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Post by catnut on Nov 23, 2023 13:36:04 GMT -8
i replied to your other post, is it loose or gone? you can crush his usual food in a bag, then a rolling pin or something to crush it like a hammer. You can also wet some oats and give him some of that, just don't give him too much wet foods. Just see what he can eat and look on the safe foods for gerbils on here.
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Post by LilyandDaisy on Nov 23, 2023 15:33:27 GMT -8
It does look like he's having some trouble with his mouth or teeth. The rubbing of his mouth and gaping is a big giveaway. If his food has pellets in it, you try soaking those in water, or oats as suggested above. Personally I wouldn't worry about feeding too much wet food though because gerbils adjust their water intake according to how much water they're getting in their food. You could also try baby food, especially a fruit-based one.
Sometimes when gerbils have mouth issues they find it too painful to even eat soft foods and they prefer things they can just lick up without chewing at all. If this is the case, you could try feeding peanut butter diluted with water (don't give a lump of straight peanut butter - it's a choking hazard), or even jam or honey just to give him some energy until his mouth is better. You can also feed malt paste sold for ferrets, dogs, or cats, if you have access to that.
Is the top tooth pointing outwards? It might have broken at the base and be about to fall out. What you could try is when you're holding your gerbil and can see the tooth, get a matchstick or something similar and give the tooth a very, very gentle nudge. Don't use any force at all, just the slightest of taps to see if the tooth just needs a little help to fall out.
If the top tooth falls out or is pointing the wrong way, you need to keep an eye on the bottom teeth as without a top tooth to grind against, they can grow too long. If this happens you'll to take your gerbil to the vet to get it trimmed. Sometimes a broken tooth won't grow back at all and then the gerbil might need regular tooth trimming for life.
My gerbil Twiglet broke her top tooth when she was a couple of months old. I've no idea how it happened, but one day she was doing the same thing with her mouth that your gerbil is doing, and she had lost weight. Her top tooth was hanging out of her mouth and by giving it a very gentle nudge as mentioned above, I will able to get it to fall out. She didn't want to eat even soft foods for a couple of days and I had to feed her on malt paste and a high calorie syrup. Fortunately, the tooth grew back normally and she's never had any tooth problems since.
Hopefully it will also be a temporary thing with your gerbil and he'll be back to normal soon. We'd love to hear how he gets on.
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Post by LilyandDaisy on Nov 23, 2023 17:36:38 GMT -8
i have an update, i checked his teeth and here’s what i saw: ibb.co/thTRM1bnot sure why his fur looks so greasy but anyway, you can see that his top two teeth (i think ?) are overgrown. what can i do about this?? at least one of them looks bent out of shape to me as well.. I think you need to take him to a vet to have his teeth trimmed. They do look quite overgrown and I think they are beyond the point where he would be able to wear them down himself. He will probably struggle to even eat soft foods with his teeth as they are.
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Post by LilyandDaisy on Nov 23, 2023 18:42:30 GMT -8
I think you need to take him to a vet to have his teeth trimmed. They do look quite overgrown and I think they are beyond the point where he would be able to wear them down himself. He will probably struggle to even eat soft foods with his teeth as they are. i’m going to call them tomorrow. do you have any experience trimming gerbil teeth yourself? i’ve heard it can be done at home with the proper equipment but i have a few concerns with that, mainly that i would be afraid of causing him excessive pain by trimming his teeth while not under anesthesia. as far as i know though, gerbils don’t have any nerve endings in that part of their teeth..(?) i’ve seen people do it on various rodent teeth with no issues, but i’ve also read that it can be dangerous. i would be willing to take him to the vet the first time, but i read that in some cases (such as malocclusion) they would need to be trimming every few weeks and if that’s the case i can’t be spending however much that costs (knowing where i live it’s probably a ridiculous amount of money) every few weeks for teeth trimming and hence would look into possibly doing it myself in the future. if i do have to take him in i was planning on asking the vet to teach me how to do it in case it needs to be done again. any thoughts on that? also, some other symptoms i’ve noticed are that he has started to scratch near his mouth area occasionally and sometimes rub his mouth on things. Some people have managed to trim front teeth themselves, though it's not something I've ever done myself. I believe Thea has. The tooth trimming itself doesn't hurt them because it's like cutting fingernails. I think it's probably better to have it done by a vet the first time, and if necessary then you could try yourself next time when it's less urgent. Right now they're severely overgrown and need immediate attention, but if they start growing back again in the futureyou could practice by trimming small amounts at a time. I can understand your concerns about it becoming a regular thing. When my gerbil broke her tooth at such a young age, I was so worried about that too. But fortunately her tooth grew back perfectly. Hopefully your gerbil's will too.
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Post by LilyandDaisy on Nov 23, 2023 18:44:00 GMT -8
oh and also, i gave him some of my cooked pasta and corn as soon as i realized he may not be eating hard food since it was the only thing i had on hand. he ate it all up lol! it did have butter on it though. is that okay to continue feeding him or should i make something healthier? I wouldn't worry too much about healthy foods right now. As long as it's not dangerous for him, let him have what he's able and willing to eat. Butter has lots of calories which is what he needs right now.
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Post by angel on Nov 23, 2023 19:20:28 GMT -8
oh and also, i gave him some of my cooked pasta and corn as soon as i realized he may not be eating hard food since it was the only thing i had on hand. he ate it all up lol! it did have butter on it though. is that okay to continue feeding him or should i make something healthier? I wouldn't worry too much about healthy foods right now. As long as it's not dangerous for him, let him have what he's able and willing to eat. Butter has lots of calories which is what he needs right now. perfect!! thank you for all your advice, i will post an update in this thread later on
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Post by angel on Nov 24, 2023 12:34:02 GMT -8
update: thankfully i was able to get him in to a vet today. she did a brief exam, trimmed his teeth and told me that his teeth are loose and bleeding and that he has gingivitis. i now have to give him medacam (for pain relief) and antibiotics to help get rid of the infection. she said that best case scenario his teeth will go back to normal and worst case scenario he may need to have them extracted, all depending on how they heal. i don’t know the probability of each outcome but we are hoping for the best!!
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Post by angel on Nov 25, 2023 11:27:53 GMT -8
i have another update… after the trimming, the angle of his teeth went back to normal (kind of), they are actually overlapping now as opposed to having a gap in between them. now i’m scared that they will set in that way and continue growing overlapped. his teeth are still normal colour and as far as i know as not showing any indication of falling out, but the vet did say that they were loose so i’m really not sure if i should touch them. should i try to nudge the overlapped tooth back into place? or just leave them be??
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Post by catnut on Nov 25, 2023 14:43:38 GMT -8
i would try to nudge them but don't use too much force, like with a toothpick or something to see if they will move.
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Post by LilyandDaisy on Nov 26, 2023 14:22:32 GMT -8
i have another update… after the trimming, the angle of his teeth went back to normal (kind of), they are actually overlapping now as opposed to having a gap in between them. now i’m scared that they will set in that way and continue growing overlapped. his teeth are still normal colour and as far as i know as not showing any indication of falling out, but the vet did say that they were loose so i’m really not sure if i should touch them. should i try to nudge the overlapped tooth back into place? or just leave them be?? They may straighten out as they grow. I'd leave them for now but check them every day.
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Post by angel on Nov 26, 2023 19:57:49 GMT -8
i have another update… after the trimming, the angle of his teeth went back to normal (kind of), they are actually overlapping now as opposed to having a gap in between them. now i’m scared that they will set in that way and continue growing overlapped. his teeth are still normal colour and as far as i know as not showing any indication of falling out, but the vet did say that they were loose so i’m really not sure if i should touch them. should i try to nudge the overlapped tooth back into place? or just leave them be?? They may straighten out as they grow. I'd leave them for now but check them every day. i didn’t try to mess with them at all out of fear that i might hurt him or make it worse 😬 in hindsight i’m glad i didn’t touch them because they ended up just falling out. i don’t know what to do now!! is there a chance of them growing back or has he just lost his teeth for good?
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Post by TJ's Rodent Ranch on Nov 26, 2023 20:13:25 GMT -8
Oh my gosh, I'm so sorry... I honestly don't know, but my immediate thought would be that once the root has left, and the whole tooth has come out it probably won't grow back. If they're gone for good, you can probably keep him on a liquid diet, and for life that should work for him. Obviously, you may not be able to feed him several times a day like this, and if you're not you could put the liquid diet in a water bottle with a loose ball to let slow-flowing stuff through. You could also make a seed and vegetable paste that you put in a little bowl for him that he could just mash with his tongue. But if you went with either of these you'd have to change both out probably once a day since these aren't shelf-stable foods. Anyway, someone might be along with better news about his teeth. I'm so sorry to hear that, but I hope he gets better.
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Post by catnut on Nov 27, 2023 15:07:50 GMT -8
it depends if the root is gone or not, you will just need to make sure he is eating and see if they grow back- i had one gerbil lose a tooth and it did grow back normally but took afew days to see them, i was soo relieved!
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Post by angel on Nov 29, 2023 10:20:34 GMT -8
Oh my gosh, I'm so sorry... I honestly don't know, but my immediate thought would be that once the root has left, and the whole tooth has come out it probably won't grow back. If they're gone for good, you can probably keep him on a liquid diet, and for life that should work for him. Obviously, you may not be able to feed him several times a day like this, and if you're not you could put the liquid diet in a water bottle with a loose ball to let slow-flowing stuff through. You could also make a seed and vegetable paste that you put in a little bowl for him that he could just mash with his tongue. But if you went with either of these you'd have to change both out probably once a day since these aren't shelf-stable foods. Anyway, someone might be along with better news about his teeth. I'm so sorry to hear that, but I hope he gets better. thank you for those ideas, i didn’t think of using a water bottle! i did take a look at his teeth again and it looks like they are growing back, although not necessarily very straight. they look a bit crooked to me. i’m hoping they will straighten out but if not, at least he will have teeth! i’m so happy 😄
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Post by LilyandDaisy on Nov 29, 2023 10:27:10 GMT -8
Oh my gosh, I'm so sorry... I honestly don't know, but my immediate thought would be that once the root has left, and the whole tooth has come out it probably won't grow back. If they're gone for good, you can probably keep him on a liquid diet, and for life that should work for him. Obviously, you may not be able to feed him several times a day like this, and if you're not you could put the liquid diet in a water bottle with a loose ball to let slow-flowing stuff through. You could also make a seed and vegetable paste that you put in a little bowl for him that he could just mash with his tongue. But if you went with either of these you'd have to change both out probably once a day since these aren't shelf-stable foods. Anyway, someone might be along with better news about his teeth. I'm so sorry to hear that, but I hope he gets better. thank you for those ideas, i didn’t think of using a water bottle! i did take a look at his teeth again and it looks like they are growing back, although not necessarily very straight. they look a bit crooked to me. i’m hoping they will straighten out but if not, at least he will have teeth! i’m so happy 😄 It's so good to hear they're growing back! If they're pointed slightly inwards, sometimes the pressure from the adjacent tooth will help them straighten out as they grow (a bit like wearing braces).
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