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Post by gfountain on May 24, 2014 13:14:24 GMT -5
Maybe you can shed some light on the process. Are we planning to move him onto a frankenprey diet and THEN move him over to whole prey?
The plan is to get him eating solid food, whatever the type, and then bones, fur, feathers, whatever. Generally, I think the switch is from kibble to frankenprey and then to whole prey, but I don't see any reason not to go directly to whole prey (I'll check with the others though just to be sure). You gave him a hopper and he liked it, so let's just go for it if that's what you want to do. That said, there are some caveats. Immature whole prey will NOT provide all the nutrients he needs. A good variety of animals of varying ages are necessary for complete nutrition - at least 3 different proteins and mostly adults. Until he's able to eat entire adult prey, you'll need to be sure he has the right balance of organs, heart, bones, etc. Whole prey can sometimes be difficult to get. I would suggest continuing with some grocery store meats, so he'll be familiar with them in case of emergency, if your supplier runs out or if you have to leave him in the care of someone who can't handle the whole prey. I know, I know - we are moving too fast here... Forgive me for being so ambitious.
Nope, if he's eating it, it's not too fast Nothing to forgive.. I like ambition. I don't want to gross you outLOL, I am not a complete baby! I don't have a problem with feeding whole prey, just with ME feeding whole prey. Also, his poop had a chunk of fur in it this morning? Completely normal. Fur is edible but indigestible. It is good for cleaning out the GI tract. Ferrets who eat whole prey poop out little packages wrapped in fur or feathers. I didn't know prolapse was a concern. I'm sorry. I worded that incorrectly, didn't mean to worry you. Prolapse is not normally a concern. I should have said IF it happens, we can up the eggshell. Slinkee never had a problem, Minnie's was terrible. But her switch was too too fast (not by my choice). No need to make any changes at this point. Soup poops are going to be soft, so just keep an eye on him. He looks like he's enjoying that mouse soup And I love the video of him climbing into the desk.. those legs & tail hanging down There is no place sacred with a ferret in the house.
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Post by gfountain on May 24, 2014 13:22:59 GMT -5
Basic Frankenprey Menu
Based on 14 meals/week - 1.5 meals organ (half liver, half something else), 1.5 meals heart, 9 meals edible bone-in, 2 meals muscle meat
The example I've found elsewhere on the forum does not meet these requirements for some reason. It only includes 1 meal each of organ and heart. So this is what I use:
Monday am: heart Monday pm: edible bone-in
Tuesday am: organ Tuesday pm: edible bone-in
Wednesday am: muscle Wednesday pm: edible bone-in
Thursday am: heart/organ Thursday pm: edible bone in meat
Friday am: edible bone-in Friday pm: edible bone-in
Saturday am: muscle Saturday pm: edible bone-in
Sunday am: edible bone-in Sunday pm: edible bone-in
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Post by Deleted on May 24, 2014 13:48:08 GMT -5
Okay, copied the menu to my phone for reference!
Thank you for clarifying about the prolapse concern, I feel better about it. Did Minnie's heal up okay?
I agree with getting him used to grocery store meats first, in case I can't get him whatever whole prey he's used to. Also because I have a huge stock of gizzards, thighs, and hearts - and no money for whole prey right now. So I'll chop up some chicken thigh tonight into slivers about the size he's been eating the mouse, and we'll see if he takes to it.
Stupid me, I got no-bone thighs, so I'll probably save the rest of those for us to eat, and get something with bones for him tomorrow so we can start working on bone slivers too.
Is it alright to begin to follow this menu with his slivers? So where there's a bone-in meal, I will give him chunks of meat and bones, and where there's an organ meal, I'll give him chunks of gizzards? Am I correct in thinking that "muscle" is just boneless meats?
Btw, update on the mouse... Sam says he ate the skull, ribcage, tail, and all without issue. Woo!
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Post by gfountain on May 24, 2014 14:51:05 GMT -5
Okay, copied the menu to my phone for reference!Double check that to make sure it's the correct one with 1.5 meals each of organ and heart. I cut & pasted and posted before I realized that I had the correct one, then had to edit it. So just make sure you've got the right one. Thank you for clarifying about the prolapse concern, I feel better about it. Did Minnie's heal up okay?I'm really sorry about that. Sometimes I type before I think and it comes out wrong. Minnie's is fine... we had one full week of poop h*ll, with vulva issues and prolapse, then it went away almost as fast as it started. I agree with getting him used to grocery store meats firstGood. Nutritionally, there's no need to do frankenprey first, but for YOUR knowledge, it is advisable. I think it's important for you to know the basics of his nutrition and be able to calculate what he needs, to know WHY you're feeding what you're feeding, and how to fix his diet if his poops get off. Stupid me, I got no-bone thighs, so I'll probably save the rest of those for us to eat, and get something with bones for him tomorrow so we can start working on bone slivers too.Nothing stupid about it. You can't start feeding thigh bones yet And didn't I read somewhere that you are vegetarian, or is that someone else I'm thinking of? You don't want to sliver his bones. That's something he'll have to work up to himself. If YOU sliver them, he won't get the hang of chewing them and they could cause problems going down. He's not quite ready for bone yet at any rate. We need to get him eating about 1 inch cubes. We're not only working on building up his tolerance for new foods, but also his jaw strength. When it's time for bones, you'll want to start with wingtips. Those are soft and easy to chew, and seem to be very yummy. My two fight over them every time they have wings. Actually, since he ate the hopper, you could try tossing him a wingtip and see what he does with it. For his edible bone meals, you'll want to use non-weight-bearing bones, so wings, ribs, necks. Thighs are denser and harder to eat. He should be able to do it eventually, but not yet. Is it alright to begin to follow this menu with his slivers? That menu is what we're working up to. It will take a while to get there so be patient! For now, stick with the balanced soup recipe to be sure he's getting enough organs and heart. We're going to gradually add more and larger slivers, then chunks and begin decreasing the amount of soup. Once he's eating good size chunks, we'll start adding whole chunks of organ and hearts and working with the bone-in. We're working toward being able to toss a chunk of bone & meat into the cage, but he needs to work up to it. How fast he goes is up to him. So where there's a bone-in meal, I will give him chunks of meat and bones, and where there's an organ meal, I'll give him chunks of gizzards? Am I correct in thinking that "muscle" is just boneless meats?Eventually yes, but not yet, lol! You're getting ahead of little Ezra. Gizzards are not organs, they're muscle. I posted examples of the different kinds of meat, but I don't see them up there. I'll put them here again in a minute, but if 2 copies show up that's why. Btw, update on the mouse... Sam says he ate the skull, ribcage, tail, and all without issue. Woo!That's awesome! This is still the hopper right? At this point, let's treat the baby prey as snacks or treats, and try to keep the frankenprey foods balanced while working up to adult prey. Now when he poops again, you'll likely get a little fur-covered package so don't be alarmed.
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Post by gfountain on May 24, 2014 15:32:58 GMT -5
Edible bone-in meat:
This is meat that is still attached to bone. Bone should account for 10% of the diet, so when you feed it still attached to a chunk of meat, the total of 'edible bone-in meat' is about 75% of the diet. (Does that make sense?)
Examples of edible bone-in meat: Most non-weight-bearing poultry bones - wings, necks, backs, ribs. (Weight-bearing bones are usually too big and dense and ferrets cannot break them up. If you want to feed those, you can smash them with a hammer or cut them open lengthwise, but DON'T sliver them.) Whole quail, rabbit, pork button bones, pork rib ends. Another option is commercial frozen raw or freeze dried raw with 10-15% ground bone (i.e. Stella & Chewys, Vital Essentials, Nature's Variety Instinct)
Organs:
Organs are defined as anything that secretes. The organ requirement of 1.5 meals per week must be half liver, half other organ. Organs have a strong taste and may require creativity in serving to get your ferret to eat them.
Examples of organs: liver, kidney, thymus, pancreas, reproductive organs, lung, brain. Gizzards and hearts are NOT organs; they are muscles.
Muscle meat:
This is any kind of meat without a bone (including hearts and gizzards). 1.5 meals of hearts are required for their taurine content. Another source of taurine is the tongue of ruminants, so cow tongue or goat or sheep tongue can be substituted if you cannot find hearts. Dark meats are better than white meats because of the taurine and the fat content.
Examples of muscle meats: This is generally where you can find the greatest variety of proteins - heart or tongue (required), gizzards, chicken or turkey (thigh or leg is better that breast), duck, lamb, goat, beef, venison, elk...
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Post by gfountain on May 24, 2014 15:37:57 GMT -5
And then there are eggs. I'm not really sure where they fit into the menu, but raw eggs are very healthy. You can feed the equivalent of one egg per ferret per week. Egg yolks are great for breaking up hairballs (not mouse fur, but shed hair that's ingested during grooming), so during shed season you can give egg more frequently. But eggs do cause really stinky, yucky poos.
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Post by Deleted on May 24, 2014 18:32:35 GMT -5
Hello! Another quick update and answers to your questions. The menu I copied was the 1.5 meals organ & heart, so I think it was after your edit. Yes, it was the hopper that he ate all of. Yes, we are vegetarian, but we VERY rarely eat chicken. Never red meat. We would've gritted our teeth through eating the chicken thighs, but now that we know we don't have to, we've got them all chopped into slices. This is day 2 of him consistently eating 3 oz, so kibble is still removed. He will barely eat that much, I think he realistically gets pretty full after 1.5 oz each meal, but we don't have enough time to feed more than about an ounce in the morning, so we are just struggling to get 2 oz in him at night. I think this will get easier over time. I think you were right about the meat souring when left in the fridge. It was kinda brown and he didn't want anything to do with it today. So, we got a new bag thawed and put into ice cube molds. They will be ready to use tomorrow. Some of that, we served 50:50 chicken slivers/soup this afternoon and he ate it all like a champ. 2oz of it! He seems to prefer slivers and chunks to the liquidy soup. We cut them the size you suggested - width of my pinky nail and twice as long. As discussed, we'll hold off on the mice until he's more ready. Just let me know if you think we should try it again and we will. We have 2 adult mice in the freezer for whenever. We have the chicken slivers ready, too, for whatever our next step is.
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Post by gfountain on May 24, 2014 18:58:28 GMT -5
If he prefers the slivers to the soup, try just giving him the slivers for the next meal. You can always add some soup if he doesn't eat his slivers. And you want to be gradually increasing the size of the slivers. He's doing GREAT!!
If he's not wanting to eat 2 whole ounces in the evenings, don't push it. As long as he gets an ounce and a half down, just leave the rest available for him. He's eating from the dish now, so if he gets hungry, he'll eat it.
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Post by gfountain on May 24, 2014 19:48:23 GMT -5
Also, you said you still have hearts that haven't been made into soup right? What about liver or other organs?
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Post by Deleted on May 24, 2014 21:19:04 GMT -5
Yep, we have about 3 lbs of chicken heart frozen. We also have beef liver that we pureed but didn't mix into soup. We're fine with tossing it if we don't need it.
Hmm. *runs to the freezer*
2.8 lbs chicken hearts (whole) 0.6 lbs chicken hearts (diced) 1.5 lbs chicken drumlets (mini drumsticks - bone in) 2 adult mice 0.8 lbs mushed beef liver (lol) 0.8 lbs turkey breast (boneless) 1.7 lbs chicken gizzards 1.3 lbs chicken necks And also about 2.5 lbs chicken thigh (boneless), a third of which we cut into the afformentioned strips. We'll keep the rest whole to make bigger chunks if he's ready.
You said to only use the slivers if he prefers them. Does that mean we're temporarily not worried about his ratios of heart and organs, or do we feed a meal a day of soup and a meal of slivers to keep him balanced? I'll try 25:75 soup:slivers in the morning to see where he's at with 'em.
Thank you!!
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Post by gfountain on May 24, 2014 21:27:53 GMT -5
And you keep your food where? You said to only use the slivers if he prefers them. Does that mean we're temporarily not worried about his ratios of heart and organsYep, key word being temporarily. Deficiencies in the diet don't happen for a while and I want to see where he is with the slivers/chunks. For his next meal, just give him slivers and let me know how that goes. Of course, if he doesn't go for the slivers, give him his soup.
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Post by Deleted on May 24, 2014 21:32:29 GMT -5
Coincidentally we actually keep ALL of our food in the freezer too because we cook in bulk and freeze all our meals for the month. Sooo we should probably get a chest freezer! ANYWAY, roger on the all-slivers meal in the morning... we'll see what he thinks.
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Post by gfountain on May 24, 2014 21:43:39 GMT -5
Just wondering about the freezer because that's a lot of ferret food!! :thumbsup:
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Post by Deleted on May 25, 2014 10:51:22 GMT -5
Alright... chicken slivers for breakfast, here's how big the chunks I cut were: The only issue we had was that he wanted to stash it all. Every single chunk (which was every bite, because there was no soup), he'd try to run away, dangling the meat between his teeth. When I let him, he took them to various random dark parts of the room and just left them there. When I grabbed him and stopped him from running away, he'd chew and swallow the chunk while I held him in place, but then getting him to focus on the bowl again was a bit of a struggle. Overall, though, he did good. He ate 1oz. We offered 2oz and worked with him for about an hour.
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Post by gfountain on May 25, 2014 11:06:14 GMT -5
Awww... Ezzy likes his meatz. I love the video. It's so awesome to see them enjoying their food and licking their lips. Those chunks are pretty good sized and he did great with them. If you just leave the rest in his cage for them, he'll probably go back for more later. Being a kibble baby, he's used to grazing throughout the day. He may do that for a while with the raw also. Slinkee still wants to eat a few bites, then go play, then eat more when he's locked up. That's fine, as long as he's eating. So how long has it been since he's had kibble?
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