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Post by katt on Sept 13, 2014 19:09:39 GMT -5
I called several meat shops today looking for leads, but haven't ending up speaking with an actual butcher shop yet. One of them is able to special order chicken hearts, but only in 40 pound cases. I'd have to buy a standalone freezer if I was going to start buying individual frankenprey items in such bulk amounts, I wouldn't have enough space to store it otherwise. That same shop does sell chicken backs and necks though, just in frozen blocks instead of individual pieces, which probably doesn't matter. Beef heart seems available if I had to substitute that, but given how they don't care for beef liver, I don't know if they'd like beef heart or tongue any more. I may have found a couple actual butchers though, so I'm going to try to contact some tomorrow.They WILL take to beef heart as long as you out-stubborn them. Beef heart is a perfectly fine source of taurine and I would definitely not recommend using a supplement or even tongue meat when you have access to heart muscle. Right now they aren't even eating raw meat yet, and heart and organs are more strongly flavored and typically take them longer to accept, so expecting them to like the beef liver right now is asking a bit much. It takes a lot of time and Persistence. If you're that sure lean meats aren't a problem, I won't worry about it then. As Elk are not carnivores, is there any significant reason to worry about parasites surviving in wild Elk meat after a long freezing period? Yes I am sure and no there shouldn't be anything to worry about. Are the needs for protein variety met by simply providing just different animal muscle meats (ie. can all of their non-liver organ meals be beef if that's all that's available)? A taurine supplement should be easy to mix into raw soup so if I can't get chicken hearts in just a couple pounds at a time and the ferrets refuse to eat beef, I'll have to fall back onto the supplement as an option.Yes if they are getting a Balanced and Varied diet, with a minimum of 3 protein sources each week, then their protein and other nutrient needs will be met. See above RE taurine and beef heart. They don't really free-roam, but they have a large pen that covers about half the size of a bedroom. So far I haven't witnessed my ferrets stashing FDR anywhere, at most they leave a stray piece or two just outside the bowl. They both seem to prefer eating out of the dish instead of putting the food on the ground first. As with soup, I imagine it would be something that I'd need to feed the ferrets somewhat regularly so they remember it's food if I need them to eat it?Not really, it just depends on the ferret. I always keep some on hand for treats to stuff into foraging toys, but my boys have gone many months at a time without so much as a sniff of FDR and they always accept it just fine. I would not give it "somewhat regularly" as in make it a regular part of their diet. Once they are fully switched to raw, FD is best kept as a treat. As for eggs being considered a complete meal, does that depend on them eating the shell with it, or do they just make up the calcium in one of their normal bone-in meals?You can offer the eggshell with the egg or not, it doesn't really matter. They need to be getting 7-9 meals a week containing significant amounts of edible bone REGARDLESS of whether or not they get egg. If you include the shell, it can help firm up soft egg poops, but watch to make sure that their poops don't get dry or hard from too much calcium either. Ans an egg is not a "complete" meal like whole prey is. Edit: They ate most of the FDR Stella and Chewy's duck that I'd mixed into their food this morning, so I upped the amount of it this evening. I want them to be used to a few proteins and then I'll try leaving them wet FDR. I tried brushing their teeth a little bit but they were both revolted at the idea. In the past I'd bought some Marshall's ferret toothpaste, but I decided to read the ingredients before I used it and it lists "essential oils" so I guess it's going into the trash. I think I'll contact them to complain about their use of such harmful ingredients in their ferret hygiene products. They get Oxyfresh in their water, which helps prevent gum disease, but it doesn't seem to claim to do anything about dental health. What's a recommended tooth cleaning paste/solution to use? Or are there tricks like just wetting the toothbrush with water and putting a drop of salmon oil on it to make them interested?I generally suggest staying away from anything Marshalls brand except a few select toys or bedding pieces. As for tooth brushing, they just have to get used to it, just like nail clipping. Keep at it.
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Post by katt on Sept 13, 2014 19:11:03 GMT -5
Oxyfresh makes a pet gel that is supposed to clean teeth, but it is brush-less and rinse-less which by my understanding, all enzymatic tooth pastes are. I wouldn't have to be concerned about brushing the teeth as much as getting it on their teeth so it can do its work. I couldn't tell if any of the active ingredients are different from their oral solution that I already use, so I emailed them to ask. Enzymatic toothpastes have some antibacterial properties, and I understand nothing is better than them cleaning their teeth naturally with edible bone, but until then, is this type of toothpaste considered safe? I would personally avoid anything that they are going to be ingesting regularly. Brushing teeth they ingest it once, putting it in their water they ingest it all day every day.... Like I said they just have to get used to having their teeth brushed. Just like anything else it takes time and practice.
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Post by katt on Sept 13, 2014 19:14:40 GMT -5
The ferrets had pretty much cleaned out their food dish when I got home, so I prepared them their first re-hydrated FDR meal with the Stella and Chewy's duck, duck, goose. Reska, the good girl that she is, ate a good tsp of it almost right away with minimal coaxing. I spent a while trying to get Copper to eat and I got him to at least taste it before I left the dish in their pen to eat at will. A few hours later I checked back on it and it seemed it was going away a little at a time. I added a little warm water and stirred to get it back to baby food texture and fed them a little more one on one. Reska ate some more but Copper still seemed hesitant. Then just a half hour ago, I added a little more warm water and stirred it again and Reska ate the last couple tsp worth. At this point she was wolfing it down right off the plate. It seems she's just about gotten the hang of it. I saw Copper pass a BM in the litter box so I know he at least got a meal's worth out of it in secret, since it was the only food they had available to them for a 7 hour window.
Dab it on his nose and finger feed if needed. He already knows the taste, he just needs to get used to the texture.
I didn't get around to calling more meat shops, I'll have to see if any are open later today. I'm also considering getting a freezer chest so I'll have all the storage space I'll ever need for meat. I'm assuming 7 cubic feet would be more than adequate for 2 ferrets' meals, right? Given how hearts are more or less scarce in my area, I think it would be best for me to keep taurine powder on hand in case of an emergency like a power outage spoiling my meat supply.
I would highly, highly recommend a chest freezer if you can afford one and have the space for it. A nice big freezer is every raw feeder's best friend. 7 cubic feet should be plenty. And yes, it is always a good idea to have taurine on hand for emergencies but as said above, I would not use that a their regular taurine source when you have access to heart. Supplements just aren't absorbed in the same way as nutrients in actual food.
Since wet food is still relatively new to them, I think I'll leave them a small amount of kibble/FDR mix while I'm asleep until they both eagerly eat wet raw. Since they're accustomed to the chicken and quail FDR, would it be worth rotating proteins yet or should I try to stick with the duck for a while? I also got my rabbit FDR in the mail so I've got another protein available. Would it be fine to introduce this new FDR to them wet, or would they need to have it mixed (wet or dry) with a food they're already used to in order to ease them into it?
Introduce it wet and rotate all you want.
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Post by raynebc on Sept 14, 2014 6:22:38 GMT -5
It turns out that fancy pet store near me has a second location in my area. I went there to check it out and they gave me some samples of Primal FDR (chicken and salmon). This formula has 8% produce though, which is a tad high for commercial raw but still lower than most kibble. Would it be OK to offer them this in a rotation of 4 other FDR proteins that each have 95+% meat? Both ferrets love salmon and are extremely used to chicken so I think this flavor would be a hit with them. The store also has a small freezer which, besides some commercial raw, includes chicken necks, so it's good to know another place I could get something like that.
It's looking more and more likely I'll buy a freezer chest. My only worry now is ensuring the contents stay frozen and if that's not the case, that I know about it. Some of the more expensive upright freezers have a handy "high temp" feature that will alert the user about the temperature getting too high (ie. above low twenties), but it doesn't seem to be a feature commonly available in the more economical chest freezers. It looks like thermometers that record the highest temperature reading and even those that alarm are relatively inexpensive. The "high temp" feature in some freezers will only trigger if a high temperature is maintained for a certain duration such as an hour, I don't know if digital thermometers offer something so specific, does anybody have any recommendations on that?
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Post by katt on Sept 14, 2014 14:46:27 GMT -5
Why would stuff not stay frozen? And the FD stuff should be fine in small amounts.
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Post by raynebc on Sept 14, 2014 19:28:26 GMT -5
If the freezer was failing or it otherwise suffered a power outage while I was at work, the meat may not have stayed adequately frozen. The partial thawing and re-freezing of meat is dangerous because it allows bacteria to grow and spoil the food. This would not necessarily be obvious just by looking at the meat because it could be frozen again by the time you check on it. This is a common concern for people that store bulk amounts of meats.
This afternoon I took their dry food out, they'd just about finished it off and are eating the dry FDR that I mixed into it very well. After a couple hours, I mixed 12 nuggets of the Stella and Chewy's duck/goose with warm water and sat with it in the pen for a little bit to encourage them to eat it. Reska ate the entire plate of it in one sitting, she's really becoming a champ at this. I made another batch of wet FDR and tried to get Copper to eat, but he still resisted eating much of it in front of me except for a couple mouth-fulls from my finger or from a spoon, so I left the dish in their food corner. When I came back later, at least half of it was gone so I'm pretty sure he's been eating some while I'm not there to see it.
Nonetheless they've been eating quite a bit of FDR this weekend and my Stella and Chewy's bag is close to half empty. I'm glad they're eating this commercial raw pretty well and I'll gladly pay the cost to get some more while I continue sourcing organs locally. Stella's says it's 98% meat, so that's a pretty impressive stat even if it is based on wet weight because that's still so much higher in amount than kibbles are. So far it seems to be working well to feed them wet FDR while I'm home so I can keep an eye on things and keep the food wet, and I can leave them kibble/FDR mix before I go to sleep on a work night. I would have some trouble waking up early enough to remove any remaining wet food, allow an hour or two of buffer time and put dry food in before leaving to go to work.
My room mate is in the finishing stages of buying a house, so there will be room for me to have a freezer chest and store all the meats I want in it. Until then it shouldn't be burdensome to him if I use a little "human freezer" space for storing some raw soup. I saw some posts where people recommended getting freezer storage containers to keep small portions of meats, organs, grinds, etc. and I'll go ahead and get some of that. It seems like it would be easy for me to store soup grind in a container and scoop some out to mix with warm water to prepare a meal.
Edit: They ate the last of the wet FDR from a spoon so I made another batch with a dozen nuggets. I measured it after wetting it down and it looks like that much FDR makes about 1/8 cup when re-hydrated.
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Post by raynebc on Sept 15, 2014 2:32:00 GMT -5
I spoon fed a couple teaspoons of the last of that wet FDR batch to Copper and Reska finished off the last of it right out of the plate. I think they're doing pretty well this weekend, combined they've eaten a good 1/4 cup or so of raw today. Given the consistency of the rehydrated FDR, I'm pretty confident raw soup won't look too alien to them. I ordered some taurine, freezable deli containers and two packages of Stella and Chewy's (turkey and salmon/cod) since by now they both seem to like the duck flavor quite a bit. When I get home from work I think I'll see how they like Archetype rabbit.
Interestingly, Stella and Chewy's website explains that they use extreme pressure to kill bacteria in their raw foods in order to kill bacteria without cooking it. This would undoubtedly kill any probiotics in the food, but as long as their gut flora is in good shape this should hopefully be a minor concern. I can just as easily alternate feeding Stella's with Archetype or Epigen 90, both of which contain a variety of probiotics.
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Post by raynebc on Sept 15, 2014 19:04:25 GMT -5
I heard back from the Oxyfresh people. There are no antibacterials involved, they said it safely oxidizes volatile sulfer compounds responsible for bad breath and plaque and is eliminated from the body without being systematically absorbed. I'll try to brush their teeth a little bit more, but aside from trying a drop of salmon oil on the brush, are there any tricks to make it a little easier?
I called a few butchers, a few high end groceries and ten ethnic markets but no place at all carries chicken hearts. One of the butchers is going to call me back about the price for special ordering, but I don't hold out much hope for anything less than a large case like the other butcher from before. One of the butchers was already closed for the day so I emailed them some questions. One of the ethnic markets sells pig heart and two of the groceries sell lamb/goat/beef organs like heart, liver and kidney so I think that's about as good as it's going to get for selection around where I live. Beef heart is really the only animal heart I'll probably be able to get reliably but I may consider ordering that case of chicken hearts after I have the freezer chest ready.
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Post by raynebc on Sept 16, 2014 1:18:29 GMT -5
When I got home I took their food dish out to make buffer time for giving them wet food. Most of it was still there. They were either full from all the wet food they ate on Sunday or they were holding out for more of it. This time around I fixed them some re-hydrated rabbit FDR. This was my first time re-hydrating Wysong Archetype, and instead of turning into a smooth baby food texture like Stella and Chewy's, it ended up with the appearance and consistency of cooked ground meat (small, wet chunks of meat). They didn't seem to impressed with it at first, but after a couple hours, they'd eaten a little bit of it and they were both willing to take some out of a spoon.
I'll make them a fresh batch of it before I go to bed (their first wet FDR evening) and I'll just make an effort to wake up early enough to transition them to dry food for the day time.
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Post by raynebc on Sept 16, 2014 11:56:30 GMT -5
They rebelled and dumped half of the wet FDR rabbit out of the plate. I didn't want them to starve themselves in protest, so I gave them back their kibble before I went to bed and Reska chowed down. Maybe they hate rabbit as much as they love the duck/goose. I'll give it another try this evening and when I mix some fresh dry food, I'll put the rabbit in so they have more time to get used to it.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 16, 2014 12:17:07 GMT -5
Mine aren't crazy about rabbit either. You can slowly increase the amount of rabbit into the duck,duck,goose or you can try two or three meals in a row of just rabbit. I loved that they dumped the food. Teeny tiny temper tantrums
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Post by raynebc on Sept 16, 2014 12:25:35 GMT -5
I had a paper towel under the plate, so it caught the food, but some of the juice undoubtedly soaked through and into their rug. Do I need to clean that part of the rug with a soapy sponge or something?
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Post by raynebc on Sept 17, 2014 1:16:15 GMT -5
When I got home, I took the little bit of remaining kibble out and a couple hours later made them their favorite wet FDR duck and mixed in about 20% rabbit. Copper seemed as disinterested as usual, but Reska figured it was close enough and pretty much ate the whole plate right away. So after I made some more, I got Copper to eat maybe a teaspoon or so before I left the plate with them. When I checked on it a couple hours later it was half-eaten so I added some more warm water and Copper ate a little more while Reska polished the rest of it off. She must have eaten at least 1/5 cup of it this evening. I made a fresh batch of it and I think this is a good time to try that as their food until morning.
I got about 1 and 2/3 pounds of frozen beef heart from the store and am defrosting it in the fridge. In a couple days I'll try to portion it up for soup. Since I'm not using chicken hearts, would this would be a suitable raw soup recipe? 8oz chicken thigh with skin 1oz beef heart 1oz chicken liver 1/2 tsp bone meal
I'll get a cutting board and a chef's knife and I think I'll just about be set. After I get a big batch of that concoction put together I can store it in freezable deli containers. I think this will be easier for me to deal with than ice cubes for now.
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Post by raynebc on Sept 17, 2014 12:50:00 GMT -5
I left them wet FDR for the night and I got up a little earlier than usual this morning to check on them. They were both up bright and early. I may not have left enough of the wet food (probably only about a 1/8 cup batch) because they'd cleaned it all out and they were hungry. I made a bowl of their dry food, and I put in about as much rabbit FDR as I did duck FDR and they both started chowing down right away. When I get home I'll make wet FDR and see if they will eat half rabbit, half duck and from there will continue to increase the amount of rabbit. I got the turkey FDR in the other day and will make that the next protein I test on them.
I ordered a well-rated knife and cutting board, they should arrive Friday. By then the beef heart will have thawed enough and I'll make their first frankenprey raw soup. I'll still need to get a heavier knife like a cleaver and a meat hammer for later on when I'm working with other cuts and bones, but it should be easy enough to tear the chicken thigh meat off the bone with a fork.
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Post by raynebc on Sept 18, 2014 0:50:32 GMT -5
They've gone through about 3/16 cup of wet FDR so far this evening, even though it's half rabbit. I'll make sure to leave them plenty of it this evening. They certainly seem to be eating less dry food during the day. Tomorrow evening I'll increase the rabbit so it's 3 parts rabbit to 1 part duck and see if they are still OK with it. I'm taking care to grind up the rabbit FDR clumps into a powder before hydrating, so it should make the smoother consistency that they are used to. When they are far enough into the transition that they wolf down raw soup I'll feel confident enough to ditch the kibble because they'll have a backup food they're willing to eat (wet FDR).
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