# Is my baby underweight?



## kailey lane (Apr 7, 2012)

Prinkles is 10 weeks now and she weighs 142g.when she came home at 7 weeks she was 98g.is this a normal weight for a baby this age? 


- How old is your hedgehog?she is 10weeks old
- How long have you owned your hedgehog?3 weeks
- What is the temperature of the hedgehogs cage?76


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## hedgieluv (Oct 29, 2011)

Kailey,
Your Prinkles is a similar size to my Persephone. She was103 grams when I brought her home and was 135-140 about three weeks later. She has always been healthy and wheels daily and eats well. And her poop has been good since the week after I brought her home. In my limited experience, as long as the other things seem good, she is probably fine, just a little squirt. Hugs and welcome!


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## raerysdyk (Oct 21, 2011)

Hedgehogs come in a variety of sizes. Personally, my Brillo only weighs 255g and he is 10 months old. However, there are other members that have hedgies over 600g...and that is perfectly normal. 

You need to look at the shape of your hedgie when they are standing. If they appear sunken in on the sides, like ) (, then you have an underweight hedgie. If she is I I shaped, then she is normal. Overweight is more of a ( ) shape. Hope this helps! If not, posting an overhead view of your hedgehog standing would be helpful.


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## LarryT (May 12, 2009)

I would never let a baby go at 98 grams  , I like for my babies to be around 200 grams before leaving. What are you feeding? Needs to be a kitten food for the extra fat she needs it.


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## Guest (May 6, 2012)

ive heard of lots of people who say 100 grams before they leave. sketch was 100 ish when i got her and cato was actually closer to 80 but he was let go from his mom way to soon and eating crappy cat food. hes just hitting 200 grams now


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## kailey lane (Apr 7, 2012)

larry ,she is not on kitten food...sadly all the stuff if read wasnt spacific about that;( she is being weaned off of spikes delight and going onto chicken soup but now because of the recall i want to get off of that once she is on it for a while and finishes whats left.also have solid gold kats n floken to start mixing in after shes used to one food.should i go get kitten food? what can i give her for the extra fat treat wise?

Im wondering about meal worms,id like to go gets some today, but what size?(small, meduim?) iv heard a few mealworms a day is ok? should i feed them alive or will they bite her?


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## Guest (May 6, 2012)

kitten food would help it has a higher fat content, the few meal worms you could give a day wouldnt cut it for the extra fat. 

meal worms wont bite and i have fed mine large mealworms with no problems. stay away from super worms though they can bite.


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## kailey lane (Apr 7, 2012)

oh, ok its the super worms i was thinking of.ill go pick up some meal worms in a bit.ill get large like you said,i just wanted to make sure they weren't to big for her little mouththank you quillzmom,i was hoping someone was replay before i left for the store.


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## LarryT (May 12, 2009)

Mealworms are great, get the medium to large ones, just give her a couple a day till she gets use to them. I think a kitten food would be a good idea since she's so small. I use Royal Canin Babycat 34 it's a very small size kibble with lots of fat, the downside is sometimes it's very hard to wean them from it when they get older.


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## moxieberry (Nov 30, 2011)

Quillzmom said:


> the few meal worms you could give a day wouldnt cut it for the extra fat.


I don't really agree - I know there are some people here who feed 10-15 mealworms a day, which can work well for hedgehogs that need extra fat in their diet. Feeding that many all at the same time or starting with a lot when she's never had them before can cause an upset stomach, and occasionally hedgehogs can get constipated from too many mealworms, but in general I'd say it's fine, and they can be a great extra source of fat. Just start with a few a day, and increase the number if necessary.

Personally I use Royal Canin Kitten 36 as treats to give Archimedes a little extra fat. He doesn't really need much, since he's lazy and doesn't run, but he loves the stuff. RC Kitten or RC Babycat are good choices for extra fat, and they don't necessarily have to be the entire or even main part of the diet. I would suggest keeping her on the Solid Gold and start adding some kitten food either as treats or as a small part of the mix. Watch her weight and increase the amount of the kitten food as appropriate. The thing about kitten food is once they're on it they don't like to be weaned to something with less fat, and sometimes if it's part of the mix they'll go for the kitten food and ignore the other stuff in the mix. That's why for a situation like this, using it as treats when she's outside the cage - something "special" - might work better, because that way you can be sure she won't completely snub the other food.


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## nikki (Aug 28, 2008)

moxieberry said:


> Quillzmom said:
> 
> 
> > the few meal worms you could give a day wouldnt cut it for the extra fat.
> ...


Mealworms alone aren't going to be enough unless you feed an enormous amount witch wouldn't be good for the hedgie. There is nothing wrong with feeding Royal Canin babycat as part of the mix for a smaller hedgie especially one that needs to gain weight. All my babies were weaned onto a mix which was about 50% babycat. I slowly reduced the amount of babycat as they grew and matured until there were completely off of it by 6 months. Even now I have some older hedgies that have trouble keeping weight on that have babycat in their mix. There are some hedgies that don't like it when the babycat is removed but I personally haven't had any trouble with that as long as it was done slowly.

Just giving it as a treat isn't enough to help this baby gain weight. Larry is completely correct about kitten food being a good idea right now.


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## moxieberry (Nov 30, 2011)

Sorry, I should have clarified - I meant that I disagreed with the "few mealworms you could give a day". In this situation, I see the only limit on the number of mealworms being what would upset her stomach, whereas for a typical hedgehog mealworms are kept to "few" (2-5 or so) because more than that would be too fatty. I do agree that kitten food is the best way to add fat to a diet, which I also said. Sorry for the confusion! :]


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## nikki (Aug 28, 2008)

There was no confusion, you said to feed more mealworms...but that can cause problems especially for a young hedgehog. Which is why they shouldn't be used to help a baby gain weight. You also said to only give the kitten food as a treat...which isn't enough. That advice was incorrect and could be detrimental to the hedgies health.


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## kailey lane (Apr 7, 2012)

alrighty well ill go get rc babycat when i get paid fri .i got the mealworms and she just looked at them and did not eat them lol im sure she'll figure it out at some point.


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