hair loss and pregnancy

Question
My guinea pig Silky is close to giving birth and I noticed on her back around the neck area she has some hair loss is this common in pregnancy?

Answer
Since she is pregnant it is really hard to tell what is going on unless she has a skin scraping to rule out mites. Her hairloss is either due to mites, or hormone inbalance because she is pregnant. One big difference is that hairloss due to pregnancy usually occurs on the mid-back, there also may be a scab in that area, occassionally it will also occur near the bum area and behind the front legs because of all the pressures in those areas. Mites can occur any where, but usually start at the neck, they are microscopic and under the skin, so in most pigs you just have to assume that they have then unless a skin scraping is done. If she has hormonal hairloss there is not much you can do other than supportive treatment. Try putting a thick human lotion on her skin once a day, this will help with some irritation. It also helps to give them a bath in baby oil to sooth the skin. Any scabs can be treated with a small amount of triple antibiotic cream for humans, other than that you just have to wait for the pregnancy to pass. There is some more information about mites on my website. http://woopets.bravehost.com .
Brittany