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Post by gfountain on May 15, 2014 8:10:00 GMT -5
Wow, that's a lot of soup Ezzy may prefer a plate to a bowl. Many ferrets do. If he'll lick it off your finger, that's the place to start. Hold him & let him lick. Put the bowl on your lap and gradually lower your finger to the bowl. By gradually, I mean over a few days. I've heard of ferrants having to stand with a finger in the soup dish to get the fuzzies to eat. Be patient & keep on trying.
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Post by gfountain on May 15, 2014 8:40:49 GMT -5
Just for reference, Slinkee didn't eat soups from a dish in his cage for 3-4 weeks. His progression went like this:
Being held, spoon > table, spoon > held, dish > table, dish > table, dish, mommy walked away > cage, spoon > cage, dish, mommy near him > cage, dish, mommy walked away but stayed in the room > cage, dish, mommy left the room
And he didn't progress steadily. We backed up a step several times, but he finally got there. And Ezzy will too.
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Post by Deleted on May 15, 2014 9:18:21 GMT -5
gfountainThanks so much for putting it in perspective. You and Slinkee are about to graduate, right? I will keep it up with him and I'm sure he'll get it eventually.
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Post by Deleted on May 15, 2014 9:19:08 GMT -5
you got this!
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Post by gfountain on May 15, 2014 9:49:56 GMT -5
gfountainThanks so much for putting it in perspective. You and Slinkee are about to graduate, right? I will keep it up with him and I'm sure he'll get it eventually. I just took my final exam.. waiting for my grade. And he will get it, I have no doubt.
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Post by Deleted on May 15, 2014 9:54:46 GMT -5
gfountainThanks so much for putting it in perspective. You and Slinkee are about to graduate, right? I will keep it up with him and I'm sure he'll get it eventually. I just took my final exam.. waiting for my grade. And he will get it, I have no doubt. Don't worry, I am sure you will score great! Looking forward to celebrating when you graduate! (dance)
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Post by Deleted on May 15, 2014 19:51:54 GMT -5
Ezra ate soupies!!! At first, I had to rub it on his mouth so he would compulsively lick it off, but then by the time we filmed this video, he was licking it willingly. All in all, I think he ate about an ounce of it. He is acting reluctant (maybe you can tell in the video) but he does eat it, and leans in for more after a bit. Also, is there any concern with serving it cold vs. room temp? I pulled this out of the freezer, blended it, and served it shortly after, so maybe I should try room temp? Thoughts? We are relieved about passing this first step with him. Thanks for all the support that has been offered thusfar! Spreadsheet update: docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/toiw2pmc98zOB1mMGphd5Eg/htmlview#gid=0
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Post by gfountain on May 15, 2014 20:00:50 GMT -5
GO EZRA GO!!! (dance)
No real concerns about temperature, except that most fuzzies prefer it a little warm. I heated mine by just adding a little HOT water to it, rather than microwaving it or anything.
Next step: work toward getting him to eat from the dish. Move that finger closer to the bowl and make him lower his head. :thumbsup:
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Post by Deleted on May 15, 2014 20:20:27 GMT -5
GO EZRA GO!!! (dance) No real concerns about temperature, except that most fuzzies prefer it a little warm. I heated mine by just adding a little HOT water to it, rather than microwaving it or anything. Next step: work toward getting him to eat from the dish. Move that finger closer to the bowl and make him lower his head. :thumbsup: You are so full of good ideas! Why didn't I think of hot water?! We will work on getting him closer to the bowl tomorrow. Right now, he's really not a fan. The best he did was sniff it a little, but I have confidence in him now that we've made this initial progress. I went to check on him in his room and he sniffed my hands and climbed up into my lap like "where is the stuff? It was just here! Is there more?!" I am so proud! (bounce) And how is Minnie doing? Is she keeping up with Slink or do you feed them separately?
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Post by gfountain on May 15, 2014 23:01:37 GMT -5
All my good ideas came from someone else... Can't take credit for any of them. Oh, except the egg shell powder in a salt shaker. I did come up with that one on my own. Oh my goodness.. apparently you haven't read any of the threads about my eating machine! Minnie has far surpassed Slinks in eating. She came home on a Saturday night. She was eating at the store when we got there, so I just gave her a few pieces of chicken in the crate that night. (She had chewed/sucked pieces off of a stupid sock monkey on the way home, so I was afraid she was a chewer and didn't want to risk her eating any of the blankies, so I left her in the crate until I could supervise.) Sunday morning, she stole Slinkee's pork riblet right out from under his nose and hasn't looked back since. She weighed 13 oz that first morning and she ate 12 oz of food that day. She ate an entire week's worth of food intended for Slinkee in 2 days. I could NOT keep up with her for at least a week. I thought I was set for a couple of months (for 1 ferret) with food in the freezer, but once Minnie came home, it was gone in a week. She eats anything she can get her mouth around. Her largest bone consumed to date was a T-bone BONE yesterday. She ate almost half of it in a couple of hours. We've come to the conclusion that she must have been slowly starving on that kibble, because now that she's been home for almost 3 weeks and has apparently satisfied her needs, she's not as aggressive with her food as she had been. And her intake is finally slowing down to the point where this week I have been able to fix their meals ahead of time and have the amounts fairly close to accurate. Her average amount right now is about 10 oz/day, where Slinkee's is 3 oz. So if I were to feed them separately, which I did have to do for a while, it's so that Slinkee would be able to get to the food dish.
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Post by Deleted on May 16, 2014 8:43:18 GMT -5
Not to hijack but HOLY MOLY gfountain! My eyes about bugged out of my head when I read that. 12oz in 1 day! WOW!
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Post by gfountain on May 16, 2014 10:06:10 GMT -5
Not to hijack but HOLY MOLY gfountain! My eyes about bugged out of my head when I read that. 12oz in 1 day! WOW! Yep, a 13 oz baby ate that much.
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Post by Deleted on May 16, 2014 17:15:20 GMT -5
Here's the video for today of Ezra eating his soup..... from a SPOON. He ate chunks about half the size of my pinky nail and had 3.5 oz by the time we were through. Big progress so early on, I think. We have decided to remove the kibble from the cage for tonight and are leaving him 4 oz of soup instead. Should I be concerned about moving him "too fast", or is there no such thing so long as he is happy and willing? Updated spreadsheet here (bounce)
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Post by Heather on May 16, 2014 19:53:09 GMT -5
You can move too fast and then you just step back a bit to the previous method. ciao
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Post by Deleted on May 17, 2014 6:44:29 GMT -5
Thank you, Heather ! I woke up this morning to find that he hadn't gone near the soup last night (kind of expected). He had a very runny poo, but it didn't look like anything to worry on. I gave 3.0 oz of kibble for him to have during the day today, and when I get home from work tonight we'll work on his comfort level with eating the soupie from a spoon again, and hopefully from the bowl. How long can soup be left in his cage before it "goes bad"? This morning, the batch I left had a very light-brown center (think ground beef JUST as it starts to cook and is no longer pink). Is brown normal? It was in his cage for about 7.5 hours, but it had been about 12 hours since I took it out of the fridge initially. Should I be worried about leaving it that long? There are no bugs near where he is at, and no other animals, so I'm only worried about the elements (he's in an A/C'd room).
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