2 1/2 Week Old Pot Belly Piglet Can't Btrathe! Please Help

[drdoolittle]

I am bottle-feeding a litter of pbps due ill.They have all been doing wonderfully until.yesterday when one seemed to have breathing issues. She was worse this morning, and I got Tylan 50 to give her. I finally found a syringe with .01 on it, but she is really gasping for air---barely able to suck.on the bottle. What can I do to help her? Can I use my nebulizer with albuterol on her?

 

[AshleyFishy]

Sorry to hear about your baby. Sounds like she may have aspirated some milk. It is common for bottle pigs to do that. I recommend dish feeding instead. I've thankfully only had one aspirate.. that baby didn't make it for me.

You might consider moving them over to shallow dish feeding and maybe start slowly mixing in baby cereal.

I have had aspirated goat kids and jersey calves bounce back though. So keep hope and keep up with the antibiotics.

 

[drdoolittle]

Thank you for the reply. I figured that she had done that. At least she is still very active. I was just starting them on pan feeding this morning and they dod pretty well---even her. I have been.mixing cereal with the formula, and will continue making if thicker.

 

[AshleyFishy]

Another trick I found is to add a veggie and fruit baby food. I have a PB piggy I'm feeding right now for a friend. She is about three weeks I want to say. She gets 150 cc, after liquid is added, three times daily of... 75cc ultra 24 formula, 25cc gerber multi grain cereal, just a few drops of corn oil or sunflower oil, 5cc beechnut garden vegetable and 5cc beechnut apple banana. Later I start adding in more protein only as they need it though. You can get vegetarian baby food with good protein or if you don't mind feeding animal products you can get like chicken baby food. Some people use cat food I wouldn't recommend it though.

 

[AshleyFishy]

Did your piggy clear up?

 

[BHOBCFarms]

This may sound silly, but I had good luck teaching orphan pigs to pan feed by adding a squirt of strawberry Quik to the formula. I also got them onto solids by giving them cream of wheat, oatmeal, mashed bananas, veggies once they were old enough, added to the formula.

 

[drdoolittle]

Thankfully, my little girl pulled through. I was pretty scared for a day or two, but she's thriving and growing along with her litter-mates. Thanks to everyone for your advice and support.

 

[secuono]

2.5 now probably 3wks old, start them on pan fed milk and some adult food as well.