Lethals Sudden death of 9 month old skinny pig?? Any ideas

[Simpsonspiggie8]

I fed my 4 guinea pigs veggies at around 9:30 pm and they all seemed happy and fine including my 9 month old skinny pig . She was still perky and fine when I went to bed at 10:30 but at 3 am I had a weird feeling so I got up to check on them and I went to go pet her and she was cold and lifeless I picked her up and her heart still felt like it was beating but by the time I got my stethoscope from the other room there was no heartbeat after death she kept jerking her head up and down and did it for at lease 45 mins after death. I really don't get it the room is at 67 degrees which I really don't think is cold enough to freeze her to death she had a 20 square foot cage furnished with plenty of fleece beds and hideous and tunnels she had no pre existing conditions I was aware of , she was really good friends with her cavy friend there was no scratches on her or cuts on her to indicate a fight and when I found her cavy friend was laying right next to her perfectly fine. There is no blood anywhere in the cage and I really don't understand it . My parents don't want to do a necropsy but I really need answers I really just don't understand how a perfectly happy healthy pig dies in a couple of hours has this happend to anyone else I need some ideas as to what happend I really need closure and also after one dies should I clean the fleece immediately or should I leave it in there for alittle bit to comfort the guinea pig she was living with

 

[bpatters]

She wouldn't have frozen to death at 67 degrees, but it is too cold for a skinny. They have a hard time maintaining their body temperature, and are much comfortable with temps in the mid-70s. Many skinny owners arrange some sort of heat source in or near the cage so they can more easily keep themselves warm. It's possible that she had some underlying condition that wasn't apparent.

I'm very sorry you lost her.

 

[Simpsonspiggie8]

She wouldn't have frozen to death at 67 degrees, but it is too cold for a skinny. They have a hard time maintaining their body temperature, and are much comfortable with temps in the mid-70s. Many skinny owners arrange some sort of heat source in or near the cage so they can more easily keep themselves warm. It's possible that she had some underlying condition that wasn't apparent.

I'm very sorry you lost her.

Thank you) even though the necropsy is going to be 200+ dollars I have decided that I need it to be done just for my own piece of mind since what happend to her was so unexplainable. Btw usually I keep the guinea pig room at around 73-75 but the air conditioner in the room dipped down too low last night and I just wanted to make sure that I didn't kill her by freezing her to death I still just can't beleive a seemingly healthy animal just dropped dead after seeming perfectly happy and healthy a couple of hours earlier((

 

[CupcakeCavy]

I am so sorry for your loss. Please let us know what happened to her when you get the results back. :/

 

[Simpsonspiggie8]

I just talked to my vet and she said that she can't perform a necropsy since the body was frozen. I didn't reali that it should have been refrigerated and. It frozen so I basically just ruined my only chance of. Getting an answer and I will never ever know what happened. I think that that makes her sudden death so much worse since I will never know what caused it

 

[spy9doc]

It is so very human to want to know WHY something like this happened. And sometimes we just have to accept that there is NO answer. It could have been a genetic issue, a heart attack, or any number of pathologies that lead to sudden death.

I certainly understand your need to know because it doesn't make sense otherwise, but a necropsy may have revealed absolutely nothing. Mourn the loss of your little skinny, but do consider her cagemate and how she will deal with it. Cavies don't mourn.......they just know that their cagemate is gone. I'm sure that you have a lot of love to give to a new piggy who needs a loving home and will be a great companion to your now solo piggy.

 

[Simpsonspiggie8]

It is so very human to want to know WHY something like this happened. And sometimes we just have to accept that there is NO answer. It could have been a genetic issue, a heart attack, or any number of pathologies that lead to sudden death.

I certainly understand your need to know because it doesn't make sense otherwise, but a necropsy may have revealed absolutely nothing. Mourn the loss of your little skinny, but do consider her cagemate and how she will deal with it. Cavies don't mourn.......they just know that their cagemate is gone. I'm sure that you have a lot of love to give to a new piggy who needs a loving home and will be a great companion to your now solo piggy.

Yep it sucks but I guess I will just have to just let it go and accept the fact that I will never know the reason. I've decided not to adopt a new piggie but today I have been bonding her cagemate,snowball, to my other pair of females. It is going well for now and I hope it stays that way because snowball has had a rough year she lost her last partner before the skinny pig too. That happend in October. The only reason I actually got the skinny pig was because snowball stopped eating because of grief. Although it seems soon to bond her to other piggies since her cagemate died just yesterday, I decided to try the bonding today since I don't want her to be alone and grieving to the point where she stops eating

 

[spy9doc]

Although it seems soon to bond her to other piggies since her cagemate died just yesterday, I decided to try the bonding today since I don't want her to be alone and grieving to the point where she stops eating

I think that this is a wise decision. As I mentioned earlier, cavies don't mourn as we do, but they certainly do recognize that their cagemate is missing and can get lonely and depressed......and you don't want that to happen. Keep us posted as to how everything is working out.

Sparky & Chip send wheeks of comfort to you and to Snowball.

 

[Simpsonspiggie8]

Thank you the bonding has been going well so far in the beginning there were acouple of scuffles but no blood drawn so I didn't separate. After snowballs first partner died in October I tried bonding her to the same pair but it failed so I was very nervous to try again . but now they have moved on to just some mounting. One of the other pigs is very dominant and so is snowball but they seem to be working it out. I even just caught snowball grooming the less dominant guinea pigs ears

 

[pigmommy89]

I'm so sorry you lost your piggy. It's always hard to lose one and not know the reason, especially when they're so young. This spring I was fostering three baby pigs for a lady that does rescue here in town. I picked them up when they were three weeks old, and they seemed perfectly healthy. They were from a litter of 5, but the other two were adopted already. Anyway, I put the baby girl in with my girls, and the boys had their own cage. I went in to feed them one night and one of the boys was dead, and the next night the girl died. They were about 4 months old. Then a month later the other boy died. There was nothing obviously wrong with any of them, and my other pigs have been fine, so I assume they had a genetic defect of some sort. I wish I knew the people who adopted the other two so I could find out how they're doing. '

 

[Shieme]

You didn't kill your piggie! Although she would have been cold, the timing isn't enough to freeze her. Sounds like her brain or stroke. The jerks afterwards was her heart stopping and the brain seized. Yes the cold didn't help but she would have passed anyway. You gave her a great life! I had a dog that did what you described. She laid down and when her body temp dropped she seized up. Katie was part coyote and the last of her litter that lived to three. Her litter mates died before one.

Sorry this just reminds me of Katie and I felt something wrong the day she died. I was at work and Katie was happy. It looked to me like she didn't want me to leave that day and I hugged her. Told her I was going o take her for her run after work or a car ride. My mom called me and described what you just said.

 

[Simpsonspiggie8]

Yep I'm assuming it was bad genetics. I got her from some random person on Craigslist so she might have been inbred or just otherwise genetically unsound. I'm starting to come to terms with the sudden and unexplained nature of her death..I just hope that for her sake she went peacefully and quickly and not a painful long drawn out death