Giardia

Well... turns out that Tex Buckaroo Hufflepuff is a sneaky one. Since I've had him, he's done a wonderful job of painting poop murals on the walls and mashing it into his wheel, so it's been difficult to get a good sample. I had brought what I could find to the vet previously... had to collect for days. And it came up negative. Since what I could see of his poops were nice and brown and he was active and maintaining weight, we figured we were in the clear. I dropped quarantine after a month.

This happy existence all changed when I found giant mushy diarrhea poops in his hedgiebag with him a few days ago. I scooped them up in a jar hoping it was just a fluke. Happened again the next day, so I scooped them up. I checked on Satin as I usually do and found her with messy poops. Scooped those up and called the vet. We made an appointment and I brought in both hedgies with A LOT of messy poo in small jars.

Guess what the vet found in Tex's poo? Yep. A nice smiley face. She noted it's very small and difficult to see, so it *might* not be giardia, but sure seemed like it to her... particularly given the symptoms and the absence of finding anything else. Satin's poo didn't turn up any, but we figure it's likely she has it too. Their poop looks identically bad... smells identically bad...

Poor little fuffers..

So now I'm super-duper cleaning EVERYTHING. And get to medicate two hedgies. Mind you, I've never seen the inside of Tex's mouth... he's just so private in his way (beyond spreading poop crumbles all over his wheel). So this should be a hoot.

They're both on meds for the next 5 days starting in 10 minutes... make that 9...

I tried a quick search for an "idiot's guide to giardia" but didn't have too much luck. Perhaps I'm a poor searcher. Any advice you can offer in terms of making sure I'm cleaning their belongings correctly would be much appreciated.