Guinea Pig Product Review: Small Pet Select Loofah rolls

While Valentine's Day is still a couple weeks away, there's never a wrong time to show love for your guinea pig! Whether it's a nice pet on our heads, or a new chew toy to sink our teeth into, gestures of affection are almost always appreciated.

Today, we're reviewing another toy from Small Pet Select to let you know if its a good way to show your piggy appreciation: the Loofah roll! They describe this toy as follows: "Loofah is nature's floss for rabbits and piggies!  Terrific for giving those teeth a great workout, loofah also provides a totally different and interesting chew texture for the buns and the guinea piggies."

Will we find it as interesting to chew on as they claim?

Bite!

Munch!

Sniff!

Nibble!

We got to say that this was a pretty cool texture, and it was in fact fun to chew on! But what exactly is a loofah (also spelled "luffa")? According to Wikipedia, it is the fruit of a vine plant which "may be allowed to mature and used as a bath or kitchen sponge after being processed to remove everything but the network of xylem fibers." The family of plants that it belongs to includes many foods that guinea pigs can eat, including squash, watermelon, and cucumber. In addition, no safety concerns were mentioned on the guinea pig forums that we saw, and we have a generally favorable view of Small Pet Select as a company. Therefore, we're pretty sure loofah (or "luffa") is safe.

We also looked at other reviews for this product, and wanted to note a couple things that others mentioned:

1. "I've used it to stuff healthy treats... into. This keeps him working to get to the treats, which he can smell through the loofah!"--Nice idea which could make this toy even more fun.
2. "This is a massive hair magnet! My bunnies like them, but I find I toss them out because they get all gross with bunny hair. I've yet to find a good way to remove bunny hair from a loofah!"--We haven't experienced this with ours, but wanted to note this as a possible problem anyway. (Maybe it's a long-hair vs. short-hair issue?)

We give Small Pet Select Loofah rolls 5/5 stars!

Guinea Pig Product Review: Small Pet Select Meadow Ball

'Tis the season to buy cool stuff for your loved ones! And yes, that should include your guinea pigs. We are part of your family, after all, and if you get us the right gift, you'll see as much excitement on our faces as a human child when they rip open their gifts on whichever holiday you celebrate. But how will you know what the right gift is? Fear not, because we have guinea pig product reviews going back years now, and we're about to add yet another one!

Today, we're reviewing another toy from Small Pet Select's toy sampler: the Meadow Ball. Small Pet Select describes the Meadow Ball as: "Lucious meadow grass, all twisted and wrapped into a ball of fun goodness. What is better than a treat you can eat and play with too? Healthy high fiber, totally safe. This toy is great for chewing and tossing, and you might even see more than one cavy playing with it at a time." Sounds great from the description, but will this toy be a holiday-do or a holiday don't?

Do I want to chew on this?

I think I do want to chew on this.

And give it a little toss! Wow, the description was right.

Similar to the Honeysuckle Ring, I was interested in playing with this toy, but Lola wouldn't even come near it. (Come on, Lola. Live a little!) However, I didn't play with it as long as the ring. Something about the ring was just more fun to chew on, and your neck muscles get tired pretty quickly trying to toss this thing around.

So what's the verdict? We give it 3.5/5 stars--it's a holiday-maybe!

Guinea Pig Product Review: Small Pet Select Honeysuckle Ring

Hi loyal readers! We have to apologize for not filling your lives with tales from our cage lately. It's a mistake we're fixing right now, because we're finally back! Today, we're reviewing Small Pet Select's Honeysuckle Ring, which we got as part of their the toy sampler. We've often been underwhelmed by the guinea pig toys we've gotten in the past, but we think this one is a keeper! (At least, I do. Lola didn't seem too interested in it.)

This seems fun to chew on.

And fun to step on.

Look what I can do!

Lola missed out on all the fun. Too bad for her! I'll give the Honeysuckle Ring 4/5 stars; I think it's lots of fun, but apparently not every piggy thinks so (or will even give it a chance to see if it's fun!).

Product Review: Supreme Petfood's Science Selective Guinea Pig Food

Hello there, readers. The humans recently went away on travel, and as we discussed in our post on guinea pigs and airplanes, it's usually best not to take your guinea pig with you on flights. Therefore, we were boarded at the vet until they get back, which is a little like going on vacation for us. There's all kinds of exotic sights and sounds to see there. (We honestly don't get why humans like exotic sights and sounds so much. They're a little scary, seeing as how they could indicate predators!)

Anyway, while we were being dropped off, we saw samples of a new guinea pig food called Science Selective, so we decided to make time for a new product review since we knew we'd have plenty of time. We couldn't even wait until we got home to try them, so the humans fed them to us in our travel carriers.

We like how the packaging looks. That doesn't really factor into our rating, though.

I'll try some!

She will too!

It tasted pretty good, although it was a little hard to stay focused on the merits of the product while we're in the midst of such anxiety-provoking change. But there are other considerations besides just taste, of course. We also have to look at the ingredients, which include the following: Alfalfa meal, whole wheat, wheat feed, soybean hulls, soybean meal, flaked peas, linseed, sugar beet pulp, soybean oil, fennel seeds, monocalcium phosphate, calcium carbonate, dried dandelion, dried nettle.

Here are some concerns about some of these ingredients:

• Alfalfa - Appropriate for young and pregnant guinea pigs, but not for general adult use. It has high levels of calcium, which can lead to stones. The product information page does say that it contains "Calcium 0.8%, Phosphorus 0.5%," which means that it falls within the recommended ratio of calcium to phosphorous of 1.5:1 to 2:1. However, even if the ratio seems good, we'd still be concerned about the total amounts of calcium and phosphorous being too high, even if the ratio is good.
• Beet pulp - "Considered low-quality fiber that can clog the villi of the intestine"
• Fennel seeds, Soybean oil - Seeds and oils are too high in fat, and often come from seed byproducts with little or no nutritive value
• Calcium carbonate - As we've previously noted, we're having a tough time reaching a decision on this one. Oxbow uses it, and they use an advisory board of scientists and vets, but some have raised concerns about it anyway.

Unfortunately, due to these ingredient concerns, we're going to have to only give Science Selective Guinea Pig Food 2/5 stars. There are worse foods out there so we won't give it our lowest rating, but you can certainly do better. We're going to stick with our Oxbow pellets!

Product Review: Carefresh Colorful Creations, Orange

Hi there, loyal readers! I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving with your humans. (If you're in the United States, anyway. I know we have international readers as well who might not celebrate.) Thanksgiving is a good time for guinea pigs. We aren't carnivores, so we have no interest in turkey, but there are lots of fruits and veggies that humans often cook that we can eat: butternut squash, green beans, cranberries, and  so on. Make sure you wheek as loud as you can if you your humans aren't giving you some food you're allowed to have! They mean well, but they sometimes get too wrapped up in their own business and need a little reminder that we love food, too!

After all that Thanksgiving feasting, you'll need a nice place to lounge around, digest, and eventually do your business. That's when you'll appreciate having quality bedding in your cage. Which brings us to today's product review: Orange Carefresh Colorful Creations.

It's so orange.

Looks inviting in the little cage. And I think it will match my patches of tan fur.

Here's the description for this product :

"Carefresh Colorful Creations Small Animal Bedding allows you to create a fun and vibrant living space for your small pet while keeping him comfortable and dry. This colorful bedding made from natural paper fibers can match your room decor, show your favorite team's colors, or allow you to come up with a creative design of your own. However you choose to use it, you will create a unique and aesthetically pleasing atmosphere for your small pet to live in."

We have reviewed several types of Carefresh bedding products before, including ones whose main selling point was their color. As with the other Carefresh colorful beddings, the bedding itself works great, and it looks fun:

Time to dive in and test it.

Also, it's quite comfortable to lounge around on. However, bright orange isn't a very good color for hiding the evidence of your Thanksgiving overindulgence, if you catch my drift.

We'll give Carefresh Colorful Creations, Orange 4.5/5 stars!

Product Review: Cuddy Cavies Creations Pokemon Go Costumes

Longtime readers might remember several years back when Lola (1) and Buffy entered a costume contest with costumes from Cuddly Cavies Creations, and won second place. With Halloween just around the corner, the humans decided that it might be nice to get us some new costumes. We don't really get why Halloween is so exciting to humans, but sometimes you just have to play along for their sake. I suppose Buffy and Lola (1) did look great in their costumes. But if the humans really want us to get excited about Halloween, they should give us some treats that we're allowed to eat, like pumpkin.

Anyway, Cuddly Cavies Creations has some new Pokemon costumes that I think a lot of humans will go crazy for. Have you heard about this Pokemon Go craze? It's apparently some big thing where humans will stand around on street corners, staring at their phones and trying to find and catch little creatures by throwing special balls at them. Humans, if we agree to put on these Pokemon costumes, you better not throw anything at us! Deal?

And some fussing (and biting), the humans got us into the costumes:

Top: I'm looking "hot" in my "Charmander-pig" costume! Bottom: Lola's looking adorable in her "Pig-achu" costume.

Costumes are no fun to put on. I'm a bit more relaxed about it, but Lola ended up getting a little nippy. We recommend that you have two humans put on the costumes; one who can support our feet, while the other can snap closed the Velcro. Also, make sure you listen to your guinea pig. If it seems like your guinea pig is getting too stressed out, give up on putting on the costume. It's not worth upsetting us over a few cute pictures.

Despite our complaints about having costumes put on us, we have to admit that we looked great once they're on. We give these costumes 5/5 stars!

Product Review: Small Pet Select Meadow Ball

One thing we've learned from running this blog is that there are a fair amount of ball-shaped guinea pig toys out there. We've reviewed at least two types of willow balls, for instance. There's probably a third willow ball out there somewhere we could have reviewed, but we like to mix it up around here. Therefore, we're reviewing a different type of ball today: Small Pet Select's Meadow Ball. Their online listing says: "Lucious meadow grass, all twisted and wrapped into a ball of fun goodness. What is better than a treat you can eat and play with too?  Healthy high fiber, totally safe."

The humans opened the box during floor time, and they immediately got our attention!

Is this where the expression "having a ball" comes from? It's from guinea pigs chewing on toys like this, right?

Next, the humans dropped off the ball in Lola's cage. (They're still trying to integrate Lola into our little group, but it hasn't quite worked out yet.) Lola took one look at the ball and ran back to her pigloo! That poor piggy finds the world to be an incredibly scary place, and is not a fan of unfamiliar things.

We'll give Small Pet Select Meadow Ball 4/5 stars. As far as we can tell, it's made out of safe, good-quality materials, and two of us had fun chewing on it. But I suppose we have to take off a star since Lola found it scary.

Product Review: Oxbow Simple Rewards Baked Treats with Peppermint

I wouldn't be surprised if, after all the types of Oxbow Simple Rewards we've tried already (including Apple and Banana, Bell Peppers, Carrot and Dill, Cranberry, Cranberry-Rosemary, Lavender-Chamomile, Papaya Medley, Timothy Treats, and Veggie Treats... and possibly others we've forgotten about!) that there weren't any new ones left to try. Well, it turns out there is! Today, we're reviewing Oxbow Simple Rewards Baked Treats with Peppermint, which our humans found at the vet's office the last time they refilled Buffy's medicine.

New Oxbow treats!

Good job, humans! Even though we weren't crazy about mint leaves, we tend to love Oxbow treats, so we have a pretty good feeling about this one.

Lola is still being fed separately because Broccoli and her haven't been able to settle their drama yet. She seems to like it. Our turn now!

I hope you're giving him a smaller one than you're giving me!

Chomp!

Although we hated mint leaves, the minty flavor in these treats is much milder. We loved them! 5/5 stars!

Product Review: Vitakraft Sunseed AnimaLovens Cookies with Cranberry-Orange Flavor

It's time for yet another suspected bad product review, where we investigate a product we suspect of being good before we have the humans buy it for us. (So far, all our suspicions have been correct, and the humans haven't actually gone back and bought any.) This time, we're reviewing Sunseed AnimaLovens Cookies with Cranberry-Orange Flavor. Anyone care to place a bet on whether we'll finally send the humans back to the store this time?

I bet a carrot slice this won't be the one.

As usual with suspected bad products, we're going to have to take a look at the ingredients:

A lot of these look familiar from previous suspected bad product reviews.

Here we go again:

• Ground Corn - Although guinea pigs can eat corn, the diet expert at guineapigcages.com and Guinea Lynx states that, regarding "Corn products (including corn bran, corn germ, corn gluten, ground corn, etc.) There is no legal definition of 'corn' alone in animal feed, so it may be any combination of products. Corn is not a normal feed for cavies, may contribute to allergies, and can be high in fat and certain sugars/starch depending on the product. Additionally, some corn is contaminated with deadly aflatoxin which can cause liver failure and death.)"
• Sugar - Guinea pigs should not have excess sugar. If you feed us the right amount of fruits and veggies, we'll get the right amount of natural sugars. We don't need added sugars in our treats.
• Vegetable oil - GuineaLynx forum says that nuts, seeds and oils are "too high in fat and protein, not a natural food source, often present in animal feeds in seed byproducts that have little to no nutrient value."
• Calcium carbonate - This is an ingredient we have a tough time deciding if it's okay or not. On the one hand, Oxbow uses it in some of their products, and Oxbow uses an advisory board of veterinarians and scientists to develop their products. On the other hand, some people on guineapigcages.com have expressed concern about Oxbow's use of calcium carbonate in their pellets.

Honestly, we've seen worse treat products out there, but this still isn't good. We're still giving this one 1/5 stars. (If you took the bet, you owe us a carrot!)

Product Review: Ecotrition Yogies Treats

It's time for another suspected bad product review. Sadly, there seems to be no shortage of junk products for guinea pigs out there, so we have plenty of material to post about. We'd rather be telling you about awesome products, but hopefully our bad product reviews will save some guinea pigs from eating things they shouldn't be eating.

Today we're reviewing Ecotrition Yogies Treats:

What the heck are those pink globs?

As usual with suspected bad products, we had the humans take pictures at the store and then we researched the product. If our research found nothing wrong with it, then we'd send the humans back out to buy it. However, it was pretty obvious in this case that Yogies are filled with garbage ingredients:

That's what's in the pink globs? Are you kidding me?

Let's review a few of these ingredients :

• Sugar - Guinea pigs should not have excess sugar. If you feed us the right amount of fruits and veggies, we'll get the right amount of natural sugars. We don't need added sugars in our treats.
• Palm Oil - Not only is it high in fat, but has negative environmental impacts.
• Dried yogurt, cultured skim milk - Guinea pigs should not be fed dairy products.
• Red Dye 40 - Artificial colors are another ingredient that guinea pigs should not eat. This includes red dye 40, which some say is bad for you. 
• Titanium Dioxide - Another questionable ingredient. One source says: "Taken internally, it has been shown to cause kidney damage in mice and to induce small intestine inflammation."

It should come as no surprise that we're giving Ecotrition Yogies 1/5 stars. We much prefer carrots!

Book Review: Guinea Pig Pride & Prejudice

We don't usually do book reviews on Cavy Savvy. Unlike blogs. books are made of paper, and paper is way too tempting to chew on. However. today we're going to make an exception this time and review A Guinea Pig Pride & Prejudice.

The original Pride and Prejudice, according to Wikipedia, "is a novel of manners by Jane Austen, first published in 1813. The story follows the main character, Elizabeth Bennet, as she deals with issues of manners, upbringing, morality, education, and marriage in the society of the landed gentry of the British Regency."

Is it just us, or is anyone else starting to feel a little sleepy just from reading that sentence? And the actual text of the story isn't any better. Fortunately. in the guinea pig version, we have pictures of guinea pigs in costumes to liven up this musty old story:

Adorable!

We would have preferred a more interesting story, and frankly don't understand why the original Pride and Prejudice did so well among so many humans. Fortunately, we do understand and appreciate the great guinea pig costumes in the guinea pig version! We'll give Guinea Pig Pride & Prejudice 4 out of 5 stars!

Product Review: All Living Things Bottle Brush

As we've mentioned before, we're not very happy with the water bottle we currently have because it's hard for the humans to clean. It's unpleasant to hear our humans complain about how hard it is to reach deep down into the bottle to clean out the gunk that accumulates. We've tried getting flip-top water bottles before, which should have solved the problem, but which leaked so badly that they were unusable.

The humans brought home All Living Things Bottle Brush the other day in order to make cleaning our current water bottle easier without buying one of those leaky flip-top water bottles. (It could have just been the brand. If anyone can recommend any reliable flip-top bottles, please let us know in the comments section.)

Can this brush prevent the humans from complaining about how hard our water bottle is to clean?

Today, the humans gave it a shot.

Looks a lot easier now.

The brush bristles moved, allowing the thicker end to fit easily into the bottle. Because it was so wide, the humans were able to wipe off all that hard-to-reach gunk in under a minute. Therefore, we're very happy with this thing. There's also a smaller brush that's designed to clean the drinking tube on the water bottle. The humans had trouble making it fit in our water bottles' drinking tube.

For making our humans' lives easier, thereby saving our delicate ears from human grumbling and cursing, we're going to give All Living Things Bottle Brush 5/5 stars!

Product Review: Critical Care with Apple and Banana

Most of the products we review are intended for use by all guinea pigs (whether or not they should actually be used by them, or will actually be enjoyed by them, is a separate question). Today's review will be of a different kind of product: Oxbow Critical Care, Apple Banana flavor. As the package states, this product is a "premium recovery food which can given to herbivores with poor nutritional status resulting from illness or surgery."

I do like Oxbow, apples, and bananas. But not being sick.

I'd probably prefer it if I didn't have to use a product like this, but seeing as how I was diagnosed with uterine cancer, this product has made a huge difference. It's really helped to keep my weight stable.

Critical Care comes in a powder, which has to be mixed with water into a soupy paste before you use it.

The humans have learned to only give me one unit of the syringe at a time, and then wait a while for me to finish eating it before giving more. Any more than that, and it will spill out of my mouth. They then try to wipe off my chin with a tissue, and I can't help but trying to eat the tissue, which frustrates and baffles the humans. (Have you ever tried chewing on a tissue? They're loads of fun to chew! I guess it's just a guinea pig things that humans don't understand. Like how we don't get you humans chewing gum.)

It's not bad.

Critical Care is definitely no carrot--I wouldn't recommend just eating it as a treat. But as a guinea pig food for medical purposes, it works great. The taste is okay, and more importantly, it helps me keep my weight up; my weight had gone down to 607 grams at one point, and now I'm able to keep it at around 800 grams. And for this very important reason, Critical Care with Apple and Banana gets 5/5 stars!

Product Review: Grreat Choice Small Pet Chew Ring

That's not a typo in the post title--at least, not on our part. The company that makes this is product is actually called "Grreat Choice," because nothing says you've chosen well than buying from a company with a typo in their name.

Okay, maybe we're not being fair. We shouldn't judge a product just based on the company name, right? It could turn out to be a great product. A "grreat" product, even. (Sorry, couldn't help ourselves!)

Anyway, today we're reviewing Grreat Choice Small Pet Chew Ring, which claims to "support positive chewing behaviors" and "help reduce boredom." Let's check it out:

Do I want to chew on this thing?

Nah, I'm not interested, and neither is she.

When the humans saw that neither of us were interested, they hung it up in our cage in case we'd change our minds. We didn't. We'll give this product 2/5 stars since just like the Kaytee layer cakes, it seems to be safe to chew on, but we just have no interest in doing so. 

Product Review: Kaytee layer cakes

Today we're reviewing Kaytee layer cakes, which we received through Piggies Paradise. These are chew toys that are supposed to "provide a hard source for gnawing and trimming teeth." You may be wondering if Buffy can fairly review a product like this when she's feeling sick, but don't worry. The medicine is helping her feel a bit more like her old self, and I saw her chewing on the log chew toy recently. If these chew toys are any good, she'll probably want to chew on them, too.

Wood chew toys are generally safe as long as they aren't shiny or smooth, which indicates they're coated in a sealant.

Doesn't look like sealants were used.

We're not interested. Got any food for us?

These chew toys just don't interest us. They do look nice, though, so we're thinking we'll leave them in the cage as holiday decorations. We give Kaytee layer cakes 2 out 5 stars!

Product Review: Higgins Sunburst Forage Pies with Carrots and Alfalfa Hay

Today, we're reviewing the the second item from our November Piggies Paradise box: Higgins Sunburst Forage Pies with Carrots and Alfalfa Hay. As we mentioned before, Piggies Paradise is no longer in business, so we're going to take our time and review each product individually until we've run out of complimentary products to review.

Pies? I hear humans say good things about pies. Can we eat these things, or is this going to be just like the pizza treats all over again?

At this point, we're learned to be naturally suspicious of any treats that aren't from Oxbow, so we wanted to take a look at the ingredients before getting our hopes up:

Well, at least it's a much shorter list to look into than some other treats we've reviewed.

There are only 5 ingredients on the back. Unfortunately, some of them are concerning:

• Corn, Corn starch - The diet expert at guineapigcages.com and Guinea Lynx states that: "Corn products (including corn bran, corn germ, corn gluten, ground corn, etc. There is no legal definition of 'corn' alone in animal feed, so it may be any combination of products. Corn is not a normal feed for cavies, may contribute to allergies, and can be high in fat and certain sugars/starch depending on the product. Additionally, some corn is contaminated with deadly aflatoxin which can cause liver failure and death.)"
• Alfalfa - As we said in our Ask A Guinea Pig Post on the best hay: "Alfalfa hay is a legume hay, not a grass hay. Only give alfalfa hay to pregnant, nursing, or young guinea pigs under 6 months old. Alfalfa hay is too rich for adult guinea pigs because it contains high levels of calcium, and in excess can lead to health problems, such as bladder or kidney stones. Even if you have a young, pregnant or nursing guinea pig, certain piggies who are prone to stones or other medical conditions should not be given alfalfa hay."

We feel the same way about these treats as we did with the Power Snap treats: we've seen more egregious ingredient lists on treats before, so we're not going to give it the absolute lowest rating, but the ingredients are still not good. We might have even given these treats a higher rating if they acknowledged that only certain piggies (pregnant, nursing, young) should be eating alfalfa, but they don't say that. It just says "For guinea pigs." For all these reasons, we're giving Higgins Sunburst Forage Pies with Carrots and Alfalfa Hay 1.5/5 stars.

Product Review: Oxbow Simple Rewards Bakes Treats with Cranberry

We've had our eye on the new flavors of Oxbow Simple Rewards for a while now. We've already tried bell pepper, apple and banana, and carrot and dill. Now, thanks to the November Piggies Paradise box, we're able to try the cranberry kind just in time for Thanksgiving.

Speaking of Piggies Paradise, we have some sad news to share. We recently learned that they went out of business, so there weren't be any more monthly boxes to review. This is unfortunate; we thought the idea had potential, but it apparently just didn't catch on fast enough. Then again, we don't really understand human money and businesses; we just like the idea of treats and toys to review every month!

Since ordering the monthly subscription is not an option, we're just going to take our time with the products in this last box and review each individually.

We're thankful for the opportunity to try these, Piggies Paradise!

Now, let's dig in and review them!

Gimme! Gimme! Gimme!

Buffy is trying to be sneaking and eat hers without being seen. I still see you, Buffy. You're not very good at hiding.

As we've often said, keep in mind that treats like this are only supposed to be a small part of our diet, even if we beg for the entire bag. As long as you keep this in mind, these treats are great. Oxbow does it again--5/5 stars!

Product Review: National Geographic Power Snaps

We recently reviewed our first Piggies Paradise subscription box, but held off on reviewing one of the products inside of it until later: National Geographic Power Snaps. This was because this product had a long list of ingredients, so we knew it would take a little time to review, and we didn't want to hold up our Piggies Paradise review just for one product. Now, we're going to take a more in-depth look at Power Snaps.

Okay, let's see what's in these things.

There are a few ingredients in these treats we think are worth discussing:

• Sugar, corn syrup - As we originally mentioned in the Piggies Paradise review, these treats contain added sugar and corn syrup, and guinea pigs shouldn't be eating too much sugar.
• Dried plain beet pulp - According to the GuineaLynx, forum, this ingredient is "Considered low-quality fiber that can clog the villi of the intestine. Common in all animal feed since it is a byproduct of many human products."
• Flaked corn, Ground Corn - GuineaLynx forum says: "There is no legal definition of 'corn' alone in animal feed, so it may be any combination of products. Corn is not a normal feed for cavies, may contribute to allergies, and can be high in fat and certain sugars/starch depending on the product."
• Calcium carbonate - This is an ingredient we have a tough time deciding if it's okay or not. On the one hand, Oxbow uses it in some of their products, and Oxbow uses an advisory board of veterinarians and scientists to develop their products. On the other hand, some people on guineapigcages.com have expressed concern about Oxbow's use of calcium carbonate in their pellets, and thus have switched to KMS Hayloft pellets. 
• Dehydrated alfalfa meal - Alfalfa should generally be restricted to young (under 1 year) and pregnant or lactating guinea pigs due to high levels of calcium.
• Vegetable oil, ground flax seed - GuineaLynx forum says that nuts, seeds and oils are "too high in fat and protein, not a natural food source, often present in animal feeds in seed byproducts that have little to no nutrient value." 

For what it's worth, most of these ingredients that we found issues with weren't at the top of the list of ingredients, so there is probably not too much of them in each treat.

Unfortunately, we're not going to be able to do a taste test of these treats. We probably could have eaten a few and been fine. However, we decided we're better off not putting this stuff in our bodies when there are so many better treats out there. 

We're going to give National Geographic Power Snaps 1.5/5 stars; there are worse treats out there, but you can definitely do much better than these treats.

Product Review: KMS Hayloft Timothy Choice Guinea Pig Feed

Back when Lola was diagnosed with bladder stones/sludge, we started looking into what we could do to prevent her stones from getting any bigger. In our research, we saw that some people claimed that KMS Hayloft is even better than Oxbow when it comes to pellets that won't contribute to bladder stones. This also how KMS Hayloft markets their pellets; they claim: "The calcium/phosphorus levels are right in line with the current literature in keeping with urinary tract health." Therefore, we had our humans order the  KMS Hayloft pellets at the same time as they ordered the bluegrass hay.

The first thing we noticed was that there was some packaging issues. The pellets were in a plastic bag that tore inside the cardboard box from being pressed against the bluegrass hay.

Where did all the pellets go?

The humans had to dig around the side of the box in order to get the pellets for us. We didn't care too much, although our humans looked mildly frustrated by this.

Every morning, the humans would give us 1/4 cup (1/8 of a cup for each of us) in our bowl.

It's good stuff!

KMS Hayloft Guinea Pig Feed pellets tasted just as good as good as the Oxbow pellets in terms of taste. Both are a great way to start your day. We're not sure if these pellets made any difference in Lola's condition before she passed, but at least she enjoyed eating them with us. These pellets are a great choice for any piggy concerned about stones/sludge, although it would be nice if the packaging was a little less flimsy. 4.5/5 stars!

Product Review: Piggies Paradise Guinea Pig Subscription Box

Subscription boxes like Birchbox have really taken off. You can find a lot more than makeup and beauty products in them now. For example, there's one called Sock Panda where you can get socks mailed to you every month. There's also one called Bark Box that's full of treats and gifts for dogs. Now, there's even one for us called Piggies Paradise!

We heard of Piggies Paradise recently when the creator offered to let us try it out and review it. (We feel we should mention this in the interest of full disclosure, even though as long-time readers know, we've taken freebies and still given 1-star reviews before.)

Let's see what we got in here...

There were four different products inside the box. Buffy and I then debated what the best way to review this is since we usually just review one product at a time. We decided that we'll briefly review each item here (leaving open the possibility of a more in-depth review in a later post if we have more to say on them), and then finally give an overall review to Piggies Paradise.

Oxbow Vitamin C Supplement Tablets

Wow, these things smelled good! We knew we wanted them even before the humans took them out of the package.

Open it! Open it! Open it!

Once the humans opened it up and gave us each one, it turned out they tasted as good as they smelled. We think these things will be a great substitute for liquid vitamin C that needs to be fed through a syringe for when we have a pet-sitter. 5/5 stars!

All Living Things Bumble Bee Halloween Costume

I volunteered Buffy to try this one on:

You look great!

This bee look a bit annoyed with her costume on; it's a good thing that stinger wasn't real! Even though Buffy isn't crazy about wearing costumes, she looks so good that you've got to give this costume 5 stars!

National Geographic Small Animal Wood Wreath

We reviewed a somewhat similar product to this one in the past: the Busy Bunny's Chew Ring. There are some significant differences between that product and this one, however. This one has a wooden hook so it can hang down. This one has a thing ring of tiny logs, rather than a skinny strings of wood weaved together. This one also has a pine cone in the middle of it. (Pine cones are fine for guinea pigs as long as they have been sterilized.)

Yes, I see it.

This seemed like a fine product, but it just never captured our interest beyond a couple courtesy nibbles. 2/5 stars.

National Geographic Power Snap Small Animal Treats

Last up, we have some treats from National Geographic:

Is that granola?

On the plus side, this treat claims that "your purchase supports the conservation of animals and their habitats." However, there is a long list of ingredients on these treats, and a few of them gave us pause. Therefore, we'd like to hold off on reviewing these until we have enough time to do the research on these ingredients, and we'll do a separate post about it. For now, we'd just like to point out that the ingredients include sugar and corn syrup, and guinea pigs should not have too much sugar.

The Verdict on Piggies Paradise

Rating a subscription box like Piggies Paradise is tricky, because the "product" we're reviewing is actually a bundle of other products. Not only that, but it's also the concept of getting a bundle of products of a certain type (guinea pig products, in this case) on a regular basis. Not every product on this box was a home run; we weren't too excited by the wood wreath, for example. However, those Oxbow Vitamin C Supplement Tablets were amazing! We wanted to chew through the lid to get at those things! Based on what we've seen so far, we'll give Piggies Paradise 4.5 out of 5 stars for having a great concept and some products we liked, but also at least one product with at least one or two ingredients that weren't good.

We've been reviewing guinea pig products for a while now, and one thing we've learned is that you can't trust companies to only use safe, healthy ingredients/materials in their. We generally trust Oxbow to put out good products, but we've seen some real junk coming out of other companies, such as sickly-colored lollipop treats full of stuff we shouldn't eat, willow balls with random peanuts inside of them, and a grass tunnel with burlap unnecessarily added, which can cause digestive blockages. So Piggies Paradise has their work cut out for them, trying to find enough new things to put in the box without including unhealthy or dangerous products. Other than the treats with the added sugar, we think they're doing a great job so far, and hope they can keep it up! We'll keep reviewing Piggies Paradise boxes as we receive them and let you know our thoughts.

If you want to give Piggies Paradise a try, they've been nice enough to give a special coupon code for Cavy Savvy readers. The code is: CAVYSAVVY10 (in all caps). Their website is:

https://piggiesparadise.cratejoy.com/