Ginuea pig constipation

Question
I have had my ginuea pig Pudgy for about 2 years now (He was purchased from Petsmart.) Lately I have noticed that he has not benn going to the bathroom reguarly and there has been a white odorous discharge where his rectum is. He has appeared to have lost a bit of weight as well, I have been hand feeding him his pellets and lettuce so that he can stay nourished. Any suggestions as to what could be wrong?

Answer

Impacted stool on Tedd  

Rinsing out impaction   It sounds like he's got an impaction. This happens to boars that are over a couple of years old. It's not the kind of impaction that humans get when their bowel just locks up and the stool gets backed up inside. With a cavy boar it's more of an anatomical problem.

When it's warm out the testicles in any species will hang farther down. It's nature's way of protecting the delicate sperm which must be kept at a particular temperature. If it's cold out the testicles will constrict upward to get closer to the body to keep warmer.

Because of the way a cavy is built the rectal opening is actually between the testicles at the top part of the scrotum. When they pass stool it becomes stuck between the testicles and piles up. Because it's warm the stool gets very soft, making a clay like ball of poo.  

Boars also have a white colored thick secretion that has an offensive odor (perhaps not to the sows, but to humans, yuck!). Apparently the girls find it attractive, but we humans don't. The fix is actually easy and doesn't require anything more than running water.

Turn the faucet on, not too hard, and have the water at just barely warm. Hold Pudgy on his back and put his bottom about four inches from the running water. You may need to spread the scrotum apart just a bit so the water gets to where the 'backup' is.  Boars also have a little pouch in there that also holds that ball of poo. If you very gently push on either side of the opening you will see some of that soft stool in there and usually can press enough to get most of it out.

Then comes the 'rinse cycle'.  

Allow the water to run in there for a couple of minutes. You will see the debris washing out of it. Don't get tempted to take a Q tip or anything to dig out the debris. There are delicate tissues there and you don't want to hurt him.  

You can see from the two pictures I attached what I'm talking about.  I got one of my old boars and sure enough, he was impacted. The arrow is pointing to the opening between the testes. Those are the testicles on either side and up toward the penis. You can see that they are sizable in an adult boar. That's just the way God made them. In the picture I have spread them apart a bit so you could see the stool and understand how it becomes trapped in that area.  

The actual rectal opening is farther up inside, but you can see how the stool just stayed there and got packed as more stool behind it kept compressing it into a ball. I was able to give a little pressure with one hand using my forefinger and thumb and push out a sizeable ball of poo.

Next picture is the washing out at the faucet. It doesn't hurt the pig one bit. But it cleans out that little reservoir of gunk that gets stuck in there. That's why you've not been seeing him poo much. He's going, but he can't get it to pass all the way out.

You probably need to be checking him once a week and make sure it doesn't happen again. It seems to be more of a problem during summer months, but as they get older these old boys need help staying fit.

Hope that helps you out. Let me know how it works for you.