Can guinea pigs eat watermelon? This question nowadays has been common because a lot of people now pet guinea pigs. As cute as these rodents are, you can not but worry about their wellbeing.
But don’t worry anymore! As we are here to explain your cute guinea pig’s diet plan when you want to include watermelon.
Firstly, we will elaborate on watermelon, their availability, calorie count, and nutrition. Because you can not plan a diet on something without knowing about that ingredient in detail.
In addition to that, we’ll also provide answers to the questions regarding guinea pigs’ diets. Whether they can eat watermelon or not, whether watermelon is safe for guinea pigs, watermelon’s benefits and hacks to feed it to guinea pigs.
Last but not the least, we’ll also let you know the limit of watermelon that you can feed to guinea pigs, and its probable health risks.
Can guinea pigs eat watermelon? As many people these days are adopting guinea pigs, they want every detail about watermelon and rodents.
Hence, let’s not waste any more time and see the discussion forward.
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Can guinea pigs eat watermelon?
Obviously yes!
Come on, guinea pigs are vegetarian animals. So it is only natural that they can eat watermelon.
Guinea pigs mostly eat grass and leafy vegetables. But, if you serve, they will eat fruits too. They have all vegetarian teeth and taste buds.
Hence, eating watermelon is not a big deal for these cute rodents.
But, you need to learn many other facts including the limit and frequency of feeding watermelon to them. It is for the health benefit of your cute pet.
Let’s know a little bit about watermelon.
What is Watermelon?
Watermelon is a tropical fruit. This fruit grows in a vine-like plant, and the most amazing fact is it grows in the land. Not in the higher part of a tree.
The plant of watermelon belongs to the Cucurbitaceae family. The same family as pumpkin, zucchini, cucumber, and cantaloupe.
Watermelon is large in size and sweet in taste. It is a very refreshing fruit as 92% of this fruit is water.
It has green outer skin and that is really hard, the fruity flesh inside is red and soft. Besides this, watermelon fruit contains a huge number of seeds.
Watermelon’s availability
This fruit is native to southern Africa, but now you can find it all over the world. Because the plants from the Cucurbitaceae family can survive and grow in any place.
Hence, you can find it almost everywhere in the world.
The watermelon plant produces the fruit within 90 days after you plant it, and the fruit becomes ripe in the meantime as well.
Additionally, the harvest month varies in the region, but the season, in general, is mid-summer.
Watermelon’s calorie count
The main reason behind feeding something to your guinea pig is to ensure they get a good deal of calories, right?
This is why learning the calorie count of the fruit you intend to feed to your pet rodent is necessary.
About watermelon, every 100 grams of this fruit contains 30 calories. Clearly, it is a medium amount, but as it is for guinea pigs, the medium amount is actually a big deal.
Apart from this, you are not going to feed an excessive amount of watermelon to a really small guinea pig. Hence, it’s an okay number.
Nutrition facts of watermelon for guinea pig
Guinea pigs are so small and cute. But despite their size, they require a good amount of balanced nutrition to stay healthy like every other species.
Watermelon, as a popular fruit, actually contains a good amount of various nutrition facts. Let’s check-
Water
Just as the name goes- watermelon contains a vast amount of water. 92% of a watermelon is water. This amount is amazing because it means you can keep your guinea pig hydrated by feeding a small amount of watermelon.
Carbohydrate
Every 100 grams of watermelon contains 8 grams of carbohydrates. Even though the amount might seem small, consider the fact that a guinea pig’s diet plan already includes all carb types such as grass and hays. So, it is actually not so bad of a deal.
Protein
Guinea pigs are vegetarian animals, hence they do not get proteins very often. But, for a balanced and healthy diet, your cute rodents need some protein intake too.
Watermelon contains 0.6 grams of protein per 100 grams of it. If you ask us, we ought to say that it is a good deal after all.
Iron
This is a very important mineral even for guinea pigs. These cute rodents have similar anatomy to humans. That is why genetic technology often does its gene math with guinea pigs.
Their blood requires a decent amount of iron to stay healthy. For every 100 grams of watermelon, you’ll get 1.8 mg of iron.
Potassium
As we have already mentioned, guinea pigs have similar anatomy as humans; hence, they need some potassium to have a good nervous system.
As for watermelon, every 100 grams of this fruit contains 112 mg of potassium.
Sodium
This mineral is essential for the fluid balance as well as the nervous system of rodents. As a matter of fact, you can not feed salts to guinea pigs as they are too small for salt tolerance.
Hence, you need to feed them some foods that contain a little amount of sodium that would be sufficient to maintain their fluid balance. And every 100 grams of watermelon contains 1 mg of sodium.
Vitamin C
You can not buy immunity. The only way to have it is by boosting it up. Hence, one needs to ensure regular vitamin C intake to build up a good immune system.
Vitamin C is the immunity vitamin. Regular intake of this vitamin builds a good immune system, and it is important for guinea pigs. Because guinea pigs are sensitive to diseases. Hence, feeding them vitamin C-enriched foods is important.
Watermelon contains a good amount of vitamin C. And we are pretty sure you want that for your pet rodents too.
Is watermelon safe for guinea pigs?
Clearly, watermelon is safe for your cute guinea pigs.
As we already told you, guinea pigs are vegetarian. All sorts of vegetables and fruits are safe for them unless they contain any kind of toxin.
Watermelon contains no toxins at all. The only trouble that it might cause is because of the sugar and fibers in it. Therefore, this fruit can be unsafe only if you overfeed it to your rodents.
And if you keep the limit, watermelon is totally safe for your pet guinea pigs.
Can guinea pigs eat watermelon rind or skin?
Precisely, yes.
Watermelon rind is closest to all those leafy vegetables that guinea pigs eat. It is the hard, green skin of a watermelon.
Watermelon rind is closest to all those leafy vegetables that guinea pigs eat. Additionally, the rind does not contain much sugar. It should be noted that the main risk of guinea pigs eating watermelon lies in the amount of sugar and enzymes that the flesh carries.
Nevertheless, the rind does not contain much sugar. In addition, it does not contain enzymes like the flesh either.
Hence, not only guinea pigs can eat watermelon rind, but also the rind is actually a safer food than the flesh.
How much watermelon can guinea pigs eat?
Nevertheless, we are discussing the reddish flesh of watermelon here. Not about the rind or the seeds.
As for the flash of watermelon you can feed only a cube of 1 cm one day. But that is the limit for adult guinea pigs. As for the young guinea pigs, the amount should be reduced in half.
Also, do not feed watermelon to guinea pigs often. Otherwise, it would become harmful to your pet guinea pig. If you want to make other preparations for watermelon, you should use the exact amount that we mentioned earlier.
How should I feed watermelon to guinea pigs?
This should not be a big issue. Because guinea pigs love to eat fruits and vegetables.
Hence feeding watermelon to guinea pigs is not any troublesome work. You will only need to consider the limit while you feed watermelon to guinea pigs. Other than that, the methods to feed watermelon to guinea pigs should not be something exhausting.
Even so, there are some hacks to feed watermelon to guinea pigs. Just consider one thing, do not feed the seeds of watermelon to guinea pigs as they might choke over it.
Raw watermelon cube
Guinea pigs usually love raw watermelon. Hence, feeding raw watermelon is a very simple job. You only need to cut the watermelon into small pieces. Just remember the limit right.
The limit was only one cube of 1 cm for one guinea pig a day.
Hence, you should cut the cubes of watermelon into 1 cm. After cutting into those small pieces, you can give that to your guinea pig.
We are pretty sure that your pet rodent would love it. Just make sure that the piece does not contain any seeds.
Watermelon juice
Nothing beats some refreshing juice on a hot summer day.
If your guinea pig does not want to eat raw watermelon, you can always give them some watermelon juice treats.
The procedure to make watermelon juice is simple. You only need to blend the flesh of the watermelon and serve it to your guinea pig. But, you should not use more than one 1 cm cube of watermelon to make juice for one guinea pig.
Also, you need to watch carefully that the juice contains no seeds. Another fact that you need to watch out for is- you should not use any additional sugar in the watermelon juice you prepared for your guinea pig. Because additional sugar is harmful to the health of your pet rodent.
Watermelon rind
Even though guinea pigs can eat watermelon, they should not eat it very often.
But they can eat watermelon rind as often as they want to. This is because watermelon rind contains no added sugar or fiber.
Feeding watermelon rind to guinea pigs is very simple. You just need to cut the watermelon rind into small pieces and serve it to your guinea pig. Watermelon rind tastes very similar to all the vegetables and grass that they eat.
Hence, they are going to love the watermelon rind. Also, you can use watermelon rind as a regular meal for your guinea pig.
How often can guinea pigs eat watermelon?
Even though watermelon has very amazing benefits, you cannot feed it very often to your guinea pig.
This is because watermelon contains quite a good amount of sugar and fiber. And, guinea pigs are not really lactose tolerant.
This is why giving them watermelon often could result in their deteriorating health.
You can give watermelon to guinea pigs only once or twice a week. That too, as mere snacks, and not as a regular meal.
But, if it is watermelon rind, you can give it as much as they want to eat without worrying about anything else.
Watermelon’s benefits for guinea pigs
As we have already mentioned all the amazing nutrition facts watermelon contains, we should already know that this fruit has many amazing health benefits for guinea pigs.
Nevertheless, all those amazing benefits that watermelon can provide to guinea pigs mostly depend on the limitation of feeding this fruit to guinea pigs.
Your pet rodents will get those benefits only if you maintain the limit and do not overfeed them. You need to remember that if you overfeed watermelon, not only will it not bring those benefits for guinea pigs, but it will also harm them.
Watermelon keeps guinea pigs hydrated
First of all, we mentioned earlier that watermelon’s 92% of watermelons are water.
Hence, it is only natural that this fruit is amazing for hydration. Very similar to most pets, guinea pigs too are not really interested in drinking water very much.
But, to keep good health and stay healthy in the summertime, guinea pigs too require to stay hydrated. And if your pet rodents do not want to drink water, in that case, you can feed them watermelon or watermelon juice in order to keep them hydrated.
This is sure to work, but you have to make sure that you are not overfeeding them this fruit.
Watermelon helps guinea pig’s digestion
This fruit contains many enzymes as well as fibers. All those amazing facts that watermelon contains are actually helpful for the digestive process of your pet guinea pig.
Now, as watermelon helps the digestion process, it actually helps your pet guinea pig stay healthy in some other ways as well.
First of all, the problems in digestion cause constipation and it is a very hurtful health condition. Whenever a pet gets constipation, it causes unbearable pain in their stomach as well as in the lower limbs.
It would hurt you too if you watch your pet crying over feeling so much pain in their stomach.
Watermelon can act as a natural and homemade remedy for constipation as well as for digestion troubles. So, if you ever see your pet guinea pig having stomach pain, you can give them a little amount of watermelon.
It would help them digest the foods that they eat and they will get rid of constipation as well as all the pains it causes.
Watermelon boost immunity
Guinea pigs are one of the most sensitive animals on this planet. They get sick very easily.
Hence, building up their immunity is mandatory. Because if your guinea pig gets any disease, there is a very low chance for recovery.
This is why you always need to make sure that you are feeding them foods that contain a good amount of Vitamin C. This is to ensure your pet guinea pig’s good immune system.
If your guinea pig builds a good immune system, it will not fall ill very easily.
Now, watermelon contains a good amount of Vitamin C. And the amount is really high.
Hence, feeding your guinea pig watermelon once or twice a week can help them build up their immune system. And this will eventually prevent them from falling ill.
Watermelon’s probable risks or side effects for guinea pigs
Even after all those amazing benefits that watermelon can provide to your pet guinea pig, it still has two potential health risks for your pet rodent.
But, these two risks will work only if you overfeed this tropical fruit.
Now let’s take a look at the potential risks that watermelon has for your guinea pig-
- Watermelon contains a good amount of sugar that can cause lactose intolerance reactions. That will break their immune system.
- Watermelon can cause them diarrhea. This is because of the enzymes and fibers that watermelon contains. Even though those enzymes are helpful for digestion, for the same reason if you overfeed watermelon, the digestion system will speed up and your pet guinea pig will have diarrhea.
Hence you need to make sure that you are not feeding watermelon flash to your guinea pig more than twice a week.
Conclusion
Can guinea pigs eat watermelon? You were curious about this question when you came to read this.
This is because you care about your guinea pig and you really wish for their wellbeing.
We hope that you now know the answer as to whether your guinea pigs can eat watermelon or not.
In addition to that, you actually got to learn many other things that you need to know if you want to raise your pet guinea pig. If you have further questions regarding your guinea pigs, let us know in the comment box below.
And, for any kind of health issue related to your guinea pig, please contact a vet in person.
