Green food for guinea pigs
Green fodder is the main and most important part of the diet. They are cheap, rich in nutrients, well eaten and digested by guinea pigs, and have a beneficial effect on their productivity. All seeded legumes and cereal grasses can be used as green fodder: clover, alfalfa, vetch, lupine, sweet clover, sainfoin, peas, seradella, meadow rank, winter rye, oats, corn, Sudanese grass, ryegrass; meadow, steppe and forest grasses. Especially valuable are legumes and legume-cereal mixtures rich in protein, vitamins and minerals.
Grass is one of the main and cheap fodder. With a sufficient and varied amount of natural and sowing herbs, you can do with a minimum of concentrates, giving them only to lactating females and young animals up to 2 months old. In order for green food to be in the diet of guinea pigs in sufficient quantities from spring to late autumn, it is necessary to take care of creating a green conveyor. In early spring, winter rye can be used, from wild-growing ones – nettle, cuff, wormwood, burdock, early sedges and young shoots of willow, willow, aspen and poplar.
In the first half of summer, the most suitable green conveyor crop is red clover. From wild-growing, small forbs can be good food at this time.
The need of guinea pigs for green food can be successfully covered by various wild herbs: nettle, burdock, plantain, yarrow, cow parsnip, bedstraw, couch grass (especially its roots), sage, heather, tansy (wild rowan), dandelion, young sedge, camel thorn, as well as colza, milkweed, garden and field thistle, wormwood and many others.
Some wild herbs – wormwood, tarragon, or tarragon tarragon and dandelion – should be fed with caution. These plants are well eaten by animals, but have a harmful effect on the body. Dandelion is given up to 30% of the daily norm of green fodder, and wormwood and tarragon, or tarragon tarragon, are not recommended to be fed.
Stinging nettle (Urtica dioica L.) – perennial herbaceous plant from the nettle family (Urticaceae) with a creeping rhizome. Stems erect, ovate-oblong, up to 15 cm long and up to 8 cm wide, coarsely serrated at the edges, with petioles.
Nettle leaves are very rich in vitamins – they contain up to 0,6% ascorbic acid (vitamin C), up to 50 mg% carotene (provitamin A), vitamins K (up to 400 biological units per 1 g) and group B. This is a natural vitamin concentrate. In addition, nettle leaves contain a lot of protein, chlorophyll (up to 8%), starch (up to 10%), other carbohydrates (about 1%), salts of iron, potassium, copper, manganese, titanium, nickel, as well as tannins and organic acids.
Nettle has a high nutritional value, contains 20-24% protein (vegetable protein), 18-25% fiber, 2,5-3,7% fat, 31-33% nitrogen-free extractives. It contains a lot of vitamin K, calcium, potassium, sodium, magnesium, phosphorus, iron and other salts.
Its leaves and young shoots are used primarily for the prevention and treatment of beriberi, which most often appear at the end of winter and early spring. The method of application is the simplest – powder from dried leaves is added to food.
Leaves are harvested during budding and flowering of nettles (blooms from May to autumn, fruits ripen from July). Often the leaves are sneezed with an mitten along the stem from the bottom up, but you can mow or cut the shoots, dry them slightly, and then thresh the leaves on a clean bedding, and discard the thick stems. Usually, the tops of young shoots are plucked and dried, tied in bunches. Drying of nettle raw materials should be carried out in ventilated rooms, in attics, in sheds, but always in a place protected from direct sunlight, as they can destroy some of the vitamins.
Young nettle leaves are especially nutritious in early spring. Fresh nettle must first be boiled for 2-3 minutes in water, then slightly squeezed and, after grinding, added to the wet mixture.
Grass flour prepared from nettles also has high fodder qualities. In terms of the content of substances necessary for the body, it surpasses flour from a mixture of timothy and clover and is equivalent to flour from alfalfa. Nettles are harvested before flowering (June-July) – later it loses some of its beneficial properties. Plants are mowed or plucked and the leaves are allowed to wither a little, after which the nettle no longer “bites”.
In winter, dry crushed leaves are added to the grain mixture or boiled for 5-6 minutes until softened in a container with a closed lid. After cooking, the water is drained, and the resulting mass is slightly squeezed and added to the feed.
Dandelion (Taraxacum officinale Wigg. sl) – a perennial herb from the Asteraceae family, or Asteraceae (Compositae, or Asteraceae), with a fleshy taproot that penetrates deep into the soil (up to 60 cm). The leaves are collected in a basal rosette, from the center of which leafless hollow flower arrows 15-50 cm high grow in spring. They end in a single inflorescence – a basket 3,5 cm in diameter with a two-row brown-green wrapper. The leaves vary in shape and size. Usually they are plow-shaped, pinnate-spatulate or pinnate-lanceolate, 10-25 cm long and 2-5 cm wide, often with a pinkish midrib.
Blooms from April to June, fruits ripen in May-June. Most often, the period of mass flowering does not last long – two to three weeks in the second half of May and early June.
Grows in a variety of habitats: meadows, edges, clearings, gardens, fields, vegetable gardens, wastelands, along roads, lawns, parks, near housing.
Dandelion leaves and roots have nutritional value. The leaves are rich in carotenoids (provitamin A), ascorbic acid, vitamins B1 B2, R. They are used as bitterness, which stimulates appetite and improves digestion. Dandelion roots contain inulin (up to 40%), sugars, malic acid and other substances.
The leaves of this plant are readily eaten by guinea pigs. They are a source of vitamins and mineral salts. Dandelion leaves are fed to animals from early spring to late autumn in unlimited quantities. The bitter substance contained in the leaves promotes blood circulation, enhances digestion and stimulates appetite.
Plantain large (Plantago major L.) are herbaceous perennials that grow like weeds everywhere. Plantain leaves are rich in potassium and citric acid, they contain aukubin glycoside, invertin and emulsin enzymes, bitter tannins, alkaloids, vitamin C, carotene. The seeds contain carbohydrates, mucous substances, oleic acid, 15-10% of a kind of fatty oil.
Among herbs, there are also **highly poisonous**, which can cause feed poisoning and even death in guinea pigs. These plants include: kokorysh (dog parsley), hemlock, poisonous milestone, celandine, purple or red foxglove, wrestler, May lily of the valley, white hellebore, larkspur (horned cornflowers), henbane, raven eye, nightshade, dope, anemone, poisonous sow thistle , wolf berries, night blindness, marsh marigold, meadow backache, self-seed poppy, bracken fern, marsh wild rosemary.
Various **garden and melon waste**, leaves and shoots of some trees and shrubs can be used as green fodder. Good results are obtained from feeding cabbage leaves, lettuce, potato and carrot tops. Potato tops should be mowed only after flowering and always green. Tops of tomatoes, beets, swedes and turnips give animals no more than 150-200 g per head per day. Feeding more leaves causes diarrhea in them, especially in young animals.
A nutritious and economical fodder crop is **young green corn**, which contains a lot of sugar and is readily eaten by guinea pigs. Corn as a green fodder is used from the beginning of the exit into the tube until the panicle is thrown out. It is given to adult animals up to 70% and young animals up to 40% or more of the daily norm of green fodder. Corn works best when combined with alfalfa, clover, and other herbs.
Spinach (Spinacia oleracia L.). Leaves of young plants are eaten. They contain a variety of vitamins, are rich in protein and salts of iron, phosphorus, calcium. There is a lot of potassium in 100 g of spinach – 742 mg. Spinach leaves quickly wither from high temperatures, so for long-term storage, spinach is frozen, canned or dried. Freshly frozen, it can be stored at a temperature of -1 ° C for 2-3 months.
Kale – excellent food, from the end of August until the beginning of winter. Thus, fodder cabbage can be fed to animals until late autumn and during the first half of winter.
Cabbage (Brassica oleracea L. var. capitate L.) – gives a large mass of leaves that are fed fresh to animals. Many varieties of cabbage have been bred. They are combined into two groups: white head (forma alba) and red head (forma rubra). The skin of red cabbage leaves contains a lot of anthocyanin pigment. Due to this, the heads of such varieties have a lilac or purple color of varying intensity. They are valued higher than white cabbage, but their nutritional value is almost the same, although there is slightly more vitamin C in red cabbage. Her heads are denser.
White cabbage contains in heads from 5 to 15% dry matter, including 3-7% sugars, up to 2,3% protein, up to 54 mg% ascorbic acid (vitamin C). In red cabbage, 8-12% dry matter, including 4-6% sugars, 1,5-2% protein, up to 62 mg% ascorbic acid, as well as carotene, vitamins B1, and B2, pantothenic acid, salts sodium, potassium, calcium, phosphorus, iron, iodine.
Although the nutritional value of cabbage is not very high, it contains amino acids and trace elements that are very necessary for the body, and most importantly, a large set of vitamins (C, group B, PP, K, U, etc.).
Brussels sprouts (Brassica oleracea L. var. gemmifera DC) grown for the sake of leaf buds (heads) located along the entire length of the stem. They contain 13-21% dry matter, including 2,5-5,5% sugars, up to 7% protein; it contains up to 290 mg% of ascorbic acid (vitamin C), 0,7-1,2 mg% of carotene (provitamin A), vitamins B1, B2, B6, salts of sodium, potassium, calcium, phosphorus, magnesium, iron, iodine. In terms of vitamin C content, it surpasses all other forms of cabbage.
Cauliflower (Brassica cauliflora Luzg.) stands out for its relatively high content of vitamins C, B1, B2, B6, PP and mineral salts.
Broccoli – asparagus cabbage (Brassica cauliflora subsp. simplex Lizg.). Cauliflower has white heads, while broccoli has green heads. The culture is highly nutritious. It contains 2,54% sugar, about 10% solids, 83-108 mg% ascorbic acid, carotenes, as well as B vitamins, PP, choline, methionine. Broccoli is richer in calcium and phosphorus than cauliflower. Cut heads must be stored in the refrigerator, as they quickly turn yellow. For harvesting for the winter, they are frozen in plastic bags.
Leaf lettuce (Lactuca saliva var. secalina Alef). Its main advantage is precocity, it develops a rosette of succulent leaves ready for eating 25-40 days after sowing. Lettuce leaves are eaten fresh and raw.
Lettuce leaves contain from 4 to 11% dry matter, including up to 4% sugars and up to 3% crude protein. But lettuce is not famous for its nutrients. It contains a significant amount of salts of metals important for the body: potassium (up to 3200 mg%), calcium (up to 108 mg%) and iron. The leaves of this plant are a source of almost all vitamins known in plants: B1, B2, C, P, PP, K, E, folic acid, carotene (provitamin A). And although their absolute content is small, but thanks to such a complete vitamin complex, lettuce leaves actively enhance digestion and metabolism in the body. This is especially important in spring and early summer, when there is more or less vitamin hunger.
Parsley (Petroselinum hortense Hoffm.) has a high content of vitamin C (up to 300 mg%) and vitamin A (carotene up to 11 mg%). The essential oils contained in it have a beneficial effect on the digestive organs.
The content of vitamins in 100 g of root parsley (mg%): carotene – 0,03, vitamin B1 – 0,1, vitamin B2 – 0,086, vitamin PP – 2,0, vitamin B6 – 0,23, vitamin C – 41,0, XNUMX.
Of wood fodder it is best to give guinea pigs branches of aspen, maple, ash, willow, linden, acacia, mountain ash (with leaves and berries), birch and branches of coniferous trees.
It is best to harvest branch fodder for the winter in June-July, when the branches are most nutritious. Branches no thicker than 1 cm at the base are cut off and knitted into small loose brooms about 1 meter long, and then hung in pairs to dry under a canopy.
Long-term feeding of guinea pigs with green fodder in sufficient quantities provides them with vitamins, minerals and complete protein, which contributes to the cultivation of healthy, well-developed young animals.
Green fodder is the main and most important part of the diet. They are cheap, rich in nutrients, well eaten and digested by guinea pigs, and have a beneficial effect on their productivity. All seeded legumes and cereal grasses can be used as green fodder: clover, alfalfa, vetch, lupine, sweet clover, sainfoin, peas, seradella, meadow rank, winter rye, oats, corn, Sudanese grass, ryegrass; meadow, steppe and forest grasses. Especially valuable are legumes and legume-cereal mixtures rich in protein, vitamins and minerals.
Grass is one of the main and cheap fodder. With a sufficient and varied amount of natural and sowing herbs, you can do with a minimum of concentrates, giving them only to lactating females and young animals up to 2 months old. In order for green food to be in the diet of guinea pigs in sufficient quantities from spring to late autumn, it is necessary to take care of creating a green conveyor. In early spring, winter rye can be used, from wild-growing ones – nettle, cuff, wormwood, burdock, early sedges and young shoots of willow, willow, aspen and poplar.
In the first half of summer, the most suitable green conveyor crop is red clover. From wild-growing, small forbs can be good food at this time.
The need of guinea pigs for green food can be successfully covered by various wild herbs: nettle, burdock, plantain, yarrow, cow parsnip, bedstraw, couch grass (especially its roots), sage, heather, tansy (wild rowan), dandelion, young sedge, camel thorn, as well as colza, milkweed, garden and field thistle, wormwood and many others.
Some wild herbs – wormwood, tarragon, or tarragon tarragon and dandelion – should be fed with caution. These plants are well eaten by animals, but have a harmful effect on the body. Dandelion is given up to 30% of the daily norm of green fodder, and wormwood and tarragon, or tarragon tarragon, are not recommended to be fed.
Stinging nettle (Urtica dioica L.) – perennial herbaceous plant from the nettle family (Urticaceae) with a creeping rhizome. Stems erect, ovate-oblong, up to 15 cm long and up to 8 cm wide, coarsely serrated at the edges, with petioles.
Nettle leaves are very rich in vitamins – they contain up to 0,6% ascorbic acid (vitamin C), up to 50 mg% carotene (provitamin A), vitamins K (up to 400 biological units per 1 g) and group B. This is a natural vitamin concentrate. In addition, nettle leaves contain a lot of protein, chlorophyll (up to 8%), starch (up to 10%), other carbohydrates (about 1%), salts of iron, potassium, copper, manganese, titanium, nickel, as well as tannins and organic acids.
Nettle has a high nutritional value, contains 20-24% protein (vegetable protein), 18-25% fiber, 2,5-3,7% fat, 31-33% nitrogen-free extractives. It contains a lot of vitamin K, calcium, potassium, sodium, magnesium, phosphorus, iron and other salts.
Its leaves and young shoots are used primarily for the prevention and treatment of beriberi, which most often appear at the end of winter and early spring. The method of application is the simplest – powder from dried leaves is added to food.
Leaves are harvested during budding and flowering of nettles (blooms from May to autumn, fruits ripen from July). Often the leaves are sneezed with an mitten along the stem from the bottom up, but you can mow or cut the shoots, dry them slightly, and then thresh the leaves on a clean bedding, and discard the thick stems. Usually, the tops of young shoots are plucked and dried, tied in bunches. Drying of nettle raw materials should be carried out in ventilated rooms, in attics, in sheds, but always in a place protected from direct sunlight, as they can destroy some of the vitamins.
Young nettle leaves are especially nutritious in early spring. Fresh nettle must first be boiled for 2-3 minutes in water, then slightly squeezed and, after grinding, added to the wet mixture.
Grass flour prepared from nettles also has high fodder qualities. In terms of the content of substances necessary for the body, it surpasses flour from a mixture of timothy and clover and is equivalent to flour from alfalfa. Nettles are harvested before flowering (June-July) – later it loses some of its beneficial properties. Plants are mowed or plucked and the leaves are allowed to wither a little, after which the nettle no longer “bites”.
In winter, dry crushed leaves are added to the grain mixture or boiled for 5-6 minutes until softened in a container with a closed lid. After cooking, the water is drained, and the resulting mass is slightly squeezed and added to the feed.
Dandelion (Taraxacum officinale Wigg. sl) – a perennial herb from the Asteraceae family, or Asteraceae (Compositae, or Asteraceae), with a fleshy taproot that penetrates deep into the soil (up to 60 cm). The leaves are collected in a basal rosette, from the center of which leafless hollow flower arrows 15-50 cm high grow in spring. They end in a single inflorescence – a basket 3,5 cm in diameter with a two-row brown-green wrapper. The leaves vary in shape and size. Usually they are plow-shaped, pinnate-spatulate or pinnate-lanceolate, 10-25 cm long and 2-5 cm wide, often with a pinkish midrib.
Blooms from April to June, fruits ripen in May-June. Most often, the period of mass flowering does not last long – two to three weeks in the second half of May and early June.
Grows in a variety of habitats: meadows, edges, clearings, gardens, fields, vegetable gardens, wastelands, along roads, lawns, parks, near housing.
Dandelion leaves and roots have nutritional value. The leaves are rich in carotenoids (provitamin A), ascorbic acid, vitamins B1 B2, R. They are used as bitterness, which stimulates appetite and improves digestion. Dandelion roots contain inulin (up to 40%), sugars, malic acid and other substances.
The leaves of this plant are readily eaten by guinea pigs. They are a source of vitamins and mineral salts. Dandelion leaves are fed to animals from early spring to late autumn in unlimited quantities. The bitter substance contained in the leaves promotes blood circulation, enhances digestion and stimulates appetite.
Plantain large (Plantago major L.) are herbaceous perennials that grow like weeds everywhere. Plantain leaves are rich in potassium and citric acid, they contain aukubin glycoside, invertin and emulsin enzymes, bitter tannins, alkaloids, vitamin C, carotene. The seeds contain carbohydrates, mucous substances, oleic acid, 15-10% of a kind of fatty oil.
Among herbs, there are also **highly poisonous**, which can cause feed poisoning and even death in guinea pigs. These plants include: kokorysh (dog parsley), hemlock, poisonous milestone, celandine, purple or red foxglove, wrestler, May lily of the valley, white hellebore, larkspur (horned cornflowers), henbane, raven eye, nightshade, dope, anemone, poisonous sow thistle , wolf berries, night blindness, marsh marigold, meadow backache, self-seed poppy, bracken fern, marsh wild rosemary.
Various **garden and melon waste**, leaves and shoots of some trees and shrubs can be used as green fodder. Good results are obtained from feeding cabbage leaves, lettuce, potato and carrot tops. Potato tops should be mowed only after flowering and always green. Tops of tomatoes, beets, swedes and turnips give animals no more than 150-200 g per head per day. Feeding more leaves causes diarrhea in them, especially in young animals.
A nutritious and economical fodder crop is **young green corn**, which contains a lot of sugar and is readily eaten by guinea pigs. Corn as a green fodder is used from the beginning of the exit into the tube until the panicle is thrown out. It is given to adult animals up to 70% and young animals up to 40% or more of the daily norm of green fodder. Corn works best when combined with alfalfa, clover, and other herbs.
Spinach (Spinacia oleracia L.). Leaves of young plants are eaten. They contain a variety of vitamins, are rich in protein and salts of iron, phosphorus, calcium. There is a lot of potassium in 100 g of spinach – 742 mg. Spinach leaves quickly wither from high temperatures, so for long-term storage, spinach is frozen, canned or dried. Freshly frozen, it can be stored at a temperature of -1 ° C for 2-3 months.
Kale – excellent food, from the end of August until the beginning of winter. Thus, fodder cabbage can be fed to animals until late autumn and during the first half of winter.
Cabbage (Brassica oleracea L. var. capitate L.) – gives a large mass of leaves that are fed fresh to animals. Many varieties of cabbage have been bred. They are combined into two groups: white head (forma alba) and red head (forma rubra). The skin of red cabbage leaves contains a lot of anthocyanin pigment. Due to this, the heads of such varieties have a lilac or purple color of varying intensity. They are valued higher than white cabbage, but their nutritional value is almost the same, although there is slightly more vitamin C in red cabbage. Her heads are denser.
White cabbage contains in heads from 5 to 15% dry matter, including 3-7% sugars, up to 2,3% protein, up to 54 mg% ascorbic acid (vitamin C). In red cabbage, 8-12% dry matter, including 4-6% sugars, 1,5-2% protein, up to 62 mg% ascorbic acid, as well as carotene, vitamins B1, and B2, pantothenic acid, salts sodium, potassium, calcium, phosphorus, iron, iodine.
Although the nutritional value of cabbage is not very high, it contains amino acids and trace elements that are very necessary for the body, and most importantly, a large set of vitamins (C, group B, PP, K, U, etc.).
Brussels sprouts (Brassica oleracea L. var. gemmifera DC) grown for the sake of leaf buds (heads) located along the entire length of the stem. They contain 13-21% dry matter, including 2,5-5,5% sugars, up to 7% protein; it contains up to 290 mg% of ascorbic acid (vitamin C), 0,7-1,2 mg% of carotene (provitamin A), vitamins B1, B2, B6, salts of sodium, potassium, calcium, phosphorus, magnesium, iron, iodine. In terms of vitamin C content, it surpasses all other forms of cabbage.
Cauliflower (Brassica cauliflora Luzg.) stands out for its relatively high content of vitamins C, B1, B2, B6, PP and mineral salts.
Broccoli – asparagus cabbage (Brassica cauliflora subsp. simplex Lizg.). Cauliflower has white heads, while broccoli has green heads. The culture is highly nutritious. It contains 2,54% sugar, about 10% solids, 83-108 mg% ascorbic acid, carotenes, as well as B vitamins, PP, choline, methionine. Broccoli is richer in calcium and phosphorus than cauliflower. Cut heads must be stored in the refrigerator, as they quickly turn yellow. For harvesting for the winter, they are frozen in plastic bags.
Leaf lettuce (Lactuca saliva var. secalina Alef). Its main advantage is precocity, it develops a rosette of succulent leaves ready for eating 25-40 days after sowing. Lettuce leaves are eaten fresh and raw.
Lettuce leaves contain from 4 to 11% dry matter, including up to 4% sugars and up to 3% crude protein. But lettuce is not famous for its nutrients. It contains a significant amount of salts of metals important for the body: potassium (up to 3200 mg%), calcium (up to 108 mg%) and iron. The leaves of this plant are a source of almost all vitamins known in plants: B1, B2, C, P, PP, K, E, folic acid, carotene (provitamin A). And although their absolute content is small, but thanks to such a complete vitamin complex, lettuce leaves actively enhance digestion and metabolism in the body. This is especially important in spring and early summer, when there is more or less vitamin hunger.
Parsley (Petroselinum hortense Hoffm.) has a high content of vitamin C (up to 300 mg%) and vitamin A (carotene up to 11 mg%). The essential oils contained in it have a beneficial effect on the digestive organs.
The content of vitamins in 100 g of root parsley (mg%): carotene – 0,03, vitamin B1 – 0,1, vitamin B2 – 0,086, vitamin PP – 2,0, vitamin B6 – 0,23, vitamin C – 41,0, XNUMX.
Of wood fodder it is best to give guinea pigs branches of aspen, maple, ash, willow, linden, acacia, mountain ash (with leaves and berries), birch and branches of coniferous trees.
It is best to harvest branch fodder for the winter in June-July, when the branches are most nutritious. Branches no thicker than 1 cm at the base are cut off and knitted into small loose brooms about 1 meter long, and then hung in pairs to dry under a canopy.
Long-term feeding of guinea pigs with green fodder in sufficient quantities provides them with vitamins, minerals and complete protein, which contributes to the cultivation of healthy, well-developed young animals.
Juicy food for guinea pigs
Succulent foods are vegetables and fruits that are very important for a guinea pig’s diet. But not all vegetables and fruits are safe and healthy for guinea pigs.
You May Also Like
Domestic decorative rat: care and maintenance at home (photo)
Can guinea pigs eat apples and pears?
