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Thread: acting different..eyes just opening

  1. #1
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    Question acting different..eyes just opening

    Hi everyone. My name is Greta and I am new to this board. I have successfully rehabbed baby birds but this is my first time with a baby squirrel. I found my little girl, along with her deceased siblings, on 8/13/22, in my back yard and she was injured so I brought her right in and got her warm and then hydrated. She was about 1 week old. I've been following this board for instructions on everything I've been doing and she has been doing great, up until yesterday. She started doing the guppy mouth and was very difficult to get out of the trance and I haven't been able to get all of her feedings into her. She weighed 140 grams a few days ago and I try to give her at least 7 ml. So..... This morning her eyes FINALLY started to open and I guess my concern is, do the babies get skiddish and have less appetite when their eyes first start to open? She isn't very interested in eating and she just wants to snuggle in my hands and sleep. She's still doing this guppy mouth thing, so I've tried feeding her a little more often because I can only get about 6 oz into her at a time. I don't want to lose her. Her name is Sandy and I'll try to post a photo of her from today. If I can figure it out
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  2. Serious fuzzy thank you's to Gretajean419 from:

    Chirps (09-08-2022)

  3. #2
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    Default Re: acting different..eyes just opening

    Oh, yes, eye opening can definitely cause spooky behavior. They can't focus very well at first, either, which probably doesn't help.

    Guppy Mouth . I swear there isn't anything wrong with her. YOU will probably be bonkers by the time she weans but SHE is fine. Nobody knows why some of them do this. My first squirrel did it like crazy and grew up to be a huge hunk of a squirrel man.

    You need to do two things. First, you have to stop feeding while they are gaping. It is an invitation to aspirating. Set a mug partway full of quite warm water by you and when the gaping starts, drop the feeding syringe tip down into the cup until he stops, then retrieve and start feeding again. Usually the formula cooling while they engage in this foolishness is why they don't want more.

    I started doing things to snap my boy out of it because he would just go on and on long after the nipple was out of his mouth. What worked best for me was taking the syringe out of his mouth and tapping him on the head with it - suddenly, out of nowhere. Not HARD of course and it had a nipple on the end, but the sudden, abrupt CHANGE in what was happening usually brought him back to earth.

    They seem to grow out of it if that helps. It does make feeding a marathon, though.

  4. Serious fuzzy thank you's to CritterMom from:

    Chirps (09-08-2022)

  5. #3
    Join Date
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    Default Re: acting different..eyes just opening

    I too am a first time squirrel Mom and my Myla was a pro at the Guppy Mouth (aka feeding trance) she literally would do it for over a minute at a time and sometimes longer. I would pull out the nipple and rub her head to no avail. I would tap her head, tap her back as if to burp her, still she would keep on with her shinanigans. Finally after about a week of taking FOREVER to feed her I decided to take a warm wet cotton ball and rub her face with it and it worked. Now that she's almost seven weeks old she doesn't do it anymore. It also took her five weeks to latch onto a nipple which made it a long process to feed her as well as the Guppy Mouth. But your baby will grow out of it and I assure you'll miss her doing it because when she does it you get to spend lots of time with her. My Myla chug's her milk and is off to the races lol Good luck and keep us posted.

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