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Post by teemu on Sept 21, 2022 16:51:46 GMT
Thank you for the input. How much calcium should there generally be in the diet? It's twice the phosphorus, but I mean the actual amount, in rough terms. I'm trying to gauge how much I should be giving them, in general.
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Post by moletteuk on Sept 22, 2022 9:17:05 GMT
Calcium is supposed to be 1 to 1.2% of total diet. If you start seeing them peeing a lot out and leaving white dried up puddles then it can be time to reduce it a bit.
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Post by teemu on Sept 22, 2022 13:29:58 GMT
Strangely, that still seems to happen quite often. Their pee leaves white stains behind. I wonder where the calcium is coming from? Their pellets don't have an ingredients list on them (the pet store gets them in bulk and then portions them out to smaller plastic bags sold by weight), so I'll ask them for the list next time I visit. Might be that the pellets actually have calcium added.
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Post by moletteuk on Sept 22, 2022 15:04:59 GMT
They should have calcium added as the grains and types of vegetable matter in them wouldn't have anywhere near enough the right amount. I think there is probably a lot about calcium absorbtion that we/I don't understand. Lots if things interact with calcium in the body, eg oxalic acids.
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Post by teemu on Sept 22, 2022 16:03:05 GMT
Yeah, I'll find out what is in the pellets the next time I go to the pet store. I'll also ask them about a vitamin d supplement (they actually have a person who's starting to breed degus now and seems to know a lot, so she probably has some input).
Posso is doing really well today, as well. I have not given her the metacam today since she's been avoiding me all day (she really did not enjoy me grabbing her and forcing her to eat the stuff earlier), but also because she really, really does not look like she needs any. I'm sure her mouth is a bit sore, but for the most part she looks like she's gotten such a relief from mouth pain. She's eating all the time, gnawing things constantly... if she's feeling any real pain, she's certainly not acting like it. At the moment she's absolutely mangling that carabiner clip I stuck to the cage bars. It's fairly amazing how perky she is now, obviously this gave her a lot of relief.
Unless she starts to look down, I'll just let her be and eat in peace. It's likely less stressful than chasing her down and forcing her to take the metacam.
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Post by deguconvert on Sept 23, 2022 17:44:27 GMT
GREAT NEWS, Teemu! I'm so glad to hear how well she has bounced back!! WOO HOO!
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Post by teemu on Sept 23, 2022 19:05:18 GMT
Her weight is up to 220g now, and she' a totally different degu again. Full of energy and sass. You can't always notice it when there's something wrong with them, but it's amazing how clear the difference is after they're alright again
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Post by teemu on Dec 2, 2023 18:57:09 GMT
Well, after a long while, it's becoming an issue with Pipari again. Now that she is together with Pulla, who has the problem of being on the skinny side and not being as interested in food as he should be (he does eat, and he's been better about it lately), the free access to pellets again has really, really started to show. She's clearly overweight at this point, and I really don't know how to address this...
I can't take the food away, since doing that will make Pulla even less likely to eat properly. With Limppu and Suti, I am able to simply take Limppu out of the cage and give Suti more food, but I seriously doubt that would work for Pulla. So Pipari is also stuffing herself with the freely available pellets. I've cut basically all treats from her now (she gets some forage and like... 2-4 sunflower seeds in the evening), but she really just keeps stuffing the pellets in her and stashing extra in various places. It's actually sometimes hard to make sure Pulla is getting enough since she is totally brazen about stealing his food if the mood strikes her.
Not sure how I should proceed with this. I'm trying to give her more exercise outside the cage, but so far it hasn't really helped...
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Post by teemu on Dec 7, 2023 14:34:51 GMT
Okay, after some trialing it seems like Pulla is actually fine with just eating outside the cage. It seems like he has gotten more energy and appetite now anyway. I don't think it's even the painkillers, since he has been on them for a good while, and seems to just have perked up during this month. No idea why, but it's great news. For now, I'll be offering him food multiple times a day (basically I'll try to make sure he can eat any time he feels like it), and Pipari will be on a diet regimen for now.
I'm actually not totally sure whether she even minds. It's been two days now, and she seems to have just shrugged and gone to eating more hay instead. Which is good of course, hay will be much less fattening than eating pellets all the time.
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Post by moletteuk on Dec 7, 2023 16:19:16 GMT
I'm glad you've figured out a routine that is working
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