They are attacked by few diseases, as opposed to larger grazing animals such as cows and alpacas. Guinea pigs can be fed with waste from the family kitchen and supplemented with a small amount of food such as alfalfa. Kitchen waste such as potato peelings or grenery not used for human consumption can be fed to guinea pigs. Perhaps this latter query seems a little obscure and is obviously not at the forefront of advances in nutritional science, but nevertheless it could represent a useful initiative to strengthen food security, which would automatically focus on a source of food for which women are responsible. Some varieties of sorghum containing high tannin in the grain were found to be bird-resistant.
Tannins are the most abundant phenolic compound in brown bird-resistant sorghum.
During maturation the brown sorghum develops astringence which imparts resistance against birds and mould attack. This quality is important in arid and semi-arid regions where other crops fail. Tannins, while conferring the agronomic advantage of bird resistance, adversely affect the grain's nutritional quality. Several studies in rats, chicks and livestock have shown that tannin in the diet adversely affects digestibility of protein and carbohydrates and reduces growth, feeding efficiency, metabolizable energy and bioavailability of amino acids. There is no direct evidence regarding antinutritional effects of dietary tannins in human subjects, although dietary tannin may have a carcinogenic effect.