broken front tooth as well as an infection. She had to have surgery to have it removed. Everything went ok, and shes home now and slowly starting to eat again. It's always so nail biting to get them to eat again after something like that and with the current heat in Denmark, 25 degrees celsius, it's not really helping /: But I do have a question. For good measure I gave her some Critical Care and FibrePlex after she came home, just to get things going. But then I started to think about if my supply of those products was still good to use. We store the Critical Care in the freezer, but I think it's more than a year old, so I went to get some new. At the same time I got some new FibrePlex, as that had been sitting a closet in the kitchen for a year as well.

Does anyone know how long you can store stuff like that after opening them? And how should you store them for them to remain good to use?

bpatters
And got the T-shirt

Post   » Wed May 16, 2018 10:09 am


They're not going to magically go bad when they hit their expiration date. Some of the ingredients in them will gradually lose potency, some more quickly than others.

I store Critical Care in the refrigerator, and have used it up to two years old with no ill effects.

duskern

Post   » Fri May 18, 2018 8:56 am


Thank you. I store CC in the freezer. I'm more concerned about FibrePlex. Not really sure how to store it.

duskern

Post   » Fri May 25, 2018 5:33 am


Now we finally had the time to take Abigail to the vet for a check. They did an x-ray to see the development of her stone. It is located somewhere after the bladder in the urinary tract and has grown a little bit over the year. The location is a bit unfortunate, since doing an operation to remove it is really dangerous. So knowing that, I think the only real option is to do something else. I would like some advice regarding this. Is there some form of medication or diet we can try? What can we do?

I promised to vet to gather some information from this forum to pass along to her. She told me that treatments for guinea pigs isn't as sophisticated in Denmark as it is in other countries, like the UK for instance, so all relevant information regarding medication and such is welcome!

I guess we should get a better diet, taking into account that we have a pig with a stone.

User avatar
Lynx
Celebrate!!!

Post   » Fri May 25, 2018 9:27 am


Do you have an image of the xray that you could post? I think it very unusual that the stone is in the urethra and has been growing there. Perhaps it may be embedded in the wall? If not, sometimes vets can flush the urethra and push the stone back into the bladder but this would be difficult if it was stuck there.

Read also www.guinealynx.info/stones.html and note a couple of products that may help, like shilintong.
www.guinealynx.info/stones.html#supplements

bpatters
And got the T-shirt

Post   » Fri May 25, 2018 10:28 am


After the bladder is in the urethra, and is a very odd place for a stone to be stuck. If that's truly the case, I wonder if the vet might be able to catheterize her and push the stone back into the bladder. A sow's urethra is very short, and if they can find a small enough catheter, it might work.

duskern

Post   » Sat May 26, 2018 2:36 pm


These are two photos we took at the vet. The first one is one year old and the second one is from yesterday. The stones are visible as a white blob in the right side of the pictures, just a couple of centimeters above her legs. If you guys are uncertain about where to look, I can make some new pictures pointing out the spots, but I think they are fairly easy to see. Regarding the flushing and such, I think they might have tried that, but I would have to contact the vet to get a confirmation. The case with Abigail have been going on for a couple of years on/off. She has been at good health the whole time luckily.

I have build up some courage, to try to see if I can figure out a way to help her more with this problem. Various kinds of hardship in my life have been a hindrance for this over the last couple of years, but I now hope to figure something out!

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