Guinea Pig Connection

Products For Making Veggies Last Longer

Tired of veggies -- especially cucumbers -- not lasting as long as they should, I've finally broken down this week and purchased a couple of products that claim to extend the freshness of vegetables...even washed veggies.

Debbie Meyer's Green Bags -- previously available only on TV but now showing up in grocery stores, drug stores, and retailers like Target -- offer the advantage of not taking up additional room in the fridge. Just bring veggies home, swap the store produce bags for the Green Bags, and you're good to go. You can reportedly reuse a single bag up to 10 times before it needs to be replaced. The manufacturer claims the bags help extend veggie life up to 10 times the normal life of the food.

Rubbermaid's Produce Saver line of plastic containers claim to extend the life of veggies up to 33% longer than their normal life. They will take up extra space in your fridge but offer the advantage of not having to be thrown out after a limited number of uses. The containers use a combination of a "fresh vent" and a "crisp tray" that sits at the bottom of the containers to separate veggies from the moisture that inevitably forms under them. You can find them at grocery stores and retailers like Walmart.

I should note that Ziploc makes Fresh Produce Bags with a "moisture vent." They come only in a large size (big enough to hold a head of lettuce), 15 to a box. I've only seen them at grocery stores.

If you've tried any of these products, please share your experiences.

Repairing A Leaky C&C Cage

Ellen, the rescue's board secretary and occasional foster mom to rescue pigs, was telling me the other day that she had to do some repairs on her C&C cage to deal with a leaky spot.

Now, I've never had any delusions that these cages are indestructible but do know they're tough stuff. Makes me wonder what those pigs of Ellen's are doing in there all day. Must be some rowdy pigs!

[Just kidding]

Anyhoo, she tells me she fixed the cage as follows:

• gave the coroplast a thorough cleaning and drying
• put packing tape on the outside where the pigs couldn't chew at it (I imagine that 3M's super-strength clear packing tape would be a good choice)
• spread non-toxic Elmer's Glue on the inside of each corner
• allowed the cage to dry a full 24 hours before putting bedding and pigs back in

It's certainly a low-cost repair. I'll be interested to hear from Ellen how long that glue holds up, or from anyone else who's tried this kind of repair. Especially someone whose pigs tend to use one or two corners as their "designated bathrooms."

[Thanks for the tip, Ellen.]

10 Things That Guinea Pigs Should Not Eat

Adrienne Carlson recently shared with me a link to her article "25 Common Foods That Can Be Toxic For Your Pet." The article is mainly geared to dogs and cats (and I encourage you to share the link with your pet-owning friends) but there's a lot on this list that applies to guinea pigs as well.

The following foods are poisonous to guinea pigs:

• potato sprouts, potato peelings, and anything to do with a potato plant
• beans and anything to do with a bean plant
• anything to do with a tomato plant (the tomato itself is okay)
• anything to do with rhubarb
• dill (watch out for prepackaged "salad & herb" kits)
• flowers or any part of a flowering plant
• houseplants
• unidentified weeds
• any foods that were previously frozen
• fruit cores, pits, and seeds
  

For a lengthy list of plants that are poisonous to guinea pigs, check out Karen Bawoll's book, "A New Owner's Guide to Guinea Pigs." The ASPCA also has an all-species list of 17 common poisonous plants. 

I do want to point out two items on Adrienne's list that are actually okay for guinea pigs in limited quantities and fed only occasionally: broccoli and (seedless) grapes.

As a final aside, if you or someone you know own dogs, cats, or horses, the ASPCA also has a database of toxic plants geared to those species. It's definitely another link to pass along. 

Chuckles From A Poetry Book

My friend Diana sent me a book she'd found at a book sale at her son's school, titled "Oh, Theodore!" by Susan Katz. This illustrated collection of verse promises that readers will "discover the work involved in caring for a pet...But it hardly seems like work once your pet becomes your best friend." The book was published in 2007 but this is the first I've heard of it. The illustrator perfectly captured some classic guinea-pig mannerisms. The author based Theodore on her son's guinea pig, who "liked to join in family conversations, especially if they contained the word lettuce." (Yep, she's got the species pegged. Definitely enslaved by a guinea pig.)

As I leafed through the pages filled with cute illustrations of the brown-haired guinea pig named Theodore, I had to chuckle over some of the entries. How many of us can relate to this verse:

THEO-DOOR

Open

the kitchen door.

Theodore sits.

Open

the cupboard door.

Theodore sits.

But open

the refrigerator door.

Here comes Theodore!

Later in the book came a verse that will resonate, in particular, with folks who have older guinea pigs:

SPRING STROLL

Out to the yard

we go.

But I don't

take Theodore

for a walk.

I take him

for a sit.

The verse is accompanied by an illustration of Theodore and his young owner sitting outside on the grass, facing each other as if to say, "Okay, now what?" It's followed by another funny (and familiar) verse, titled "Lucky":

I'm the one

who found 

a four-leaf clover.

But Theodore's

the one

who ate it.

The book is suitable for beginning readers, and can be found online through e-tailers like Amazon and through your local bookstore. As with most books, we found a couple of things portrayed in the illustrations that we don't agree with -- but we'll get into that in another post at another time. For now, we'll look at it for what it is: a good concept with cute illustrations that will (hopefully) encourage beginning readers to read it on their own, and younger kids to ask Mom and Dad to read it to them (again and again).