# Excessive quill loss



## Cwilkins1204 (May 26, 2012)

Harriett is around seven months old now and has gone through quilling and everything. Lately I have notice her losing 20-30 quills a night when I clean her wheel. They are not in a concentrated area and doesn't seem like her normal quilling. I took her to a vet to get checked for mites and came back negative. She does itch sometimes so I have back off her monthly bath. Any ideas on my next step???? 

I know this is not normal for her to lose 20-30 quills a night. 

Thanks!


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## Cwilkins1204 (May 26, 2012)

*Re: Excessive quill loss UPDATE!!!!*

Took Harriet to the doctor and found out she is deficient is taurine and is lacking nutrition which caused her to not quill properly! Simple fix to what another vet wanted to treat with ivermectin!!!!


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## Immortalia (Jan 24, 2009)

Are you feeding cat kibble? ALL cat food is required to have taurine added, as it's necessary for cats.
Also, I'm interested to know how your vet came to the conclusion it was lack of taurine. I've never heard of it before.


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## Cwilkins1204 (May 26, 2012)

She said that it was a lack of taurine because she was still trying to grow quills but they were not strong enough to stay in her skin and taurine aids in that. She compared it to beta Carotene in people. And I do not feed cat food. I'm not to to use a "base food" she gets natural taurine now from eggs, tomatoes and sweet potatoes.


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## Immortalia (Jan 24, 2009)

Well the not feeding cat food makes more sense then.
All meat and seafood contain taurine. So you can give more of that as well. 
People discovered that cats needed taurine when they tried to force them to eat food other than meat, which caused a taurine deficiency, leading to blindness and other ailments. Since cats are obligate carnivores, taurine is essential. (sorry lol random nutrition information)
The veggies don't provide a significant amount of taurine, so adding meat in her diet will help.

And please keep us updated! I am very interested and curious to see how it goes!!


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## Cwilkins1204 (May 26, 2012)

Thank you!! I will see about putting meat into her diet! I'll keep you updated!


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## Cwilkins1204 (May 26, 2012)

Harriet is getting better! She is loosing less and less quills each night and her new quills look nice and deep in color. I feed her chicken and apples 3 nights a week and then worms, grasshoppers and peaches. She's doing great! Hoping for loosing no quills next month!


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## MissCarlyRenee (Jun 11, 2012)

Glad to hear that Harriet is doing better!


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## Immortalia (Jan 24, 2009)

So what sort of diet did you formulate with your vet? Mostly cause there's still a wide abundance of vitamins and minerals that those foods don't cover. Are you using some sort of vitamin supplement? Or did you start offering some cat food to cover the rest of the nutrients?


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## Cwilkins1204 (May 26, 2012)

To be honest my vet told me to only supplement more taurine and even out my protein and fat rather than having more protein. She has been doing very well on this diet, more active, happier, and losing less quills. I asked about supplements but they all had some ingredients I didn't like so for now until my vet says other wise this is what works.


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## Lilysmommy (Jan 7, 2009)

I would think that missing out on a lot of vitamins and minerals might cause long-term issues that you don't see right now and that won't become apparent until it's possibly too late to change it. May I ask why you won't even consider using a little bit of cat food to supplement? Not all cat food is terrible, and it's better than thinking that she's doing fine and having problems come up later, such as with the taurine issue. That was easily resolved - not all nutritional deficiencies are. The taurine one could've been worse - the way they found out it was necessary to add taurine to cat diets was because of mass amounts of cats dying from organ failure. Personally I wouldn't my hedgehog to be the experiment that tells everyone about a key nutrient that hedgehogs need to stay healthy and alive.


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