newbie plz help

[Deleted]

My boyfriend and I want to get our 3 month old ferret Little Bear on a whole raw prey diet. He is currently on Marshall's brand ferret kibble. We bought him some fuzzie mice the other day and have been mincing them up very finely and been mixing that with his kibble and he seems too enjoy that just fine, but when i offer him the minced mouse by itself he looks at me like "dad your crazy". I know that mice alone will not sufice for his dietary needs and plan on getting him organ meats and chicken as well. So i guess my question is where do we go from here and what are some other food i should be offering him? thank you in advance

[Sherry]

Take a read through the nutrition board to start. In the raw feeding board there is a sticky called "basic frankenprey menu"(or something to that effect). It not only gives a base balanced diet but also lists several examples of each

[Deleted]

Have been reading through old threads and have gotten some great menu ideas. Should we gradually reduce the kibble to raw meat mince, then once on a all raw diet gradually make the meat and bone pieces bigger?

[Sherry]

Since he is objecting to raw period I'd start with a pureed raw soup myself.

[Deleted]

We didn't own a blender so I have to mince meat by hand till it is very very fine. Tried chicken wings today and he is currently nawing on some of it as I type

[Sherry]

Wow! That's a huge step

[Deleted]

We were quite surprised as well. A quick question how often can he have fish oil? I thought I would have to put some fish oil on the chicken because that is what we do with mice.

[Sherry]

I give about 1/2 tsp every third day.

[Deleted]

I will make those days line up with mouse days at least till he eats them without it.

[Deleted]

Update:
We gave Little Bear ox tails yesterday morning did a "scruff n' stuff" and wouldn't eat it for most of the day. We "scruff n' stuff" later that day because we knew he was hungry as he kept running to his food bowl and sniffing them but not eating and after that let me tell you he tore that ox tail a new one. He now eats chicken wings and livers and now ox tails we still waiting for our fuzzie mice order to come in the mail, so he is almost ccompletely off the kibble (we still mix the last bit of remaining kibble in with his livers that he gets once a week)

[Heather]

You've done very well. Make sure you don't feed him too much liver. It seems to be something a lot of people feed too much of and then find themselves with a wee one with a devil of a belly ache and some really nasty stools
ciao

[Deleted]

Thank you I did not know that, liver night I usually falls on Wednesday. Is once a week too often or were you referring to how much liver fed at once?

[Heather]

Both. For some reason people seem to think that animals need a lot of liver. When I feed liver (to those that will eat it in its altogether state) I usually feed with a bone meal like wings (helps keep the stools from going sticky and black. I know the break down is 1 liver to 8 oz of meat but I can't for the life of me remember how much it is for one ferret Sherry will know though. I'm going to guess about an oz (the joys of feeding prey and multiple ferrets)
ciao

[Deleted]

I did notice that after his first time eating liver will try the bone meal with it next time. What organ meats would you recommend that are more tummy friendly?

[Heather]

Oh, it's not that you shouldn't feed it it's the quantity fed and you should probably feed other organs too if you can get them. Kidney and brains are two that are often easily accessed.
ciao