|
Post by kraesmom on Jan 16, 2014 0:46:29 GMT -5
So I finally tracked down everything but kidney to do a frankenprey diet. I spent hours chopping it all up and my wrist hurts. The dog was thrilled with her raw turkey wing bone (those things are HUGE!). The cat was happy with the soupie. (And kept trying to"help" while I was chopping.) The ferrets, who have been happily eating commercial ground frozen and freeze dried, are not impressed at all. The chicken livers smell AWFUL. The pork brains are so gross. And I think I nearly burnt up my blender. Lol. I really hope they start eating chunks soon, 'cause I'm not sure how many times I can handle mincing that stuff. Oh. And they despise heart. [img src="http://i1105.photobucket.com/albums/h352/JW_2012/Emoticons/ .gif" src="http://i1105.photobucket.com/albums/h352/JW_2012/Emoticons/ .gif" style="max-width:100%;"] I'll keep trying to get them to eat it all until this batch is gone, but we might end up being a prissy little prepared raw family if I can't get it together by then.
|
|
|
Post by Sherry on Jan 16, 2014 1:32:13 GMT -5
Try applying for a mentor they WILL get there. Have you started a switching thread here in this board?
|
|
|
Post by katt on Jan 16, 2014 2:49:31 GMT -5
LOL Best thing you can do is make it up in big batches, separate into meals, and freeze it. Granted this is harder to do in the soup to chunks phase. Liver does stink, but you get used to it.
As for your blender, the easiest thing to use is boneless, skinless chicken breast. Cut it into smaller pieces and the blender should handle it fine. Boneless pork chops aren't too bad either. Liver is practically liquid already so you don't even need to chop that really, and hearts are generally easy to blend. Then use powdered eggshell for the calcium. Granted this is all for soup.
If you are going from grinds to chunks, it is easiest to just start with slivers of meat. So buy boneless meat (or if you really want to do the extra work, cut the meat off the bones and give the bones to the pups to gnaw on or make soup broth for humans out of them or something lol) and cut the boneless meat into slivers. Mix the slivers into the ground raw, and gradually increase the size and number of the meat slivers while decreasing the ground meat. You can add heart and organ slivers in there at the same time, or you can work on hearts and organs separately via the organ soup method (see below). Once they are eating decent sized chunks (use eggshell in the meanwhile), you can start on the bones. Mash up some chicken wings (easiest to start with since the bones are nice and small) with a hammer or meat cleaver. Mix the chunks of bone in, you may need to hand feed at first, and as their jaw strength increases gradually increase the bone size (smash/chop it less and less).
For organ soup method, you can start with a blended meat and heart and organ soup for about 6 meals a week (work on the chunks the other 8 meals). You can do this at the same time as the other stuff. Gradually increase the organs and hearts in the soup while decreasing the meat. When you get to a soup that is about 1/2 organ and hearts and 1/2 muscle meat, drop down to 4 meals a week. Continue to increase the organ and heart and decrease the muscle meat, at the same time starting to add in small chunks of organs and hearts. Slow and steady wins the race. Up the chunks, increase the organ/heart amount, and decrease the soup amount overall, until they are eating hearts and organs without soup. You can slowly separate hearts and organs at the same time as all of this as well (2 meals organ heavy soup, 2 meals heart heavy), or at the same time by having mixed-chunk soups. When you get down to no muscle meat needed (all hearts and organs), drop down to 3 meals a week. Eventually you should have them eating one and a half meals of organ and one and a half meals of heart each week. Easiest way to do this IMO is:
Day 1: AM: Organs (half liver, half other organs) PM: Heart
Day 2: AM: half heart, half organs (liver or half liver half other organs) PM: bone-in meal
Granted depending on your ferrets, you will probably have to spread those 3 meals out over the week instead of one right after the other. My boys do fine on that schedule though, but I do vary it up sometimes.
|
|
|
Post by kraesmom on Jan 16, 2014 10:57:54 GMT -5
Try applying for a mentor they WILL get there. Have you started a switching thread here in this board? I changed the title to make this my switching thread. I just got my scale last night, so I hope to apply for a mentor tonite or tomorrow. Looking forward to getting the little beasts on chunks of meat. Incidentally, the dog threw up from the turkey bone. *sigh*.
|
|
|
Post by katt on Jan 16, 2014 11:48:21 GMT -5
Dogs tend to get GI upset if you switch them cold turkey. You probably just need to item things more gradually for him so he can adjust.
|
|
|
Post by Heather on Jan 16, 2014 13:44:43 GMT -5
He probably in typically good doggy fashion woofed down that good bone material and then threw it all up when his stomach went hey, what's that ...if you could have handled the gag factor and allowed him to eat it again it would have stayed down. I always have switched my dogs cold turkey but with a fasting day in between. I also use something easier to digest than the large turkey bones. If you feed a bit more meat and less bone, the dog would probably handle it fine. Actually, that's what my dog had this morning. Today was his bone meal...he got 6 turkey necks, 5 turkey legs and a half dozen wings, oh and a pound of whole beef (tomorrow is an organ day hence the reason for a good bone meal today) ciao
|
|
|
Post by kraesmom on Jan 16, 2014 13:53:38 GMT -5
She (the dog) actually just ate all the turkey meat that was clinging to the bone and left the bone to gnaw on today.
|
|
|
Post by kraesmom on Jan 16, 2014 21:20:07 GMT -5
So the little monsters repeatedly spit out the tiny pieces of boneless chicken breast I was hand feeding them. They did, however, gobble down some commercial raw lamb grind that they have never had before. I had to hand feed them initially, but it wasnt long before they were enthusiastically eating it on their own.
|
|
|
Post by katt on Jan 17, 2014 0:00:38 GMT -5
So the little monsters repeatedly spit out the tiny pieces of boneless chicken breast I was hand feeding them. They did, however, gobble down some commercial raw lamb grind that they have never had before. I had to hand feed them initially, but it wasnt long before they were enthusiastically eating it on their own. Mix the slivers into their regular grinds. As long as they are small enough and you increase them (# and size) gradually enough they should hardly even notice they are there. It can also to use the same protein too, especially for extra picky ferrets. So for example if they haven't had ground chicken before, they will be more likely to notice the chicken slivers in their beef mix vs if you mixed beef slivers into their beef mix. (Though mixing a new protein into an "old" grind is also a good way to intro new meats). I'm assuming they have had chicken grinds before though, so the flavor isn't likely the issue as much as the new texture. lol
|
|
|
Post by kraesmom on Jan 17, 2014 14:57:13 GMT -5
I'm assuming they have had chicken grinds before though, so the flavor isn't likely the issue as much as the new texture. lol Good idea, I'll try it. And yes, so far they've had pheasant, chicken, turkey, chicken/salmon, beef/salmon, and lamb
|
|
|
Post by kraesmom on Jan 17, 2014 21:39:50 GMT -5
I didn't have any chicken per minced, so I fed them CGF chicken. I did weigh Foster. He is 1024ish grams. He squirms. He ate about 30g of the food. I'm still waiting for Avery to show up. He is free roaming at the moment.
Avery finally "came home". He is 1165g. He didn't eat much, but I think he was sneaking dog kibble while he was out. (headwall)
|
|
|
Post by kraesmom on Jan 19, 2014 12:51:11 GMT -5
Three meals of CG yesterday. I've got the chicken in the fridge to mince today for adding to the CG.
|
|
|
Post by Sherry on Jan 19, 2014 15:05:43 GMT -5
Sounds like they are doing fairly well so far And yes- make the slivers no bigger than the cresent on your pinkie nail, and just start with 5-6 well mixed in. As they accept those increase the number.
|
|
|
Post by kraesmom on Jan 19, 2014 18:31:19 GMT -5
Sounds like they are doing fairly well so far And yes- make the slivers no bigger than the cresent on your pinkie nail, and just start with 5-6 well mixed in. As they accept those increase the number. I'm glad I checked before I made dinner. I was going to mix in about a tablespoon full of tiny pcs! Lol. Gotta start slower...
|
|
|
Post by Sherry on Jan 19, 2014 18:48:28 GMT -5
Right now it's more a matter of tricking them into eating it,
|
|