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How Much? Too much romaine lettuce?

relay400

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So we recently found that it's okay to feed romaine lettuce to guinea pigs, so we started feeding that. Our two male guinea pigs ate it - and they eat it fast. We give them quite a lot, and they don't seem to stop eating. However, we're having to refill our hay rack less and less often and the water bottle is pretty much full every day, so I'm dumping out a whole bottle of water every day to refill it. This is probably because of the water content in the lettuce, but I just want to make sure. Also, they're no longer eating baby carrots like they used to - they just poke it around rather than gobble it up, and carrot leaves get trampled around. Should I cut back on the lettuce? Should the diet be more hay or more fresh vegetables? Not sure how much we give them every day, but between the two it's about half a bunch of lettuce per day, which is approximately 100-150g. We like to feed them whenever they come up to the side of the cage and ask for it.

The pigs are about 6 months old, about 18oz in weight each.

On both weekends, we set them out on the lawn in the playpen so they can eat the grass (no pesticides or nasty chemicals), is that good? Or should we leave out alternative food choices for them?

Overall, should we find more veggies to put in the cage or is romaine lettuce a good staple?
 

Soecara

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First things first, hay is by far the most important part of their diet and should make up at least 90% of everything they eat in a day. If you over feed vegetables they will eat less hay which is a very bad thing that can lead to health issues such as overgrown teeth.

Guinea pigs should get 1/8 cup of high quality pellets per guinea pig per day, the brands we recommend are Oxbow or KMS. For vegetables they should get 1 cup per guinea pig per day, in this 1 cup there needs to be a source of vitamin C that is also low in calcium, the best vegetable for this is 1/4 to 1/8 of a medium to large bell pepper/capsicum per guinea pig.

Romaine lettuce should be fed with caution, some guinea pigs for some unknown reason will have issues with calcium in their urine when fed it, this doesn't affect all guinea pigs and we don't understand why this happens but if it does you should stop feeding romaine lettuce. How much you are currently feeding though is definitely too much and you should drastically reduce it and add in some other vegetables.

Some good vegetables for daily feeding are bell peppers/capsicums, zucchini (1-2 inch chunk per guinea pig), 1-2 cherry tomatoes (or equivalent sized slice of a larger tomato per guinea pig), a limited amount of carrot (a 1inch chunk of a large carrot is a good amount per guinea pig), red leaf/green leaf/butter head lettuce (1-3 leaves depending on size per guinea pig), and radicchio (1-3 leaves depending on size per guinea pig). There are other vegetables that can also be fed less frequently but generally it is easier to feed the same range of vegetables every day, for what vegetables can be fed less frequently check out this chart https://www.guineapigcages.com/foru...vy-Nutrition-Charts-amp-Poisonous-Plants-List

Personally I currently feed my guinea pigs bell peppers/capsicums, 2 types of lettuce or 1 type of lettuce and radicchio, zucchini, and 2 "other" vegetables daily. More often than not those two other vegetables are carrot and tomato but I will sometimes switch one or both out for some other vegetables I have on hand that they can only have occasionally.
 

maggiee

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I am curious why Romaine causes calcium issues? In the chart here, it lists the calcium content of romaine and red leaf at 33. But is red leaf better for calcium? I noticed some chalky urine after beginning to feed romaine daily and am looking for a better daily green to feed.
 

bpatters

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It has nothing to do with the amount of calcium in the lettuce -- romaine has no more calcium than most of the other common lettuces.

But some pigs, for some unknown reason, will excrete excess urinary calcium when being fed romaine (sometimes cilantro, too). Nobody knows why, and some pigs are not bothered. But for safety's sake, if you've got one of those pigs that does, it's better to feed red or green leaf lettuce.
 

maggiee

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Thanks for the explanation!
 

Soecara

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We really have no idea why Romaine can cause calcium issues. It is no higher in calcium then other lettuces, and it doesn't happen to all guinea pigs, but some guinea pigs will have calcium issues in their urine when fed Romaine and stopping the Romaine stops the issues.

This doesn't happen with loose leaf lettuces (Red leaf, green leaf, oak leaf, Lollo, etc.), butter head lettuces (Boston, Bibb, Butter, etc.), so all are perfectly good alternatives to Romaine lettuce (also don't feed Iceberg lettuce).
 

Gandalf

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So we recently found that it's okay to feed romaine lettuce to guinea pigs, so we started feeding that. Our two male guinea pigs ate it - and they eat it fast. We give them quite a lot, and they don't seem to stop eating. However, we're having to refill our hay rack less and less often and the water bottle is pretty much full every day, so I'm dumping out a whole bottle of water every day to refill it. This is probably because of the water content in the lettuce, but I just want to make sure. Also, they're no longer eating baby carrots like they used to - they just poke it around rather than gobble it up, and carrot leaves get trampled around. Should I cut back on the lettuce? Should the diet be more hay or more fresh vegetables? Not sure how much we give them every day, but between the two it's about half a bunch of lettuce per day, which is approximately 100-150g. We like to feed them whenever they come up to the side of the cage and ask for it.

The pigs are about 6 months old, about 18oz in weight each.

On both weekends, we set them out on the lawn in the playpen so they can eat the grass (no pesticides or nasty chemicals), is that good? Or should we leave out alternative food choices for them?

Overall, should we find more veggies to put in the cage or is romaine lettuce a good staple?

Have you seen the chart on this forum showing what and how much of various types of greens and veggies to feed a guinea pig? Here is the link:
https://www.guineapigcages.com/foru...vy-Nutrition-Charts-amp-Poisonous-Plants-List

It should help answer some of your questions.

What others are saying about romaine lettuce, I know is also true in feeding rabbits. Rabbits have the same potential issue with romaine but are typically fine with the other dark leafy lettuces. Most can eat it without issue -- especially if it isn't fed daily in large quantities.
 

relay400

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Yes, I have seen the chart. However, I saw the 100gram measurements, and I'm not able to fit 100g of lettuce into a cup, much less make space for other vegetables.
 

bpatters

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The chart isn't recommending that you feed 100 grams of lettuce, it's telling you how many of the vitamins/minerals are in 100 grams. If you're feeding 50 g of lettuce, cut the vitamins/mineral amounts in half. If 25 grams, cut in one-fourth. Rinse and repeat.
 

relay400

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Okay, cool.

UPDATE: So I've been feeding them 1cup/day for 4 days now. I just noticed today that they were eating the wood bedding. Should I be concerned?
 

bpatters

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Absolutely you should be concerned.

What kind of wood bedding? And are they actually eating it, or just tasting it and moving on?
 

relay400

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It's aspen wood (shavings). They were kind of chewing it but they did consume some of it.
Also, I noticed that they were fighting last night, and I think it was fighting because it ended with one of them chattering its teeth.
 

bpatters

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How large is the cage? And how much furniture do you have in it?
 

relay400

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It's about 6-7 sq ft, the guinea pigs are about 19 oz each.

For furniture, there's a second floor and a ramp. They seem to get around fine without the ramp, so I'm planning to remove it next weekend.
 

bpatters

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That's not large enough for one pig, much less two, still less two boars.
 
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