# Dropping Weight & Not Eating



## zookeep (May 8, 2012)

Arya is just over 11 months old. Her current weight is 219g She topped out at 250g last August and stayed about that weight until around Christmas last year. Since then she has dropped 31g and has had a major appetite decrease. She was eating between 5g and 10g of Innova Low fat adult dry kibble a night and has since dropped to about 0-2g per night in addition to 5-10 mealies a day. All of this has been fairly gradual and I have not changed anything during that time. Two weeks ago she had a hibernation attempt when my electricity went out overnight and I didn't know. So she got down to 72 degrees for about 3 hours. (I usually keep her at 74-78 degrees). I have upped her temps to 78-82 degrees. She seems to have recovered from that okay. I got her on a heating pad as soon as I found her (cold tummy, but still semi-responsive) and she hasn't attempted to hibernate since then. I have begun adding Royal Canin Baby Cat 34 to her regular food but she totally shuns it and I've tried grinding it up with her old food to see if that helps. I have gradually upped her mealies to 20 a day (some when I have her out for cuddles and weights, some in her food dish, some in her dig box). I'm hoping that putting her mealies in her food will result in essentially "gut-loading" the mealies so she gets more of what she needs. I seriously doubt she has parasites, because she would be eating and still losing or losing much faster than she is. However I am going to do a fecal float and smear to see if I can find anything.

At 250g she had great body condition and now she is visibly thin [looks more )( than ( ) ] and you can feel how thin she is when you rub her underside (something she LOVES). She hates all treats except mealies. I've tried watermelon, strawberries, bananas, and wet innova cat food. She is an avid runner as well, which is why she gets so many mealies as well as her small size.

If anyone has had similar issues or has any suggestions please let me know.


----------



## Lilysmommy (Jan 7, 2009)

That's a long time for her eating to be so low. I would definitely take her in and see if you can figure out if there's anything going on. Have the vet check her mouth too - they'll probably need to lightly sedate her in order to get a thorough look at her teeth, roof of her mouth, and throat. If she's not eating the Babycat, you might want to just find a different food. The regular adult formulas or kitten formulas of most foods have a higher fat and you could add one of those in for a higher fat food to see if it helps her out.


----------



## exoticfluffy360 (Jan 22, 2013)

I've also been having eating problems with my sonic she didn't eat anything last night and her appetite has slowly been been decreasing but she's been using her wheel regularly and definitely pooping a lot! i made a vet app for here but still wanted to ask for any ideas you may have.


----------



## alexvdl (Dec 19, 2012)

If you still have the temperature up at the 78-82 range, that could be part of the issue. Hedgehogs tend to get lethargic if it's too hot.


----------



## zookeep (May 8, 2012)

Thank you for all the ideas. I'll give an update once this gets figured out or something changes. I'll drop her temps as well. If she tried to hibernate at 72, would 74 be high enough (for a low) to be safe or should I only go to 76? I'll drop it slowly so I don't shock her, but I don't want to go too low and have her attempt hibernation again.


----------



## Lilysmommy (Jan 7, 2009)

I would try around 76-78, just make sure you lower the temperature gradually, over the course of a day or two. If you lower it too fast, even by only a few degrees, sometimes that can be enough to cause a hibernation attempt.


----------



## zookeep (May 8, 2012)

Dropped her temps down and that helped a little bit. The vet checked her over, inside her mouth and ran some fecals and she checked out clean. I started syringe feeding her a while ago and she's doing better. She had dropped to 211g and is now back up to 225g. I'm feeding her as much as I can get into her. Does anyone have any recommendations for amounts? She took 10g (about 11 mL) of a wet food/ dry powdered kibble / water mix and then ate 5 mealies in her second feeding and ate about 5g in the first sitting. 
Also how many times a day? Or if there are any threads about it just send me that way. I've done quite a bit of looking and haven't found much of any help.


----------



## zookeep (May 8, 2012)

I should say that those were today's feedings. She's been taking about 3-5g per sitting and today I finally figured out the best way for me to hold her and manage the syringe. It went a lot better than it has been and I didn't accidentally shoot her in the face with food! =]


----------



## Lilysmommy (Jan 7, 2009)

Glad that all of the health stuff checked out clean...It's possible that she's just naturally dropped her appetite a bit, but that still seems like a very small amount for a regular eating amount. Is she still eating on her own at all with you syringe-feeding her or not? If she is, how much is she eating on her own? Are you still using the same foods that you mentioned, Innova and Babycat? If she's still not keen on the Babycat, I would start looking for another regular adult or kitten food to try instead. You could try adding in the regular version of Innova, to see if she's okay with that. It should have a higher fat. I would also try getting a new bag of Innova low fat (unless you've opened a new bag since she started eating less and it didn't help) since sometimes they'll eat less of a kibble that's getting old/stale.

As far as syringe-feeding, it sounds like you guys are doing pretty well so far! Hopefully syringing will stimulate her appetite and get her eating more again. There's a bit of syringing advice from Nancy and Kalandra on my thread here - viewtopic.php?f=17&t=15492&st=0&sk=t&sd=a&hilit=syringe&start=30 It helped me a lot when I was dealing with Lily being sick.

For amounts, the general rule of thumb is 24 mL for 24 hours - and that translates to how often too. If she eats 4 mL in a sitting, then feed her again 4 hours later. However, since you're also trying to get her eating on her own again, you could shoot for around 15 mL a day (or something like that), and see what she eats on her own at night. In addition to syringe-feeding, you could also encourage her to eat more on her own by giving her numerous options - kibble mix, dampened kibble mix, crushed kibble mix, syringe-feeding mix, baby food, etc. You may discover if she has a preference to one thing, and how to get her to eat enough to keep her weight on.

Good luck and keep us updated!


----------



## zookeep (May 8, 2012)

Her eating really varies and has no apparent pattern. I've offered her a variety of fruit and veggies, mealies, crickets, decapitated superworms, whole kibble, crushed kibble, wet canned innova, moistened kibble whole and crushed, syringe mixure, wetter food, drier food. She's only eating the mealies and supers consistently, and will munch on kibble sometimes (in any form) bc I see crumbs in her water even if the mass doesn't change. I'll try opening a new bag of innova, this is getting to the end of the last bag. She's been getting the babycat innova blended and soaked in her syringe with about a 50:50 ratio of the two. I dropped some mealies in some wetter syringe mix and left that overnight and she ate quite a bit of it to get the mealies. I'm also gut loading her mealies on powdered babycat/innova mix. 

I'm considering introducing more insects into her diet, like wax worms (she likes them, but I never really buy them) and some canned stuff, to encourage eating as well as supply a more natural diet. Should I hold off on this until she stabilizes her eating or try it to get her to eat more?

I'm pulling her wheel for the night to see if that helps at all. She hopefully won't burn as many calories and will spend more time eating... She's a hardcore wheeler, and I know she spends most of her night doing that. 

Thank you for all the advice. My main concern was that she was dropping so much weight so fast and is already a very small hog. I'm glad we've stopped that and reversed it though. The vet is really perplexed and just told me to keep doing what I'm doing.


----------



## Amlinals (Jul 26, 2012)

*Re: Dropping Weight & Not Eating*

Well, my first thought was that if she started going off her food for whatever reason, the hibernation or whatever, that could she have possibly started with hepatic lipidosis?? I dont know much about it in hedgehogs, but i've read its not an uncommon thing. and i have had personal experience with one of my cats almost dying from it a few years ago. 
You said your vet was perplexed, perhaps they dont realize its something hedgehogs are succeptible to? in my opinion, a vet likely wouldnt have noticed possible hepatic lipidosis just from a general glance-over and fecal, unless she was really jaundiced or something. It's more something you'd suspect from symptoms and then confirm with bloodwork. 
But like I said that was just my first thought and I don't know much about the condition in hedgehogs, just what I've dealt with with my cat. Hopefully someone with more knowledge on the subject will chime in. 
As for the food, I would drop the babycat.


----------



## zookeep (May 8, 2012)

It had crossed my mind, but it didn't seem to fit her. I'll talk to my vet more about it. She's never been on a fat heavy diet until now (because I'm trying to get her to gain weight). She was on Innova reduced fat food, which is very low in fat and is an avid runner on her wheel. She was getting 5 mealies a day and has never been a big hedgie. Hedgies that are most at risk are obese hedgies on high fat or otherwise poor diets that don't wheel or who don't have access to a wheel. She attempted to hibernate because she got too cold, The minimum on her temps for that night was like 72 degrees and I'd always had her above 74.

Other than being concerned about Fatty Liver Disease why else would you reccommend dropping the babycat? 

Thank you for reminding me about it, and Iike I said, I'll talk to my vet, but it would surprise me if that's what's going on with her.


----------



## Amlinals (Jul 26, 2012)

*Re: Dropping Weight & Not Eating*

As i understand it, It's not necessarily because they EAT a lot of fat, just that they have fat in their bodies, and if they don't eat then their body reverts to using the body far instead of stomach intake and that body fat starts to back up before the liver can process it.

Royal Canin foods in general tend to have an exceptional amount of grain fillers, including the especially frowned upon ones such as corn and wheat. That may fatten a pet up, but not in a good way. If you're going to add extra calories in, better in my opinion to do it with a higher ingredient quality food or extra insects or meat.


----------



## zookeep (May 8, 2012)

Okay, thank you for explaining it a little bit better for me, I apparently misunderstood how it worked when I read up on it again. My vet and I are looking into it and will probably do a blood test this week. I'll look into different foods as well and look back through the RC stuff to look at what I should avoid in the future.


On a happier note, she has started eating more on her own. I cut back on her syringe feeding for a couple of days to see how she'd do (I thought I was probably filling her up, especially at her night feeding) and she's been eating around 5 superworms and 3-5g of kibble a night. It could be that stretching her stomach out a little (by actually putting a decent amount of food in it) increased her appetite (Like in people where you tend to need bigger meals to feel full if you eat big meals. If that makes sense.) or she's feeling better. I'm still syringe feeding in the morning a bit, but have totally knocked back evening feedings and this seems to help her eating on her own, which is what I want to encourage. =] Hope this is finally resolving...


----------



## Amlinals (Jul 26, 2012)

*Re: Dropping Weight & Not Eating*

Well if that IS what was going on, blood test could help confirm a liver problem, but force feeding (syringe feeding) is apparently the only way to reverse it, to tell the body "yeah we're using the stomach again, stop using body fat". It takes quite a bit to make that reversal once things have gotten to a bad point. So that (the syringe feeding) is probably what helped. Also the added fluids from the wet syringe foods as opposed to dry probably helped dilute and flush a little of the toxic buildup out. 
Since she doesn't seem that far gone yet, i would maybe think about allowing her to eat on her own for a day and measure carefully how much she has eaten - if its not enough, then syringe feed a significant amount for a day or two more and test her own intake again.

If you do confirm fatty liver syndrome and there are no reports on this not being allowed in hedgehogs, supplementing a little bit of milk thistle in with your syringe feedings might help. Milk thistle helps with supporting the liver. 
Sometimes animals (cats in particular) will associate a particular food with the feeling of illness, so if she's not interested in a food that you were using during this period, consider changing to something new.


----------



## zookeep (May 8, 2012)

Update: Arya is eating her crushed up kibble fairly well and is getting as many insects (meal, wax, and super worms) as she'll eat. I also discovered that she has a sweet tooth! She LOVES blue, black and raspberries. I had some and hadn't tried them on her yet so I gave her some overnight and she licked the bowl clean, and this is the hedgie who hates all new food items! Still doing 1 syringe feeding a day to help put on weight and keep eating, but so far so good. Thank you to everyone for their help, advice, and general support.


----------



## momIImany (Oct 14, 2012)

Super, I'm glad she is doing better.


----------

