Well I felt like a right idiot on Sunday.
I made the SOS call out to my long standing piggie friend Alida Hazelgrove on Saturday. One of my preggers sows had taken ill; the silly dear broke her two lower teeth in a dominance squabble with one of the other sows. During the week she'd dropped a lot of condition and as the weekend approached she was clearly in a bad way. So Alida was kind enough to come to South Turrumurra to show me how to trim her now excessive top teeth to a more appropriate level.
Well when it came down to it she didn't need her teeth trimmed. There were many exacerbated sighs of confusion from Alida during the day (I've technically been in cavies a few years longer than she has and there are times i simply have no clue) but lots of laughs too. In the end though by the time we'd cuddled pigs and had lunch we returned to see the sow scrunched in a corner looking as bad as ever. Alida agreed there was something not right and we looked at her again. She was showing the same symptoms as a failing satin so there was nothing more either of us could do.
For two more days i've checked on her fearing the worst, worried about her and the babies moving in her belly. But today she was looking brighter in the eye. Still losing a bit of weight but generally looking less distressed. Come dinner tonight with apple, celery and carrot all sliced into 3mm-5mm wide long sticks she was hoeing into her dinner and even started to talking with her cagemates again.
The big agouti sow, who was the first to have kicking babies is bigger than ever... But she's so relaxed about it. it's a real joy to handle her, even this pregnant. This is actually a good picture showing her fanning because her belly has exaggerated the fault, making it obvious.
I made the SOS call out to my long standing piggie friend Alida Hazelgrove on Saturday. One of my preggers sows had taken ill; the silly dear broke her two lower teeth in a dominance squabble with one of the other sows. During the week she'd dropped a lot of condition and as the weekend approached she was clearly in a bad way. So Alida was kind enough to come to South Turrumurra to show me how to trim her now excessive top teeth to a more appropriate level.
Well when it came down to it she didn't need her teeth trimmed. There were many exacerbated sighs of confusion from Alida during the day (I've technically been in cavies a few years longer than she has and there are times i simply have no clue) but lots of laughs too. In the end though by the time we'd cuddled pigs and had lunch we returned to see the sow scrunched in a corner looking as bad as ever. Alida agreed there was something not right and we looked at her again. She was showing the same symptoms as a failing satin so there was nothing more either of us could do.
For two more days i've checked on her fearing the worst, worried about her and the babies moving in her belly. But today she was looking brighter in the eye. Still losing a bit of weight but generally looking less distressed. Come dinner tonight with apple, celery and carrot all sliced into 3mm-5mm wide long sticks she was hoeing into her dinner and even started to talking with her cagemates again.
The big agouti sow, who was the first to have kicking babies is bigger than ever... But she's so relaxed about it. it's a real joy to handle her, even this pregnant. This is actually a good picture showing her fanning because her belly has exaggerated the fault, making it obvious.