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Post by Deleted on Nov 13, 2015 0:01:59 GMT -5
Ask them about the Lupron dosage you're using. The normal therapeutic range is 100 to 250 mcg/kg. We were using 400 mcg/kg for Atreyu per month. Seemingly, it can go up to 500 mcg/kg. The best confirmation of this information would be to have your vet call my vet for actual dosages (it will be in Atreyu's files). The order of the DES implant should only take about 2 to 3 weeks. Once the paperwork is approved, the DES is sent from the US distributor and I believe we received the order in less than 2 weeks ciao Thanks! I just emailed them asking for the dosage. Yeah, the Vet told me there were some problems with the paperwork and they had to send it again (that was last week) so hopefully we get it soon, Rino did not stop itching with lupron, it is not as bad but still enough to wake him up a few times during the night. Thanks! (twitch)
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Post by Heather on Nov 13, 2015 0:09:02 GMT -5
Try using some melatonin for his itching. I've found this to be very beneficial and continue to use it while they're on the DES Now you can get the implant (called ferretonin) or you can use an oral application (I use a liquid) but to use the oral application you or someone has to give this every day without fail between 7 and 9 hrs after the sunrise. With the implant you don't have to worry about the hours. I've had considerable success with dealing with both the itchies and MCT's that often accompany adrenal disease ciao
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Post by Deleted on Nov 13, 2015 0:20:09 GMT -5
Up his egg shell powder to 3/4 tsp to a tsp. Don't go any higher. One of the biggest problems when adding meaty chunks is forgetting to allow for the extra meats. As the ferrets aren't on bone this can have significant results. That's great that there appears to be no health issues visible. As for a bacterial overload, it's possible. Though in truth those stools appear more like too much meat, which was why I asked what your recipe was ciao Thanks! I will up the egg shell powder, I am also thinking it may be that I'm not crushing it fine enough and his body does not absorb it as well? I will look into switching to bone meal just to be safe, I should be able to find it at healthfood/supplement stores, right?. The Vet just emailed me the ultrasound results, the one confusing part was that they did not mention anything about lumps in the adrenal glands and said they were not enlarged, but the adrenal panel did show slightly higher hormonal levels (than normal range), maybe he is just really at an early stage (?) BTW I just asked by email about the dosage so hopefully they'll be able to email me that tomorrow.
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Post by Deleted on Nov 13, 2015 0:31:40 GMT -5
Day 12 AM: only 1.4 oz, I left the rest (1.1 oz) in the cage to see if he would eat some... looks like he took a few licks since there was only .8 oz when I got back home. PM: he ate 2.5 oz of soupy (chicken and turkey) + 1 oz of turkey slivers in 2 feedings about 3 hours apart. He struggles with the bigger chunks and often gives up on them. I noticed he does not chew enough and ends up chugging them, some times he gags them back ... then eats them again. Is there a way to get him into bigger chunks? Activity: he woke up with enough energy to bite my foot, lol... walked around for a while and "knock" on my roomate's door a couple of times, once because he wanted to bring his bell-in-ball into the room hehehe... anyway, his activity periods probably last about 15 minutes at a time before he looks for a place to sleep again. Stools: went back to red-ish brown, loose, seedy and small. It's been raining this week so I have not been able to take him for walks like last week
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Post by Deleted on Nov 13, 2015 7:17:01 GMT -5
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Post by Deleted on Nov 13, 2015 9:29:49 GMT -5
mariana,U can sift thru a little strainer that fits on a cup, too.
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Post by Heather on Nov 13, 2015 14:23:45 GMT -5
The egg shell powder appears to be ok. I use a coffee grinder. Bone meal might work better, I tried to view the ingredients but couldn't pull it up. It just wouldn't load. I will try again a bit later The whole chewing on a piece of meat, becoming annoyed, swallowing it whole, hacking it up to chew some more...it's a ferret thing. All my guys do it. I think it's because a carnivore normally doesn't chew their food very well and just swallows it. You can try making a couple of bigger pieces and see how it goes down or if he will eat it. Soupy will always be accepted best because it's easy and it's fast. Post another pic of the most recent stools and we will see what's going on. One thing to remember is that sleeping takes up most of their day at this time of year. He sounds about as active as my guys. I'm finding right now they come upstairs, eat, bash each other for about 20 minutes or trundle around and slam a few doors and go to bed under the futon. Lady Morgain bit the dog and went to bed that was the total of her day. She was upstairs in the upper bunk in the hob room, snoring so it wasn't like she'd be overly active prior ciao
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Post by Deleted on Nov 16, 2015 0:06:09 GMT -5
Thanks Abbey! My eggshell looks a bit bigger, I will definitively get the powder instead!
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Post by Deleted on Nov 16, 2015 0:17:30 GMT -5
The egg shell powder appears to be ok. I use a coffee grinder. Bone meal might work better, I tried to view the ingredients but couldn't pull it up. It just wouldn't load. I will try again a bit later The whole chewing on a piece of meat, becoming annoyed, swallowing it whole, hacking it up to chew some more...it's a ferret thing. All my guys do it. I think it's because a carnivore normally doesn't chew their food very well and just swallows it. You can try making a couple of bigger pieces and see how it goes down or if he will eat it. Soupy will always be accepted best because it's easy and it's fast. Post another pic of the most recent stools and we will see what's going on. One thing to remember is that sleeping takes up most of their day at this time of year. He sounds about as active as my guys. I'm finding right now they come upstairs, eat, bash each other for about 20 minutes or trundle around and slam a few doors and go to bed under the futon. Lady Morgain bit the dog and went to bed that was the total of her day. She was upstairs in the upper bunk in the hob room, snoring so it wasn't like she'd be overly active prior ciao Thanks Heather! I will stop worrying too much! I got his ultrasound results and were all great and his fecal culture test did not show anything. For the past few days he has been doing better, maybe because I introduced him to turkey and now lowered the amount of chicken in his food, I am planning on getting him off chicken slowly. This poop was from Nov 13. Most of his poops look like this one one, except for the ocassional weird one. Now I must confess, he has been munching on kibble in the middle of the night (3 or 4 pieces) for a couple of nights. I don't know why and I do not want to stop him at that time since I don't have any raw available for him (everything is frozen). Today I tried leaving some small chunks of meat coated in soupy to see if he would eat that instead of kibble. postimg.org/image/gxnh0l5j7/As for the chunks, I tried bigger pieces, and he will try and then just stash them away and never look for them again. So I take them and cut them up into smaller pieces, then he eats them.
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Post by Heather on Nov 16, 2015 15:20:04 GMT -5
That stool looks really dark I'm going to guess it's part of the switch. See if it changes to a lighter stool that is a bit more formed when you try the turkey. See if it changes anything. With the number of ferrets who are showing sensitivity to our antibiotic laden chicken it could be that Now is that stool a kibble raw mixture or does it have any relevance to this stool at all? I found my guys were rather lazy about really large pieces and stashing them. I was more than a little annoyed when I found a half dozen large rabbit chunks stashed in a tube out in the wilderness the other day. Here I thought they were eating it. Try a bit smaller and see if he will eat that any better. You may be able to work it up later after he gets the hang of actually ripping and tearing ciao
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Post by Deleted on Nov 17, 2015 21:07:35 GMT -5
That stool looks really dark I'm going to guess it's part of the switch. See if it changes to a lighter stool that is a bit more formed when you try the turkey. See if it changes anything. With the number of ferrets who are showing sensitivity to our antibiotic laden chicken it could be that Now is that stool a kibble raw mixture or does it have any relevance to this stool at all? I found my guys were rather lazy about really large pieces and stashing them. I was more than a little annoyed when I found a half dozen large rabbit chunks stashed in a tube out in the wilderness the other day. Here I thought they were eating it. Try a bit smaller and see if he will eat that any better. You may be able to work it up later after he gets the hang of actually ripping and tearing ciao Hi! His poop has been this dark ever since I started the switch, some days is a lighter brown and some others dark green, but this is most of the times. That poop had kibble mixed, when he does not eat kibble, poops tend to be looser. He only ate a few pieces of kibble in the middle of the night for 3 nights, I took it away last night and left quail chunks, I heard him wondering around but he did not eat them, I guess he was looking for his kibble, poor thing. He ate his breakfast quite well, a bit over 2oz. Today's dinner had no chicken (other than the heart and liver in the soup mix) and it was about 60% soupy 40% quail chunks (some neck and some meat) he does well with small pieces, chews a few times then swallows... if they are too big or hard, he will give up and leave them in a corner His activity level is somewhat better than last week's although he still sleeps a lot, I can see when he is awake he actually does have energy, it was not the case last week. He now weighs 1077 g ... that's a lot! he's got a roll on his neck hehehe . And does not let me sleep at night as he walks around the bedroom pushing stuff and playing with his ball (headwall). I think I will make him sleep in his cage once in a while again. He is still having prolapses some times after he poops, goes back to normal within 10-15 minutes as long as I let him lay down, seems like holding him up makes things worse. I hope he gets used to the chunks without the soup. At this point, he eats about 1/4 of his food and tries to get away until I feed him with a spoon... then I feed him until he really does not want any more so he normally eats 3 - 3.5 oz for dinner in 2 feedings.
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Post by Heather on Nov 17, 2015 23:21:38 GMT -5
Have you upped his powdered egg shell to match the new amount of chunks that he's eating. One thing to consider if he's putting on a lot of weight is that maybe he's actually eating more than he needs. This will make it difficult to get him to eat chunks and bone....(he will have to be hungry to eat these ) You changed to feeding turkey but are still feeding chicken offal.....I wonder what would happen if you were able to offer another protein offal. I'm not saying he's allergic (I'm hoping not as it removes a good bone in meat)but it would be interesting to see if he is indeed allergic to chicken. This would mean you would have to stop feeding all chicken though including eggs. One thing you can try too, once you figure out of chicken is an allergy is to add some small chunks of bone...ribs are a good starter (turkey ribs might be a bit heavy but you might give it a try). I think we will see better stools if we can convince him to eat bone rather than egg shell but we need to get him more comfortable with chunked meats because he needs to chew. He's doing well though and as long as the prolapse is returning to normal after a few minutes then it may just be him in that regard ciao
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Post by Deleted on Nov 19, 2015 0:11:53 GMT -5
Whoaaa! I did not count right. Today is day 25 of the transition, this seems to be going slow? I read somewhere that it takes about 4 weeks and they start slowing down... now that explains why he would not eat his full portions anymore... AM: 2 oz of soupy with mixed in quail chunks PM: 1.5 oz of soupy with mixed in quail. I actually prepared 3 oz from which 1.7 was soup and the rest chunks, even a bit of bone but he only ate half the portion, this may have been because I gave him an egg yolk a couple of hours before dinner time. He's been pooping a LOT of hair balls... I hope they are hairballs, I checked all of his bedding and hiding spots and did not see any chewing, hence the second egg this week. Activity: In the morning he wanted to play so we played for about 15 minutes, in the evening he only played about 10 minutes but he does not seem uncomfortable or sick. He's been waking up in the middle of the night and not letting me sleep (he sleeps in my bedroom) so I think to get his play time sorted out, I will make him sleep in his cage again once in a while so that he actually plays when I take him out of the cage. The beef heart and pork kidneys are chopped up and in the freezer so I will start using them I don't know whats going on but he seems to not want quail anymore so I better change it up. The vet told me he gets 100 mcg shots and that is the recommended dose for his weight (he was 880g last time he got his shot) but now he's almost 200g more... I hope the implant comes in soon. I did up the eggshell to 3/4 tsp :thankyou:
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Post by Heather on Nov 19, 2015 12:35:21 GMT -5
He's eating some chunked meats and some bone that's good. Rabbit is another good bone in meat that is well received if you think he's tired of quail but it's low in taurine, so it can't become a mainstay. 3oz is a good amount and if you've got an egg in there as well as added quail that's a really good meal ciao
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Post by Deleted on Dec 2, 2015 22:05:53 GMT -5
it has been a while!
Day 38
It has been pretty steady for both breakfast and dinner. 1.8 to 2 oz each meal, he is eating it really well with the rabbit chunks, does not do very well with quail bone in pieces
His activity level is much better. I don't know if it is because he is no longer eating chicken (although his soup still has chicken liver) but he is doing so much better... still not chewing all that much though. and his poops are all over the place but seem to be a bit less lose.
His weight is 1055g and has stayed like that for the past 2 weeks so I think he will stay at that.
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