Veggie of the Wheek: tomato

The veggie of the wheek is the tomato. Tomatoes come in many different shapes, small, big, sweet or less sweet. Above you can see a tomato cut in half. As there are four of us, we all get a quarter of the tomato.
We like tomatoes but our late friend Lotje used to adore tomatoes, watching her eat tomatoes was hilarious according to our slave. She would take a bite then her face get a disgusted look. But then she did like the taste and took another bite, get another disgusted look on her face and take another bite...

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Guinea Lynx' VEGETABLE CHART 100 gram portions	Percent Water	Energy (Kcal)	Protein (g)	Ascorbic Acid (C)	Calcium (mg)	Phosph. (mg)	Ca:P Ratio
Tomato	93.76	21	0.85	19.1	5	24	0.2:1

Source: http://www.guinealynx.info/diet_vegs.html

We don't get tomatoes often, but we do like them. Here you can see Chico enjoying a piece of tomato.

Here's some points to take notice of when feeding tomatoes:
1) Be sure to remove the green tomato plant tops, tomato plants are poisonous!
2) We just read that if you have big tomatoes you should remove the seeds. We never did that, but also don't get big tomatoes...
3) We are doubting whether tomatoes can be a bit acidic like apples, which are not nice to eat when you have a mouth sore.... and can even be the cause of mouth sores when given in large quantities!
4) We don't advise the really small very sweet tomatoes (also called snack tomatoes in the Netherlands) for your piggy, or at least in very small amounts, cause since they are so sweet they must be high in sugar! Which is not very good for piggies...

Okay, well I hope you enjoy tomatoes, do let us know how you eat them, and feel free to send in pictures or videos of you eating tomatoes (see the contribute tab on top of the page).

Halloween Pigture Report

Agent Butterloaf here - I was carefully watching from my pigloo of a setup that I overheard was for "a Halloween photo shoot." I remember from last year that meant I got to eat lots of parsley so I was excited. After a lot of setup outside of my house, I was picked up (I always squeak a lot so people know to be careful with my chubby self) and placed on a blanket with lots of parsley! My piggy buddy Flashbang Fatbottom got to join me too, he hung out in a cool box. We both ate a lot of parsley and when we were done we went back to our pigloos. I got to wear a fancy chapeau, too!

Agent Cannonball - Me was put into a box and couldn't find a treat at first. Me sat quietly but still no treat. So me ran around and bulldozed the entire set to find it, but me still couldn't find the treat! Then me was put back into my pigloo. Then me received treats! Finally!!

Halloween Pigtures

Agent Momma with her babies Ariel on the left and Agatha in the Pumpkin

Haven't the babies got big, we wonder how much they weigh now?


Agent Bumblebee in the Pumpkin and Agent Dinosaur in Front

They look like they enjoy halloween but do they like pumpkin?

Ghost

Halloween Report

Agent Big Red reporting.

 

Here is a Halloween pigture from the Piggyfriends. This piggy's name is Halloween as that was the day, in 2006, upon which our Slave went to collect him and his friend Hope. He is a Harlequin piggy.

 

You may notice that this is not a real pumpkin ( it would be hard NOT to notice ). Slave made this pumpkin in her pottery class many years ago. They were supposed to be making plain coiled pots but Slave improvised. She left it to dry, intending to glaze it the next week but the class was cancelled due to severe weather. When classes resumed, she found that the pottery teacher had "helped" by glazing everybody's work but she had used brown glaze instead of orange.

 

Slave didn't really mind as it meant that her pumpkin was ready to be lit and placed on our garden wall on October 31st. and the colour doesn't notice in the dark.

 

Slave first tasted pumpkin on a visit to the US and never wanted to repeat the experience ( no offence intended to you pumpkin lovers out there ) so we don't have pumpkin to eat.

 

When Slave was little, her granny always made a Halloween lantern out of a swede or turnip from the garden and Slave carries on this tradition. She celebrates this day as Samhain ( pronounced sowain ) which is the Celtic festival to mark the end of summer. Samhain means "summer's end" in Gaelic. It represents the death of the summer sun god, Lugh. Slave gets miserable at this time of year as she hates the cold and dark English winter. We don't like it either as there is less grass for us to eat and our favourite tasty weeds are killed off by the frost but we don't think that pumpkin will be on the menu any time soon.

 

Pumpkins do appear in the shops in the UK these days but some people grow them to enter "heaviest pumpkin" competitions, for which there are prizes. The world record for a pumpkin is held by a grower in the US but, considering our short growing season, some very large ones have been grown here.

 

On behalf of the Piggyfriends, Happy Halloween everyone!!

Piggy Snap Lemon Agouti

Hurray we have another Lemon Agouti piggy snap lets meet agent DJ.........



Agent DJ



Greetings Agent Ghost! I would like to become Agent DJ. I just found out today that I'm a Lemon Agouti after seeing all the pretty pictures of the lovely sows on your web site. The humans who we share our home with did not know what I was, besides adorable, until today. They named me after another beloved piggie, who was also a Lemon Agouti.

I enjoy eating hay and carrots and fighting with my roommate Chakalaka. Sometimes the humans separate us when we fight, but we get very upset when we are apart. Chakalaka would make a good agent too, but he's not an agouti. I think he is a dust mop.

The human has attached a recent photo of me. Maybe if I can be an Agent, they will stop calling me Baby DJ, and I can be Agent DJ instead. That would be great. I am not a baby. I am eight months old now and weigh 2.86 pounds. I am trying to gain more weight so I can weigh more than Chakalaka some day. He's more than three pounds, but I think that most of that is fur.

Please let me know if I can join your group. Even though I had a heart problem when I was younger, I'm sure that I can be a great agent.

Best Wishes,

Agent? DJ

Welcome Agent DJ we are glad to have you on board maybe you could write and tell us about your heart problem we love sharing medical advice here to help other piggies.

Now everypig else your clues to DJ's real name.... its a welsh name meaning from the ocean and is also the surname of a very famous american singer song writer whose first name was Bob.

Get Guessing

Ghost

Piggy snap: Lemon agouti's

Lets meet the lemon agoutis......

Agent Not So Lil Woop

Agent A for Agouti



Mystery Agent Avatar

Lets meet the new mystery agent......

I am going to pick the agent name of Avatar.

I picked this because Slave enjoyed the film of that name ( and there is a link between it and my real name ). They wouldn't let guinea pigs into the cinema so we will have to wait until it comes on the television.

My favourite food is fresh grass with cucumber a close second.

I love playing with the girls in my group.

I am a nurse piggy when we have virtual adventures

Agent Avatar is a female piggy living in a mixed herd in the UK her real name is the same as a very famous box in Greek mythology and also the planet in a recent 3D film she has given you that clue already in her choice of agent name.

So get guessing

Tribute to the Apple

Hi All!

Miss Yaya here, aka the Guinean Queen, aka Agent Piggy Galore. Apples are absolutely AWSOME!! I love Apples soooo much! No other veggie tastes as great as an Apple; that perfect balance between sweet and sour.. ow and don't get me started om the crunchyness or the different textures while you chew through an Apple *swoon*. I do not know what I like more, the skin with it's sour aftertaste, the flesh or the crunchy bits of the core. But anyhew... I LOOOOVEE APPLES!!!

*hemhem*

Apple dearest...

Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer’s lease hath all too short a date:
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimm’d;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance, or nature’s changing course untrimm’d;
But thy eternal summer shall not fade*,
Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st,
Nor shall death brag thou wander’st in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou grow’st;
So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

*that is.. until I devourst thy

Slave tends to forget I like apples, she buys them far too little and when she does, she often forgets to feed them to me. She sits on the couch and chews happily away. Whenever that happens I wheek up a storm and make her feel VERY guilty (well, she should anyway... The ladybug-Apple in the pigture is  Slave+Apple+Guilttrip ;-) )

Lots of Wheeks! And may ye have bountiful of apples (or something like that anyways.. ;-) )

Miss Yaya