Raw/Kibble?

[charlie]

So I'm fairly new to this and may be having a fuzzbutt coming to live with me in the next week or so. He's a four year old sable ferret named Benny, whose owners can't keep him anymore.

I tried to re-find the 'If you MUST feed kibble' thread I could have swore I saw the last time I was on, but I'm not finding it this time.

I've seen a lot about Evo, Orijen, Go!, etc being good brands but I never see these brands for ferrets in the pet stores I go in - I've heard that you can feed them cat food, is that it? HELP, lol.

I currently feed my dogs grain free kibble, with the occasional raw. Would such a diet be okay for the ferret? Grain free kibble with occasional raw? And is it specifically ferret grain free kibble, or is it the cat or dog grain free kibble? That's where I'm most confused.

While I've heard it's cheaper to feed raw, my freezer is tiny and I'm still learning what I can about feeding raw to my dogs, let alone a new ferret friend. Any thoughts on this? I'll be checking out all the raw fed forums. Raw soup sounds like a treat even my dogs would love!

[Sherry]

Here you go:
holisticferret60.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=food&action=display&thread=125
Yes, you can feed them that way. Only potential problem is that some fuzz get upset tummies if they are fed too closely together. So it's better to feed one one day, and the other the next. Or at least separated by a minimum 4 hours.
One other problem- some ferrets take to the raw so well, they no longer want the kibble ;D
As for feeding kibble, you want to look at the first 4-5 ing. and have as many meat based ingredients at the top of the list. No corn/corn products, and fewer grains/veg/fruits as possible. Fat content should be high, so go more for kibbles aimed at kittens.
Hope this helps some.
Is there any particular reason you'd not be interested in a totally raw diet? If it's simply that you aren't sure how to do it, that's why we're here

[charlie]

Thanks so much Sherry! It's appreciated!

Lol. Yeah, I was wondering about the upset tummy thing and whether he might decide he refuses to go back to kibble!

So basically look at the ingredients of the kibble the same way I look at my dogs food. I feed them grain free and always check what the ingredients are. Maya, my female, used to be fed really crappy filler-based foods from grocery stores before I got her and it added to her arthritis flaring up and being painful more often and she lost twenty lbs being on the crappy food as her health declined and she was neglected. When I got her, I switched her over to Acana.

It's mostly my concern about the cost. Granted, it'd be more costly to feed my two dogs raw than a ferret. What does the average cost run? I don't drive, so my access to stores is limited. If it's the same or cheaper than grain free kitten food, I may grab a mentor when I get a ferret. I have no issues other than cost. I prefer raw entirely otherwise. However, with two dogs, the raw works out to being more expensive, especially with one dog being a big Rottweiler.

Actually, raw is more difficult with my dogs cause they're picky. I'd love to have my ferret on raw though when I get one.

[Deleted]

For me, I have a variety of places to shop. I buy meats on sale for under $2 a lb. Feeding 3 ferrets, I spend about $30-50 a month, depending on what I need to stock up on. Raw is cheaper than kibble for me, and saves on buying tooth brushes tooth paste, they poop SO much less so that saves on litter.

[Sherry]

Generally, I've found straight RMB's to be on par, if not a bit cheaper than the higher quality kibbles.
Since you can't get to a store as often, you'd have to buy in larger batches, but you could also take better advantage of sales that way. A ferret will eat between 1-5 oz a day on average, depending on gender, age, health, activity level, size, etc.
A couple of my very active, but very tiny, girls will only eat about an ounce a day. Another of my girls is much larger, and will consume about 4 oz per day. My males on average 4-5 oz.
Be warned, though. When they first switch to a raw diet, you will think they are going to eat you out of house and home for the first 2-4 months ;D They do slow down a great deal after that, though