Aredhel's Switching Thread/Sunnyberra

[Heather]

Name: Gemma
HF Forum Username: aredhel

1. Where did you first learn about natural diets for ferrets? Ferrets for Dummies and then from Ferret World.

2. Please describe the type of diet you would like assistance in switching your ferret(s) to. A full switch to a natural diet. Up until recently they've been fed frankenprey, until on a whim i bought them each a little pinkie mouse which went down a storm.

3. Why are you interested in switching your ferrets to a natural diet? I know that it is the best diet for ferrets and it was always something which I considered, and which up until recently i used to feed as a treat, but Jasper now refuses to eat kibble and eats raw so I want to make sure I’m doing it properly. Once Jasper is settled completely with a natural diet, I would consider switching my three jills who already eat certain meats.

4. Do you understand that switching your ferret to a natural diet can be a lengthy, arduous process? Its not an overnight switch. It can be a commitment of several weeks or even months. Your HF Mentor will be more then happy to assist you in switchng your ferret(s) to a natural diet, but you need to be equally as commited. If you aren't willing to tough out a potentially lengthy switching process, or if you have major life changes approaching (baby on the way, moving, starting school, getting married/divorced, etc) then it might be a better idea to wait on switching your ferret's diet until you have more time. Are you willing to make the commitment? Yup

5. How many ferrets do you currently have? What are their names? Ages? Genders? Do they have any health problems? Are they overweight? Underweight? How long have you had each ferret for?

We have four ferrets: Jasper, Male, est. 2 years. No health issues. He weighs in at 1.35kg, he's pretty small in comparison to most other males i've seen. We’ve had Jasper, since January of this year.

Suki, Female, est. 1.5years. No health issues. She weighs in at about 1kg. Suki has been with us since December 2012.

Kiko, Female, est. 2 years. No known health issues. She weighs 700gms and has been with us just over a month.

Luna, Female, est. 1 year. No known health issues. She weighs 1.2kg and she came to us with Kiko, and has put on a fair bit of weight since.

6. What diet do you currently feed your ferrets? The kibble we use is James Wellbelloved, which is the primary diet of the three jills. Jasper currently eats, chicken and chicken on the bone, liver, hearts, mince and turkey. They get the occasional egg yolk, pinkie mouse and malt paste.

7. Have you ever tried to switch your ferrets to a natural diet in the past? If yes, what happened? Yes, they love it. Jasper eats everything i've given him so far, Suki is pretty much the same, although she didn't eat a pinkie mouse. Kiko tries to chomp on bones bigger than her head sometimes, but again more or less eats anything, not massively keen on liver or mince. Are DEW, Luna (this is a name we chose initially but we hate it so only using this for reference at the minute) is more picky; she ate a pinky mouse, likes chicken and bone, but doesn't seem to like hearts, liver or mince and prefers to stuff her face with kibble.

8. What additional information about yourself or your ferrets would you like to share? We’ve never tried a ‘soup’, we just went straight to raw chunks and then to meat on the bone. I still cut it up, but the chunks are a fair size.

9. How often during the week do you have access to a computer? Everyday

10. Please post a picture of each of your ferrets (if possible

Hi and welcome to the mentoring program (wave) . In a little while your mentor (Sunnyberra) will introduce herself and you can get started on a new adventure in natural ferret care and diets. Please remember to post regularly (daily or as per arranged with your mentor) so that your mentor can assist you move along safely in this adventure. If you experience computer difficulties or are going to be away, please notify your mentor and most of all relax and have fun . Your mentor is here to help you on this journey.
ciao

[Deleted]

Hi, I'm sunnyberra, and I'll be helping you fully transition your guys and help you discover how to balance their diet. It seems you're on to a great start with your guys

A little about my experience: I started on raw for my ferrets about 8 years ago. When my first pair was 2, I looked into switching diets as a way to help ward off illnesses. It's not a cure all, but for my boy, Yew, who was prone to accidents, it gave him a lot of enjoyment, and we didn't run into issues that we had with kibble (bad teeth, scraped throats, etc). That was by far the most intensive switch with my guys. At the time, I used the fasting method, since they were vet checked and determined to be healthy. What that meant was that I took away kibble period, and used hand feeding and supplemental feedings (baby food - to keep them from losing weight, but not completely satiated, so they'd be willing to try the raw). Yew was actually a quick starter - eating raw in a soup (he had just gotten done with oral surgery, and took to soup and grinds like a champ). Pixie took about a week before she realized it was food, and then she fell in love with it, detested kibble and processed treats like she'd been eating a more natural diet all her life.

I now currently have 5 ferrets, 3 (Yogi, Sian and Rula) of whom I have had since kits, and they were easy switches. I got them home, let them play, then a few hours later, I put down kibble dusted chicken breast chunks, and watched happily as they knocked the kibble off the chunks and ate the meat! Hiko was my first rescue, fed on fruit-infused kibble and candy, but he was also relatively easy (I've been lucky more often than not). When he got home and met my guys, the first thing he did was steal a heart out of Sian's mouth. It still took about a week of kibble dusted chunks and grinds for him to adapt, but he's a pro at both franken AND whole prey now Anya is my one remaining stubborn baby. She's deaf and adrenal, had high cholesterol and total proteins out of whack when I got her. We've adapted to the hearing loss (result of a mite infection left untreated by previous owners), maintaining her quality of life with des. implants, and with a gradual switch of kibbles have normalized both the cholesterol and protein levels. She's currently on Epigen 90, and I've been slowly introducing FDR into her diet to widen her views on what "food" is, without her stressing out to the point of sliding into starvation mode (which happened when I first started introducing raw).

It seems Jasper's raring to go for the transition, and I take it he's on a full raw and whole prey diet, not wanting kibble? If so, it sounds pretty much to me that he's there, and we just need to make sure his diet is balanced. As for the girls, they seem to be more hesitant, but since they've already tried and eaten raw, we'll be able to get them caught up with their brother before you know it

So let's start by going into detail:

General questions -

- Do you have places to get at least 3 different proteins, at least one reliable source for hearts and organs (at least liver and kidney)?

- Do you have a scale?

Now for the diet specific questions -

- What is each ferret getting per day?

- How much of each is each ferret getting per day?

- How do you feed each ferret?

- For the finickier eaters, what tricks have you tried to get them to eat the proteins they are being picky with?

I think that's a good place to start, so that we are both on the same page as to understanding where you and your ferrets are at

[Deleted]

Yay! I've been really excited about the mentor programme ever since i signed up to the forum, i thought i'd be waiting ages I was starting to get a bit worried about Jasper because he massively reduced the amount he was eating but all seems to be good now and he pretty much hasn't stopped eating for the last three/four days and has put on about 250gms. Im not sure what it was, the weather has been pretty hot here so it could have been that but i decided to try him on smaller pieces so it could have been that too. So we're on small pieces at the minute

Okay, so to answer your questions...
Do you have places to get at least 3 different proteins, at least one reliable source for hearts and organs (at least liver and kidney)? Im not entirely sure what counts as different proteins, is that three different animals or three different types of meat? But i currently have all the organs you listed, and i discover my local supermarket which is five minutes up the road stocks all three Other than that they eat chicken, and chicken bone, turkey, mince, we have pork but nobody is really keen on that lol.

- Do you have a scale? Yup ^_^

- What is each ferret getting per day? Well, originally i was only measuring for Jasper and he started out with about 3oz (two x 1.5oz) a day but the girls kept pinching it so i upped the portions slightly to accommodate, but i've had to do it again because Jasper now eats like a horse and the girls are becoming more dependent on meat rather than kibble, so each portion is now 4oz. I just bag one meal for all of them together and freeze it, so their supposed to get two bags in theory, more often than not they get three.

- How much of each is each ferret getting per day? Jasper eats about 4oz a day and the girls eat about 2oz each as well as kibble. Luna is probably are pickiest and she eats about 4oz a day with meat (usually chicken) and kibble, she's a fair sized girl

- How do you feed each ferret? At the minute they're mostly hand fed to cut down on stashing. I hate flies...¬_¬ But they're happy to eat from a plate too

- For the finickier eaters, what tricks have you tried to get them to eat the proteins they are being picky with? This is mostly for Luna, Kiko eats anything and everything, Jasper doesn't like kidneys we only tried yesterday and Suki isn't massively keen on liver and the kidneys.
We've tried smaller pieces, so they look like treats-that didn't work.
We've tried dipping it in oil-that didn't work.
We've tried soup and that didn't work. Kiko was the only one to even attempt that-they prefer chunks

Thats about it really

[Deleted]

Sounds good so far. Each ferret seems like they are eating within their average (boys 4-6 oz, girls 1-3 oz, depending on size)

Different protein sources means different animals. So far, we have chicken, turkey. Is the mince one of those two meats, or is it beef or another meat?

If the girls still like kibble, you COULD try crushing some of the kibble and either rolling the pork (or new protein) in it, or sprinkling it on top and seeing if that will get their interest up, as well.

It's perfectly fine to start with chunks. Definitely always go with what your fuzzies prefer. I start with chunks, too, and only introduce soup so they are familiar with it (along with pedialyte, baby food, and pumpkin) in case they get sick and I need something easily syringed.

As for stashing, have you thought about getting them used to feeding dens? That, in theory, would cut down on the stashing worry, and they could have left overs for a bit, so that way the girls might get more adventurous.

[Deleted]

The mince is beef and the heart we use is from pigs. How would i go about crushing the kibble? I used a rolling pin to make the egg shell powder for the soup, might see if that will work for kibble too

I have question about baby food, its not something ive used but i'd love to try it out, but im not sure about which ones to use. All i know is that it has be meat based, but when i've looked they're like 5-10% meat and the rest is vegetables etc. I presumed this was bad and didn't buy any to try, is that right?

I have thought about using a feeding den, im just trying to find a way of doing it. I couldn't decide if i was going to give them a box each or one large box for all four. They all pinch each others food anyway lol

[Deleted]

Put the kibble in an unsealed bag, first, then use a rolling pin. If you're super mad that day (or you think it's fun like I do), you can pound it with a mallet

As for the baby food. I use beechnut chicken & chicken gravy, and beechnut turkey & turkey gravy. What you're looking for is ingredients that are basically the meat and water (and I know the gerber stage 2 has cornstarch in it, that's why I don't use it, but I know others on here do).

For the dens, I'd start with one, since stealing each other's food is what makes eating so fun for ferrets, hahhaha. But if you find the fighting and stealing is causing them to take the meat to stash elsewhere, you may have to a couple more options

[Deleted]

We've never had a fight over food, not really, only the one time i fed them pinkie mice, not over regular food so hopefully that shouldn't be a problem. I might make two though to prevent Jasper from cornering our two newest girls in the box and attacking them

[Deleted]

That sounds good When you are feeding raw, do you pick up the kibble, or do you feed raw alongside it?

[Deleted]

They have kibble in their cages 24/7, and they have their own room upstairs. We feed them raw downstairs in the kitchen because the floor is easier to keep clean, they have carpet in their room

[Deleted]

Okay, I'm getting the sense that your guys are actually doing pretty well with the raw, actually. The ideal sized meal, if you want to feed an all raw diet is one where, if you feed twice a day, they eat the majority of it at meal time, with only a bit left over to stash until the next meal, which is why a feeding den would be a great set up for you guys. Either in their cage, or even a container inside a box, so that way if they even want to get away, they leave the feeding "den" but hopefully stay in the box, and don't go dragging it everywhere in the room (I feel you, with that. One of my ferret rooms has carpet, but I've just gotten used to spot cleaning, hahaha). Or, you can feed them in the cage - let them eat and stash before coming out to play. They'll be more prone to leave it in there (where it's easily found), and go back when they want.

The reason I bring this up is because I think you will see them get more used to the diet if they have a bit more casual access to it, and not just full access to kibble.

[Deleted]

I have tried feeding them in their cages before, i used a sort of hanging ball type thing (designed for rabbits and guinea pigs i think) to put the meat in rather than a bowl, this was during the short period when Jasper stopped showing interest in raw and it was an attempt to make him interested again (it worked ^_^). I stopped because the meat sitting in their cages all day with the added super hot weather attracted flies and i hate flies and their horrid offspring>_< Which is another reason i moved to hand feeding. We're in the process of planning a super cage which was ideally supposed to house all four together but i think it will have to be divided and i plan on putting feeding dens in their, their cages are designed purely for sleeping at the minute but i can't resist ferret projects and i get jealous when i look at other peoples set ups so i wanted to make one for our four But in the mean time i think i'll set one up in the kitchen and see how that works out

[Deleted]

It might take some time for them to get the point of actually keeping food in there, but most that use them say theirs do end up getting the point

[Deleted]

as for flies - you can always trying chilling or freezing the toy to help keep the food longer. Also, once everyone feels comfortable with raw, you can try shower hooks to hang the meat on the side of the cage (takes larger chunks, of course). If you want to try it - a lot of finickier eaters do like that (instead of leaving it [because I've had my own battle with flies - hidden rat carcass :C so I definitely feel you) - you can try leaving it for 30 minutes hanging up, then remove. Or put it on the hook half frozen)

[Deleted]

I usually leave it out for half an hour or until they stop showing interest in it then remove it I think my main issue to raw feeding is getting enough variety, different proteins. I live in a small town, so no oriental markets and there are a few butchers but they look at me as if im mad when i ask for things for the ferrets, so i source everything from supermarkets. I've managed with the organs okay and obviously muscle meat is in abundance, its just meat of the bone i struggle with. The only bone meat they eat is chicken wings and thats a lot of chicken,and they get bored of it so i've cut chicken muscle out of their diet so at the minute they have beef mince and pork. Obviously they get some chicken muscle off the bone, but i'd love to be able to give them some other type of bone i just don't know what they could manage. I haven't been able to find duck wings or turkey tips/necks so i'm a bit stuck.

[Deleted]

Pork riblets (button bones), some ferrets can handle ox tail, my guys can eat bone in goat (but that can be tricky to find). Game hens, though chicken (they were once considered separate, but now they're usually just immature chicken), are generally very well regarded - it's a lighter meat, softer bone than the more mature chicken. You can generally try any bone that is about the size of a riblet, and see how they take it. But, yes, it's a good idea, if you're primarily relying on chicken as the bone meal, to make muscle and organ meals a different protein

Stores are definitely tricky when trying to find variety - we don't have ethnic markets or the like here, just standard grocery stores. For the ferrets it's not a big deal, but for the pups it gets time consuming trying to find the best deals, the most variety, and the like.