On Monday I noticed Adam was not his perky old self. He was eating slower,
the pellet bowl was not as empty as it should be for that time of night
and
he was hiding in his bath house. So Tuesday morning Adam went into see
the
vet. She took a good look at his teeth and could not find any spurs. She
said spurs after all this time (he is older now) would be a bit odd. But
all my observations meant tooth problems. She put Adam under to have a
better look. When she did this, she found a very wobbly molar that with
further inspection fell out. There was infection underneath. She did
what
she could, took some x-rays and did some work on his teeth to make him
more
comfortable and then Adam came home. He is on antibiotics for the
infection
and goes back for a check-up on Monday. Tuesday night and Wed Adam was
understandably finding it a bit difficult to eat hard things so I was
supplementing him with a syringe feeding formula and a little bit of pain
killers. It is now Sunday and Adam still refuses to eat on his own. It
is
not that he can not eat - he will not now. He has decided he likes the
syringe formula, that I now make into a dough like consistency and roll
into
a ball and put in his house, and he eats that readily. He will eat a
peanut
with no trouble and to test this I gave him a piece of hamster food - one
of
those very hard colored bits. He devoured it. So he can eat hard things
with no trouble. I am no longer getting up at night to feed him because
he
could easily eat his pellets now, he just won't. When I wake up he greets
me in his 'starved chin' way and I give him his ball of mush and he
devours
it. I also try giving him pellets and he will take it in his mouth,
realize
it is a pellet and then throw it aside or just let it drop without even
attempting to eat it. He can eat alfalfa as well so I know this is an
issue
of refusing to eat his normal food as opposed to not being able to. I did
try making his own pellets soft and he did take one bite until he realized
what it was and then tossed it aside. So it is just his food he doesn't
want.
How can I get Adam to eat his own food again? I left him for seven hours
last night and he didn't eat anything on his own. Because I am putting
alfalfa etc in his cage his partner Charlie is also now eating pellets!
Help!
Lori
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