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Post by Sherry on Jun 13, 2011 11:34:20 GMT -5
Poor you! It does seem with Gizmo, it's more several steps back for every one attempted forward Just keep up with his mix. No sense in trying to push until you can focus on just him! With Sam- FANTASTIC With the pork chunks, he might have just eaten them too quickly. Has he tried bone or liver yet? And for the recalcitrant ones who aren't eating actual chunks, but like the pork soup, try using that as the base to work another on forward, by using the slivers, etc.
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Post by acodlin on Jun 13, 2011 13:14:35 GMT -5
Sam will eat bone if its easy to chew like the chicken wings/mouse bones but he wont eat anything tough, like Dexter will gnaw the crap out of a turkey leg.. he probably doesnt get much bone off it but he sure tries, he LOVES it if I crack it open for him. Sam will eat liver soupies.. no one will eat plain liver, has to be in the soupies. Dexter/Dean/Kodiak will eat plain heart chunks.. maybe the others do too but I havent seen it. I just saw Kodiak eat heart today. I mostly offer that in soupies and I use the taurine powder in all the soupies just to make sure they get enough, and I put the egg shell powder in there too.. should I get bone meal powder for those who arent eating bone yet?
I went out to lunch and came back and the chicken and pork soupies were both gone, about 1/4 of the turkey was gone. I'll try using the pork more for base, maybe try and switch it around some.
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Post by Sherry on Jun 13, 2011 14:02:29 GMT -5
It sounds like you are making some real progress here, believe it or not Keep on with the liver soupies for now. We'll look at getting them on the real thing down the road. Good call on using the taurine in the soup. And if you can get some raw bone meal, then use that. Otherwise, the eggshell powder is fine. With a lot of bone meal, it is already cooked to pieces, so why pay for something that's not going to have as much calcium as the eggshell? And Sam is doing great! He will likely need to work up more jaw strength yet, but most don't/won't eat any weight bearing bones unless you really smash them up. I do that with chicken legs/thighs for mine. Ok, since Sam is doing reasonably well now, who's next?
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Post by acodlin on Jun 14, 2011 19:43:37 GMT -5
Vaeda I think. She needs to fatten up again! she weighed in at 650grams at the vet yesterday but over the winter she was much fatter. She LOVES soupies, she'll dive right into that, she'll eat small slivers but once they get too big she eats around them. I've tried slathering meat in soupies but she still ignores it.. She's not interested in playing tug of war with the meat, sometimes I can entice her into bigger chunks with ferretone, but I don't want to OD her on that. Olive oil is OK but not something she gets excited over.
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Post by Sherry on Jun 14, 2011 20:03:42 GMT -5
Alright. Give her what she is comfortable with for the next 2 to 3 days, while gradually reducing the amount of soup on them. Once she's eating the plain meat slivers, add a few very slightly larger slivers into a smaller amount than she would normally eat. If she usually eats 1oz, for example, give her about 1/2 that, and if the slivers she's eating are about this size [ ], make the new ones the same size around, but about this long [ ]. What we want to do is trick her into eating larger and larger slivers of meat, til she's kind of eating skinny 2" long slivers. Then you can start to widen them a bit.
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Post by acodlin on Jun 19, 2011 23:06:35 GMT -5
Vaeda is eating some of the slivers, I added in a few bigger pieces today, she ate a couple of those . I'm doing a ground pork base, pork/ turkey and a few chicken slivers along with all the other stuff (egg shell powder, taurine, egg yolk, olive oil, pumpkin, heart chunks and pureed liver) Tasha started joining sam in eating bone yesterday. I found her and him hanging off a turkey leg in the cage. They all seem to do better if I hang the meat off the bottom of the shelf above them instead of in a den or on the side of the cage. They kept pooping in the feeding den Hanging it off the shelf makes things a little noisy but it works better I think.
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Post by Sherry on Jun 20, 2011 9:41:22 GMT -5
Oh, what brats ;D Hey, if hanging it off the shelf is what works- then roll with it ;D And Vaeda sounds like she's doing wonderfully well Keep on with reducing the amount of ground for her, while increasing the slivered meats, then the same with larger bits.
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Post by acodlin on Jun 27, 2011 7:48:34 GMT -5
Vaeda is doing pretty well, there is very little ground in her bowl. I give her a bowl of slivers first thing in the morning and later on the soupie base with pureed liver/ground pork/turkey in it. I dont think i'll be able to get anyone to eat plain liver lol, they just wont do it so I HAVE to mix it with some kind of ground or it wont get eaten. I think it'll be a real challange making sure everyone gets enough liver in their diet.
Everyone else is good. I got a few of these goat steak things at the asian food market and dexter and maggie ate some and sam gave it a try. I'm so proud of him, I put a pork neck in the cage the other day and he went to town chewing on the bone. He's even more determined to chew on those bones than Dexter is. Dexters little buddy Maggie has pretty much made the switch 100%, she loves just about everything I've thrown at her, even loves chicken hearts and liver soupies. I wish I could get her two brothers to eat raw. I think they will be as stubborn as Gizmo.
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Post by Sherry on Jun 27, 2011 9:28:50 GMT -5
Well,we'll just pick away at them ;D And that's GREAT news about Vaeda Time, I think, to start upping the size of the slivers, but just a wee bit, and just a few to start. If her slivers are this big [ ], make them this big [ ], and slowly work her up as she accepts them. If you are worried about stool consistency, will she take pumpkin? You can always mix a wee bit in with the meat if she'll take it.
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Post by acodlin on Jun 28, 2011 11:42:56 GMT -5
Stool is fine for her, she eats pumpkin in her soupies just fine. She's not big on eating it plain unless I put a little olive oil on it but I'm not worried about her at the moment.
I'm going to make some bigger slivers tonight so hopefully she'll take them.
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Post by Sherry on Jun 28, 2011 15:29:39 GMT -5
Good Luck! If she takes to them fairly easily, then you'll likely be able to up the size about every other meal
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Post by Sherry on Jul 3, 2011 11:51:10 GMT -5
So how's Vaeda doing with her chunks?
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Post by acodlin on Jul 6, 2011 14:33:20 GMT -5
We got up to a little smaller than a dime sized piece and she started refusing to eat those, so I backed down a little bit. Certain foods she's willing to eat bigger pieces of (chicken and pork) turkey rabbit, duck have to be small and I found if I make the pieces reaalllly tiny, she'll eat beef. She refuses gizzards of all kinds. No matter what kind of meat it is, she still wont eat it off the bone. It has to be all nice and sliced pretty in a bowl for her. She doesnt like to chew on skin or fat either >,< she got a piece of fat yesterday on her chicken thigh and she shook her head like a dog and sent it flying into the wall.
It's a little frustrating >,<
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Post by Sherry on Jul 6, 2011 17:12:09 GMT -5
What a prissy little missy she is! You've really got two choices here. Whichever way you decide to go is what we'll do. One choice is to simply start slipping in a couple pieces per meal a WEEEEEE bit bigger than she's now willingly eating til they are all that size, then doing it over and over til she's eating the same size as the others. Next is to give her pieces a bit larger than she is comfortable with for the next two meals, and just keep popping them in her mouth when she refuses to eat them. Hopefully, after missing a meal or two, she'll decide to start chewing. For the skin/fat, you can try giving her an entire meal of JUST that, but cut up so she gets used to the taste.
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Post by acodlin on Jul 15, 2011 8:54:09 GMT -5
The meal of skin/fat did not go over well.. she refused to eat any of it. I'm starting to get a little bit bigger chunks into her. I tried putting them in her mouth but she would spit them back out at me or just hold them there until I let her go lol. She's pretty stubborn.. but slowly comming around.
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