Can I feed them this as there main diet.

[Deleted]

After I switch them over. I'm thinking after Christmas since I don't have much time now, but I will have two weeks off in December.
I have rabbits, & chickens.
I'm thinking about raising mice, & if all goes good I might start rats if I have to.
But if like to know what the best way to feed rabbits and for to prepare them.

[Sherry]

Okay, first you will need a minimum of 3 different proteins, preferably more
With any whole prey it depends on how accustomed the ferret is to eating them. I know some who just slit and gut the rabbit and toss it in whole. The ferrets take care of the rest, basically only leaving the jacket(fur and skin).
Mine are a wee bit more spoiled and will only take rabbit skinned and sectioned. Others gut and grind the whole thing, fur and all.
So- it's really all going to depend on you and your ferrets. There is no one answer, and no wrong way.

[Deleted]

thank you Sherry. If I was able to do rabbit (I can skin in and section if needed since I already know how) then the mice. I'd have to do rats to? What other things are there to chose from?

[Sherry]

Here you go holisticferret60.proboards.com/thread/146/meat-bone-organ-weekly-menu

[Deleted]

Thank you very much! Once I get 15 posts I'll sign up for the mentoring program,

[Deleted]

You want to make sure you feed other meats besides rabbit as rabbit is lower in taurine and not a sufficient source of it on its own. A long term study was done with cats fed only rabbit meat. They had a lot of serious health problems. Taurine is essential for good health, so it is vital you feed a variety of different meat proteins to your ferrets.

[Sherry]

There was one flaw with that study Yurei in that the rabbit was ground, which helped destroy the taurine. But yes you are right in that rabbit is lower in taurine than the other animals.

[Deleted]

Yeah. I'm now planning on doing rabbit, rats & mice. Would this be okay?

[Sherry]

Why not also throw in some chicken wings and some heart meat of some sort? That way if you can't source any of your whole prey(and yes this can happen), you have something else they recognize as food.

[Deleted]

I'm still on the soup stage. So that's pretty far from that.

[Deleted]

Taurine is an extremely crucial amino acid for carnivores - especially ferrets. Taurine is also NOT manufactured by their body, nor is it stored - so it is ESSENTIAL that you offer Taurine sources on a daily basis. Taurine can NOT be "OVER" fed - or "OVER" dosed - so that is one reason I feed turkey hearts every day. Taurine is higher in dark meats - Rabbit meat is considered a "white meat", so are chicken wings, chicken breasts, entire Cornish Game hens. Please keep that in mind with your menu.

[Deleted]

Josiesmom, a question for you...I am always quite anxious that mine will not get enough taurine, I offer dried duck hearts on the weekend, is that a good source like the turkey hearts? And second question, the weekly menu plan suggests hearts on the weekend, and that is the plan that I have stuck to, so should I be offering hearts thru out the week (the Wysong Archetypal 1 has taurine added and so does Stella and Chewys)?

[Deleted]

I am a bit of an odd duck, even here on the HHF, in that I don't stick to a rigid menu. Taurine is a degradable amino acid so the further the meat item is from fresh, the less taurine there is in it.

To put it in perspective, there is more Taurine in a fresh raw heart than there is in a refrigerated raw heart; there is more Taurine in a refrigerated raw heart than there is in a frozen raw heart, there is more Taurine in a Frozen raw heart than in a dehydrated heart (depending upon how long the frozen heart has been frozen). If the dehydrated heart was dried directly after slaughter - the dried heart may offer more Taurine than a frozen heart that has been frozen for a long time. I tend to think that frozen meats are fresher over all than dehydrated and offer the added advantage of high moisture for the ferret.

That is NOT to say I dislike feeding dehydrated. I do feed dehydrated, also dehydrate my own meats for them. They enjoy the texture, and it keeps them eating a form that may be an ONLY source of meat in an emergency!

I also tend to feed my kids there frankenprey as if they were devouring a full animal each day. So that means they get edible bone, skin, meat, sinew, heart, liver and fat daily. I let their systems tell them what they need and simply offer them daily choices of a range of sources, but the majority is chicken. I do feed a fair amount of whole prey too.

Hope my answers doesn't seem to convoluted or evasive, feeding naturally can be done in various manners as long as one keeps the basics in mind. So far this approach has worked for a number of years for multiple Ferrets.

I find it fascinating too that after their initial switch the former kibble cruncher will be ravenous and tend to devour what they find tastiest. But after a time they begin to level off and will eat a wider variety and then you can see them select different things from the buffe set out for them.

[Deleted]

It's reassuring that I can't overfeed heart/taurine (as long as he gets ample bone and organ meat). This has been quite the adventure-- I was initially giving a whole chicken liver each day, because it was always the first thing Pippin ate. Then, about the time I read HFF's recommended proportions, Pippin hit 3 lbs, 6 oz at 4.5 months old and he was starting to waddle. I cut down the liver to the recommended proportion, and he's also backed off the total weight eaten per day, and he's looking more trim, last weighed 2 lbs 14 oz. In addition to chicken hearts, liver, gizzards and wings, he has eaten turkey giblets. Turned his nose up at duck (except, of course, the liver). In my search for another type of protein, I tried pinky mice (with a squirt of salmon oil). He ate them before anything else in the dish! So, I'm thinking it's time to start trying other "whole" foods.

[Deleted]

That's a really cute picture of Pippin. Sounds like he is a good eater, you've got to love that!