Feeding Cavies

So the compost house looks more and more likely *sighs as she wistfully thinks of her dream of living in an actual street, with a concrete driveway and little square patch of the lawn out the back*. Being a farm brat definitely gives you a unique perspective on things...

Anyway I'm bored so I thought I'd share some of the inane chatter that runs daily through my head.

I've been reading and reading and reading about cavy feeds and I have to say I've learned quite a lot. You see when I first bred and showed I made a mistake that proved fatal for my stud, I bought cheap feed from a dodgy produce store. I lost my entire stud to enteritis because of it, not an experiment I ever wish to repeat.

Now Armidale is a rural town, they are all about sheep, cattle and horses so of I toddled to get a list of the brands they stock up there. Hay will never be an issue at least which is good to know. As to feed I'm thinking I'll feed Mitavite Athletes Plus. It has a crazy high protein content at 25%, 12% fat and 12% fibre. Now I've not been able to get exact percentages for hay but I believe that if I feed this mixed 50/50 with lucerne chaff that will bring the protein content to about 21-22%, fat to 6% and I have no idea about fibre. So it should provide a good all round feed for cavies and I can tweak the mix depending on if I'm feeding pregnant sows or old fat retired boars.

The other great thing about Mitavite Athlete Plus is the Vitamin C content. It has 1000mg per kg. So if you take your average 1kg cavy who eats on average 60g of food a day, half of which is this horse feed it means the cavy gets 30mg solely from the feed. Seems like a good deal to me. Now it is expensive at $30-40 per 20kg but I learned the hard way that skimping is definitely not good.

We'll also be growing a proper vege garden again which should provide most if not all vege needs for the cavies. I intend to grow wheat grass as well but that has it's issues. I am very allergic to grass and even handling guinea pigs that have just eaten grass causes skin problems. But although it looks spectacular the allergies not too annoying so I intend to work through it so my animals can have the best life possible...