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Post by Heather on Oct 23, 2014 1:04:33 GMT -5
Name: Emily HF Forum Username: Julesalot 1. Where did you first learn about natural diets for ferrets? On this Forum. 2. Please describe the type of diet you would like assistance in switching your ferret(s) to. Be sure to include if you are interested in feeding whole prey (live or frozen-thawed) and if you are wanting to FULLY switch to a natural diet or PARTIALLY. If you are unsure what kind of diet you want to put your ferrets on, please express that and we can help you find the best type of natural diet for your ferret. I want to put them on a full frankenprey/raw diet 3. Why are you interested in switching your ferrets to a natural diet? I know it is a lot better for them, and with one of mine having Adrenal I want them to be healthier and happier, and avoid having another ferret with Insulinoma, I lost my last one to it and I want to keep them from going through that. 4. Do you understand that switching your ferret to a natural diet can be a lengthy, arduous process? Its not an overnight switch. It can be a commitment of several weeks or even months. Your HF Mentor will be more then happy to assist you in switching your ferret(s) to a natural diet, but you need to be equally as committed. If you aren't willing to tough out a potentially lengthy switching process, or if you have major life changes approaching (baby on the way, moving, starting school, getting married/divorced, etc) then it might be a better idea to wait on switching your ferret's diet until you have more time. Are you willing to make the commitment? Yes, I am. I understand it’s lengthy and can be tough, but it’s worth it. 5. How many ferrets do you currently have? What are their names? Ages? Genders? Do they have any health problems? Are they overweight? Underweight? How long have you had each ferret for? I have 2 ferrets. Juliet- 4-5 years old Female She has Adrenal Disease, she had surgery to remove the tumor but it was on her right gland attatched to her main blood vessel so we didn’t get to remove it. She’s on melatonin until I can pay for the deslorelin. And she also has cataracts in both of her eyes. She’s a healthy weight, but she has been slowly losing weight since diagnosed with Adrenal. But the Vet says she's holding her weight good, and not to worry too much about it. I’ve had her for 2 years in October Caillou- 4-5 years old Male He’s healthy, slightly enlarged spleen but Vet said it’s normal, nothing to worry about. He’s a healthy weight I’ve had him for 1 year in September 6. What diet do you currently feed your ferrets? (Please include all treats, supplements, etc) Do they already eat some form of soup? They eat Wellness Core dry cat food, and get ferretone every week for nail clippings. I’ve gotten them to take a few spoonfuls of raw soupie so far, but they’ll only eat it with ferretone. 7. Have you ever tried to switch your ferrets to a natural diet in the past? If yes, what happened? I gave my ferret who is no longer with me a raw soupie sometime last year once or twice but that’s it. I had family troubles and stopped attempting the switch. Only one would eat it. 8. What additional information about yourself or your ferrets would you like to share? My two ferrets I have now are quite picky. One more than the other, It took me 2 weeks to get him to even try Ferretone, I’m a bit worried about them not taking very well to the switch, but I do believe they can do it. 9. How often during the week do you have access to a computer? Every day, all the time. Hi and welcome to the mentoring program . In a little while your mentors (Hurricanekatt & Poncesmom) will introduce themselves and you can get started on a new Adventure in natural ferret care and diets. Please remember to post regularly (daily or as per arranged with your mentor) so that your mentors can assist you move along safely in this adventure. If you experience computer difficulties or are going to be away, please notify your mentors and most of all relax and have fun . Your mentors are here to help you on this journey. ciao
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Post by katt on Oct 23, 2014 4:02:46 GMT -5
Location: Anchorage, Alaska I became a mentor because... I really like helping people (hence the whole becoming a doctor thing) and animals. I am a strong supporter of a natural diet and probably bore most people that I meet to death ranting about raw diet and why it is the best way to go…this way I can rant to someone who actually cares! About My Ferrets: Koda – male, Real Canadian, I got him when he was about 8 weeks old when I bought him in December 2009, Sable. I gave him raw the second he came home and he immediately ripped into it and started hissing to keep me away from his tasty prize! Neither of us has ever looked back. He is a real trouble maker and is pretty well known around the forums as such. He is my first ferret and he has forced me to learn and learn FAST! He has managed to eat several foreign objects, and is constantly finding new trouble to get into (his nose has a rubber detector in it). He had to have an emergency blockage surgery, which (we believe) ended up being the catalyst that resulted in his IBD. He loves digging the carpet up, or more recently chewing it, has a very serious oral fixation (if his mouth can stretch wide enough for his teeth to touch it – he will chew it), he will rearrange the room to reach things, has learned how to levitate, and is an all around little monster. He is also very strongly bonded to my boyfriend and I, and can be a huge love bug. When the endless energy is finally burned off, he will curl up in our laps, give us kisses, and fall asleep. As you can tell, I have this problem where I can’t stop talking about him or taking pictures of him… He has IBD which we struggled to get control of (and finally succeeded!) with diet. He has recently had a second blockage surgery, and this week he will be getting his second Des implant for juvenile adrenal. He's been a handful, that's for sure! Kenai: male, Silver/Black Roan Mitt. I brought Kenai home towards the end of November 2010 when he was about 7-8 weeks old. He is also eating 100% raw diet, whole prey, frankenprey, meaty bones you name it! He was a tiny little bag of bones when I brought him home, but he eats like a pig and grows like a weed! He is now huge and rolly-polly! definitely a little porker - he can barely make it out of his rice box because he is so bottom heavy. lmao He finally started shedding some fur and a little winter weight and is slimming up, but he is still a clumsy critter. haha He loves, LOVES toys and is a loveable, goofy little guy and has been helping to keep Koda company and burn off each others energy! He's definitely a little spaz - I thought Koda was until I got Kenai! He's a bit of a simpleton. He has trouble finding the potty box a lot, and he doesn’t learn very fast. He also is much less physically adept at things – he has trouble climbing and getting into/onto/out of things. He is sloooowly figuring out how to control his floppy body, but he definitely has some developmental delays. But, we love him just the same. About My Natural Feeding Experience: I've been feeding raw since December 2009 when I brought Koda home, but I had started researching a few months prior to that. Thanks to this forum, I was ready for a fuzzball to come home with my freezer stocked with meats! I gave him a raw chicken wing his first night home and that was the end of that! My boys are fed frankenprey, f/t rodents, and live prey. I have been reading and learning since before I brought Koda home and learned a lot from the people here on the forum. I am always on the forum, and various websites trying to learn more about ferrets in general, and especially raw diet. My boys are healthy, energetic, have super soft fur, and smell so good that people regularly comment, asking me what perfume or spray I sprayed them (esp Koda) with! I love telling them: Thanks to a raw diet - he just smells that good naturally! When Kenai first came home he had been eating Marshall's kibble and his poops were HUGE and smelled...awful doesn't even come close to describing it! Now he smells much better and his scraggly coat has been replaced by a luxurious pile of fur. Type of Mentor: Full switches only! I feed a frankenprey and whole prey diet - raw meats, bone-in meats, ground meats, frozen/thawed rodents, live prey, and occasionally freeze dried raw and commercially ground raw. I have never fed kibble so I can’t help with picking a good kibble. I absolutely do NOT do partial switches. My Specialty: Trouble makers! I focus entirely on full switches to raw – no more kibble! I "specialize" in ferrets with IBD and food allergies, many of who may need to do food trials. I have been through quite the ringer myself in that field with my boys. I do just about any type of switch including switches to Frankenprey, whole prey (live or f/t), and commercial raw (whole and grinds) but I will NOT do partial switches.
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Post by katt on Oct 23, 2014 4:22:24 GMT -5
You get two of us! Steph should be on to "introduce" herself soon too. School is crazy and right now it's hard for me to get on the forum every sometimes, so Steph is joining in to help make sure you don't get neglected on finals weekends LOL and so we can get another Pro on elimination diets. (dance) We'll both be working together with you. Steph is super awesome so I'm excited to have her on our little mini-team here. So I'm actually going to have you start a journal for Mr: Caillou the Chew. Cai-chew. An excel sheet works, or a notebook. Whatever is easiest for you. If you use Google Docs Excel you can link it and we can follow it too but it's whatever you will remember to fill out the best. Every day you will want to record what Caichew is eating (preferably the food things LOL), and essentially how it affected him. Each day you should have: - what he ate each meal: protein, format (soup, chunks, grind...) - roughly how much he ate each meal (estimates are fine. If you weigh the food ounces works or you can eyeball "2tsp, 1/4cup" whatever works as long as it is a relatively consistent measurement so you can compare day to day intake - any additional supplements (eg probios, meds, pumpkin, etc) - what his poops are like: consistency, color, texture, etc (it is often helpful to rate poops so say 1-10 from horrible to perfect, or good bad ugly) - what his energy is like - Notable Notes: is there anything else you want to make note of. Did he not be out of the cage today? Did something stress him out? Was it super hot and that may be why he is sleepy? Is he drinking more than usual today? Did he chew significantly more or less than usual? Did he eat something naughty? Etc etc etc. And for Caichew I'm going to add something to the journal I usually don't which is a chewing section. Each day try rating from 0-5 (or 0-10 if you feel you need a larger scale lol) how badly he is chewing. 0 being nothing 5 (or 10) being he literally will not stop chewing anything. It may be good to make note of his gum condition too (do they look more red today? Do they look totally normal?). This is a lot of work but once you get into the habit of doing it it gets easy. A protein trial journal is super super helpful for noticing trends that you might not notice otherwise. For example, maybe you fed him beef, pork, and chicken and he has had diarrhea all week and you aren't sure what's going on...but then you look at your past journal patterns and realize he gets diarrhea for 3-4days every time you feed him beef. Or maybe you find that every time you rearrange the cage he gets stressed. Etc. A journal Really helps to start seeing long term patterns when an allergy or IBD is suspected. We want to get him on a single protein first, and from there we will work on slowly testing new proteins one at a time. How much pork did he eat? Sounds like he loved it, but would he eat it without chicken mixed in?
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Post by Deleted on Oct 23, 2014 8:20:43 GMT -5
Yay (dance) bring it on! I'm very excited to be worked with both of you. Stef knows what's going on with them pretty well, she's been helping me over the past couple weeks. I'm obsessed with my MacBook and use microsoft word like nobody's business, so I'll log everything there. Last night after I gave him his nasty Baytril I offered him 2 ounces of pork soup (just pork sirloin and water blended to a pudding consistency) and I put 0.5 ounces of the normal chicken soupy on top of it. It takes him a minute to start eating, he thinks everything is poison at first but I just dab it on his nose/mouth and he digs in. This time after a few licks his entire face was in the bowl, and he licked it clean and was going back looking for more. I'll try it with no chicken soup this morning. And also, we gotta include my angel, Juliet! Jules is a sweetie pie and she has 2 cancers, is blind from recent cataracts and is deaf, we spoil her like crazy. There have been some changes since I applied for a mentor so I'll look back at my application and let you know what's changed. Juliet- She was deemed at least 6 years old by teeth examination She has adrenal disease AND insulinoma now, she should be getting a DES implant soon, and is on .1mg of pediapred twice daily every day for about 1-2 weeks now. Caillou- Is 5 years old He is still healthy other than the gingivitis we can't get away. And for a little over 7 weeks they have been off of their kibble and on raw. I do pictures and weights every Saturday, because that's the day they went off kibble. Right now they eat pudding like soup, were eating it thicker but they like it a lot better when it's more like pudding. And they will eat slivers about the length of a quarter and width of a pencil. The proteins they have eaten are quail, lamb, ground turkey, chicken, and pork. They don't like turkey a whole lot though. Okay, that's my update out of the way
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Post by Deleted on Oct 23, 2014 8:28:04 GMT -5
Oh and I think I should mention, I will be picking up a new little ferret to foster today at around 1:00m She's a 1yr old girl, her name is Artemis but we're thinking of changing that. I do want to keep her, but it's up to whether my mother will allow it, and that's a stretch, she doesn't like their vet bills or food bills. Artemis she's been in the "system" for 3 months, she's really nippy and I'm the only one allowed to hold her they said, as to not bring back her bad biting habit. I'm gonna offer her some raw, just because she is young and I want to see how she likes it, but I cannot switch her until I know if I will be keeping her or not.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 23, 2014 11:49:47 GMT -5
Good Morning Emily. I'm very excited and pleased to be working with both you and Katt. We've talked alot and you know me well, but here is a link to my Bio: holisticferret60.proboards.com/thread/176/meet-mentorYou've done very well so far and with Katt's help, we should move forward and hopefully help Caillou with his chewing and make Jules feel a little better. I'm looking forward to meeting Artemis and seeing pictures. Good Luck this afternoon. It's going to be a great learning experience. We're both in good hands with Katt.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 23, 2014 12:14:56 GMT -5
Good afternoon Stef I have her! We are on our way home right now, Shawna was very nice and super talkative and guess what? She's interested in feeding raw! She is going to look around on the forum and possibly join and apply for a mentor. We talked for an hour and she's really considering it. After a few minutes with Artemis I knew this name didn't fit her. So will watch her personality and we can play the name game, get ready! Haha
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Post by katt on Oct 23, 2014 15:01:58 GMT -5
Oooo the name game is my absolute favorite! What types of names do you like? You'll want to get her caught up with the other two, which may take a little time. What is she eating right now? (I'm assuming kibble). See if Caillou will take pork only soup today. What does little Juliet think of the pork?
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Post by Deleted on Oct 23, 2014 15:08:27 GMT -5
I like weird names, names that mean something, funny, cute, feisty. Like, nobody can pronounce Caillou, I love it! LOL. Caillou was from a tv show I watched as a kid, all but Neichei's name are from tv shows. Juliet from "Psych", Adrian is from "Monk", and Caillou is from, "Caillou".
I'm not sure if I want to start her on raw just yet, if I can't keep her would it be bad for her to have switched back to kibble after being on raw? If I start switching her my mother will know, and think I want to keep her, and I don't want to talk to her about it until she is a little more bonded with the new girl. I'm not allowed to introduce them to each other for a couple days, it's in the fostering contract I was told.
I fed Caillou just pork soup this morning, he ate 2 ounces of it very well. I haven't given Jules the pork yet, should I try it tonight with her?
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Post by katt on Oct 23, 2014 16:34:17 GMT -5
I like weird names, names that mean something, funny, cute, feisty. Like, nobody can pronounce Caillou, I love it! LOL. Caillou was from a tv show I watched as a kid, all but Neichei's name are from tv shows. Juliet from "Psych", Adrian is from "Monk", and Caillou is from, "Caillou".
I know how to pronounce Caillou because my younger siblings watched the show. For Steph: lol I'm not sure if I want to start her on raw just yet, if I can't keep her would it be bad for her to have switched back to kibble after being on raw? If I start switching her my mother will know, and think I want to keep her, and I don't want to talk to her about it until she is a little more bonded with the new girl. I'm not allowed to introduce them to each other for a couple days, it's in the fostering contract I was told. It is best to keep any new pet quarantined for at least a week or two anyways in case they are carrying anything but not showing symptom yet. RE switching her, I understand if you have to wait for your mom to get on board, but no it would not be bad to switch her and switch her back. It would be unfortunate if she had to go back onto kibble, but every meal without kibble in it is one less blow to her little pancreas. You can always do a mixed raw and kibble diet until it is decided to keep her or not too. It's not ideal, but better than no raw. You'd preferably want to alternate days as kibble and raw should not be fed within a few hours of each other, but you could do raw one day and kibble another. I fed Caillou just pork soup this morning, he ate 2 ounces of it very well. I haven't given Jules the pork yet, should I try it tonight with her? Good boy! And yes, it is best to have them both on the same schedule if possible. What is your current feeding routine? When do you feed, how much, where do you feed (cage, hand fed meals), do you leave food in the cage, etc etc etc. The more detail the better.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 23, 2014 17:19:56 GMT -5
Not many people have heard of the show, I know my Vet always pronounces it a different way every time we go. Lol. Is 5 hours long enough to go after they eat kibble to feed raw? I may try to feed the new girl some soup, or just attempt to give her a sliver and see if she takes it. I'm kind of broke so I hope I have enough meat to last, I'm curious to see if she likes it. I think she will, she was trying to eat a belvita biscuit on the way to our house and then went for the coffee ( don't worry she didn't get any ) so she may not be too picky. I gotta watch her closely, she was trying to chew on my remote buttons and my laptop charger, she obviously is a fan of rubber. I feed them at about 10:00am give or take an hour, depending on what I'm doing that day. I used to have to hold them and spoon feed them but for the last couple days they've been eating on their own, I put the food bowls in their cage. I usually feed Caillou first, I give him his medicine and then sit his bowl in the cage while Juliet is asleep or playing and when he is done eating I give Juliet her medicine and she sits in the cage and eats. I might have to help them eat the last spoonful or two by putting them back in front of the bowl and dabbing it on their nose and they'll usually finish it. I didn't leave food in the cage before, but now I leave the bowls in if their is food left, a lot of times they eat it all but sometimes they don't and Caillou is the only one I've seen to go back to the bowl and eat. They usually eat about 2 ounces in the morning and 1-2 ounces at night, depending on what protein and if there are slivers, they eat less if there are slivers and more if it's a protein they like. They both average around 3 ounces a day, but they are different and sometimes may only want 1 ounces and other days will eat 5 ounces, if they don't eat a lot one day they eat a lot the next.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 23, 2014 17:24:26 GMT -5
How are they doing eating without their Oil. Do you still have to tempt them with a little, now and then? Okay, I'm playing the name game: Ayita- cherokee for "first to dance" Opal is October's birthstone Marigold is October's flower Tiva is Hopi for "Dance" Lubiana has a video called Silly Girl. Here are the lyrics: www.lyricsmode.com/lyrics/l/lubiana/silly_girl.htmlAmaris is Biblical and means given by God Tiegan mean Little Princess in a Big Valley Kiyo is Japanese and means Happiness in our family Mia is Italian for Wished for Child Calliope is a Latin word for Beautiful Music. Okay, that's it. I could go on and on, but she's still settling in and may tell you her name very soon.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 23, 2014 17:57:25 GMT -5
They eat without it now, for about 2 days they don't need any oils to eat on their own (dance) She hasn't eaten since I think 3 or 4, I don't know how long I should wait after they eat kibble, to feed raw, they get dinner at 9 or 10.
Oh and I got the "professional" camera out, and got some great pictures of Silly Pants. Takes a little while to upload them but I'll post them when I do.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 23, 2014 18:49:00 GMT -5
Aw I love all of those! Especially Calliope It's so hard to choose names, but it's so fun at the same time! Here are a few of many pictures I took Going to upload some action pictures in a minute.. hehe I love pictures
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Post by Deleted on Oct 23, 2014 19:08:28 GMT -5
More pictures... is it possible to get tired of pictures? Nooo! She's asleep now so no more pictures, unfortunately.. hehe
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