Loss Worried about my pig after loss of her cagemate.

[lauraspiggies96]

Hello all.

I purchased my first pig about 2 months ago, and my second about 1 month ago.

My second pig got ill and unfortunately passed away this morning
depsite my efforts to save her for the past week and a half, but now I am worried about her housemate, my older pig. I know they were only together a short time, but I am still concerned about whether or not my piggy will go through a grieving process and how to cope with that and help her through it.

Could grief negativey affect her health, even if they were only together a matter of weeks?
Do I need to get her a replacement housemate? How soon would you all recommend?

Sorry if there are any errors in the way I have written this post, it has been hard losing my fur-baby.

Thanks in advance.

 

[lauraspiggies96]

Okay, thank you for your advice!

My vet wasn't even quite sure, it was thought to be an inner ear infection at first, but she went on anti-biotics and it still did not fix the problem. She eventually lost control of one side of her body, which my vet thinks could have been from either a type of brain infection or a serious stroke. She declined rather rapidly after and I made the decision to put her down as to not have her suffer any longer.

Luckily my other piggy is her normal quirky self.

I have learned my lesson about pet store piggies, and as much as I wish I could save them all, I will be adopting when I get my next pig. The rescue I was considering does complete health checks on all pigs before allowing them to be adopted, if this is the case is it still necessary to quarantine?

Thank you for your kind words!

 

[bpatters]

The rescue needs to also have quarantined the pig if you're thinking about skipping it. A vet check can certify that a pig is healthy at a certain point. But many diseases take up to 21 days before an animal shows symptoms, and a health check won't show what they pig may have been exposed to.