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Post by Deleted on Aug 20, 2015 8:16:55 GMT -5
So I have came across a problem with my two babies. when I first got them they were on zupreem. So knowing that was not a good food for them I slowly added four different foods in the mix and slowly took away the zupreem. now my girl is losing a good amount of weight while he has gained a good amount of weight. it turns out she is not eating anything but one of the foods in there, and only because she has to. if I give her zupreem she gobbles it right up. so she is getting hardly no food and he is eating it all. my question is how would I go about putting him on a diet per say to get a little weight off of him, I can see it is effecting him a little, he is dragging himself around lot. he however will eat just about anything so when I put food that she will eat anywhere in the cage he eats EVERYTHING. I have a vacuum fuzz butt and im not sure what to do. help
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Post by Deleted on Aug 20, 2015 9:04:42 GMT -5
adult males eat 2-4 ounces per day. you may want to get a little scale to weigh his food. I would go with the 3 or 4 ounces. 2 ounces may be a little bit of a shock to him ) About your little girl, I would start her immediately on the forum soupie ---she needs to be off kibble. Evidently, she is holding out for food and then little man must be eating her food as well. This is what i did with my senior: I held her in my lap and daubed her mouth with soupie(finger -fed). I let her run off when she wanted, which was pretty quickly, and in a little bit, I did it again. Sorry i can't remember if it took 1hr or 4 hrs of trying or a day. But however long, it is worth it. You can warm up soupies that have gotten cold from sitting out by microwaving a saucer only with a little bit of water in it(maybe 40 sec? ). I find a wet plate heats up faster than a dry one. Then, put soupie in warm plate and stir around. Of course, make sure no hot spots on plate. I would separate , at least for a while the two eating.
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Post by Deleted on Aug 20, 2015 9:16:34 GMT -5
adult males eat 2-4 ounces per day. you may want to get a little scale to weigh his food. I would go with the 3 or 4 ounces. 2 ounces may be a little bit of a shock to him ) About your little girl, I would start her immediately on the forum soupie ---she needs to be off kibble. Evidently, she is holding out for food and then little man must be eating her food as well. This is what i did with my senior: I held her in my lap and daubed her mouth with soupie(finger -fed). I let her run off when she wanted, which was pretty quickly, and in a little bit, I did it again. Sorry i can't remember if it took 1hr or 4 hrs of trying. But however long, it is worth it. You can warm up soupies by microwaving saucer only with a little bit of water in it. I find a wet plate heats up faster than a dry one. Then, stir your soupie around in warm plate. maybe 40 sec?
I would separate , at least for a while the two eating.
they are not adults, sorry I guess I left out some important information. He is roughly 7 months old and she is about 7 and a half. I have tried feeding her soup before when she got sick and she refused. it had me worried when she got sick, she would not even drink anything I had to use a syringe and make her drink. im really worried that if she was to ever get sick again she wont eat anything at all. she refuses to eat anything but freeze dried treats ( what I use for her click training) and zupreem. she wont touch egg raw or cooked , cooked or raw meat, duck soup, none of it. and I started trying when I got her at about 3 months old. she still will not eat anything else. she will flick food out of the bowl and look for the one she wants. if there is not the one she wants I don't see her eat.
I have tried feeding them separate and once they are done and go on there way I open it up and he darts right to where I put her food and eats it. he will just push her out of the way and eat it.
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Post by Heather on Aug 20, 2015 11:24:13 GMT -5
One thing to remember, please....when people are talking about feeding kibble our 2 to 4 oz doesn't apply. That is for raw diet only...not kibbles. Kibble fed ferrets are supposed to have food in their cage 24/7, so are you saying no matter how much food you put in their cage he's eating all of it?? I have a hob and jill who live together about 6 months of the year. Tico is a pig, he eats Lady Morgaine's food...all of it. Now their food is weighed because they're raw fed. At night they're kept separate so she can have peace and quiet and get a good meal for the night. If you've got a FN cage this could be very simple, just lift the partition ramp and close it off. ciao
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Post by Deleted on Aug 20, 2015 11:50:37 GMT -5
Yes , I was thinking he was on raw and she was on kibble because she would not eat it. I guess the four different foods were processed food---sorry. Did you hold and finger fed her the soupie---there is something about holding and finger feeding ferrets. They eventually give in after a while. While some may lap up from plate mine would not. You may have to annoy the dickens out of her because they r stubborn. Does she eat chicken baby food? Thinking of a way to slip soupie in . Some people have sprinkled a little kibble powder on soupie. I would not give up on feeding her raw. Although a long shot, and if you don't mind being out a few bucks, when you lock her up at night, you could offer her a mouse( just trying to kick in her prey seeking drive) I occasionally feed my baby (although born in January) a defrosted mouse at night. Well i wish you the best of luck---be stubborn
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Post by Deleted on Aug 20, 2015 12:17:19 GMT -5
One thing to remember, please....when people are talking about feeding kibble our 2 to 4 oz doesn't apply. That is for raw diet only...not kibbles. Kibble fed ferrets are supposed to have food in their cage 24/7, so are you saying no matter how much food you put in their cage he's eating all of it?? I have a hob and jill who live together about 6 months of the year. Tico is a pig, he eats Lady Morgaine's food...all of it. Now their food is weighed because they're raw fed. At night they're kept separate so she can have peace and quiet and get a good meal for the night. If you've got a FN cage this could be very simple, just lift the partition ramp and close it off. ciao no matter how much I put in he eats most of it. some times there is a little left come morning some times just crumbs.
they do have food 24/7 that's why I was not sure what to do. and I thought about keeping them separate at night but there are two problems with that. one, I had a hard time getting them to bond and now that they are and are sleeping together the last thing I want to do is take that away. the second being when I did have them apart. (I have a ferret nation 182) I would block the ladder off to the bottom half and she would some how get under the plastic liner and be under it on the metal grate. I also don't want that.
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Post by Deleted on Aug 20, 2015 12:20:45 GMT -5
Yes , I was thinking he was on raw and she was on kibble because she would not eat it. I guess the four different foods were processed food---sorry. Did you hold and finger fed her the soupie---there is something about holding and finger feeding ferrets. They eventually give in after a while. While some may lap up from plate mine would not. You may have to annoy the dickens out of her because they r stubborn. Does she eat chicken baby food? Thinking of a way to slip soupie in . Some people have sprinkled a little kibble powder on soupie. yes it is kibble im sorry for lack of information
I have tried holding it on my finger, nothing. I have tried baby food she wont eat it, homemade duck soup wont touch it, power duck soup wont touch it. I even mushed her kibble in a little water and she wont touch it. but she will eat the same kibble dry (only the zupreem), I have tried wet foods, I have really tried anything and everything I can think of.
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Post by Deleted on Aug 20, 2015 12:37:19 GMT -5
I know my senior was 6 at the time I changed to raw, and I almost cried (giggle) trying to get mine to change to whole prey-- I would go to Petco and buy frozen mice and tie them to a string. I have one girl who luvs cat toys, so around and around we would go. When I untied it she would just stash but not eat it. One day while we were playing, the front leg come off mouse, and she gobbled it down like she thought it was going to get away.
Just saying do not give up hope---but do know how disheartening it can be.
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Post by raynebc on Aug 20, 2015 13:46:20 GMT -5
I just got two more ferrets and have been switching them off kibble cold turkey. I would freshen up or replace their FDR soup every few hours and hold/scruff them and hold the food in front of them with a spoon. They both refused to eat it at first and would wriggle free. Then came dabbing on the nose to force them to taste it. The boy ferret (around 8 months old) took a liking to it pretty quickly and by the next day he was eating straight out of the plate on the floor. The girl ferret (around 3-4 months old) is a little pickier, and she put some holes in my fingers to let me know I was making her cranky. When she absolutely refused to eat off the spoon even while being scruffed I would scruff her and gently squirt some soup into the side of her mouth (never from the front to avoid food aspiration) with a syringe and she'd at least swallow it. For the first day or two she ate very little, but eventually hunger kicked in and she would eat from the spoon or plate while she was on my lap. Last night I mixed in a little ground lamb to the soup and while the girl was hesitant, the boy ate up like usual. He was still hungry so I made more soup and added a bit more lamb and he seemed to enjoy it. I got the girl to take a little too. As of this morning she was eating half soup, half lamb off the plate on her own: You may have to show the ferrets some tough love, but a raw diet will help bring both their weights into check.
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