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Post by FireAngel on Oct 11, 2016 10:29:29 GMT -5
I'm sorry I did not get a lesson together yesterday, Loki kept me on my toes. I am off again tomorow so hopefully I will have one ready for you then.
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nannah
Junior Member
Raw and Whole Prey Feeder
Posts: 232
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Post by nannah on Oct 11, 2016 14:35:59 GMT -5
it's no problem! I'll be ready for it though. are pork rib ends the same as pork rib tips? I've been asking google this all day and have found nothing. my mom was at the grocery and got a little excited; she bought a huuuuuge pack of pork rib tips, haha! bless her, though. I'm also making a new soup tonight and will be cutting the chunks even bigger. they've been doing an excellent job of eating so far. gizzards were a no-go, though, haha! they looked at them, then at me, like "are you serious? ta heck is this stuff?" we'll keep trying. in the meantime, my mom will eat some gizzards herself. I also talked to a local butcher within a small grocery store in town. if I call and give my name, he'll save some turkey necks for me and then let me know when he has enough of them to package up. sounds like a pretty good deal! super exciting considering it's the only place I could find that even sold poultry necks. hopefully gonna give him that call today. is there anything else I should be focusing on? or that I should be focusing on??
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Post by FireAngel on Oct 11, 2016 21:21:09 GMT -5
That is awesome news! With the gizzards you can combine them with the soup. So instead of 8oz of what ever meat use 7 oz of whatever and 1oz of gizzards. Since it is really more like chunks now I think we can stop calling it soup hehe. They are doing well with bones? If they are doing well with the bones you can start to separate the meals and follow more of a frankenprey menu. So it would be bone in one meal and muscle another and organs another and heart another so on and so forth. How about as a little practice for you, you do up a mock weekly menu based on the frankenprey model.
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Post by FireAngel on Oct 12, 2016 16:12:00 GMT -5
Today's lesson will be Variety and Balance. Variety is extremely important for many reasons and can directly effect balance. Ferrets need mental stimulation and variety in food types, sizes, textures and temperature can help provide some of this stimulation for them. It is good to have them used to many different textures of food for that reason and to keep them used to softer foods such as grinds and easy to digest foods such as soup for when/if they become sick and need to have such textures. While we never cook their meals, warming them can be helpful and occasionally is even their preferred way to eat. What counts as a different protein you ask, well this is pretty easy to answer. Any genetically different animal counts as a different protein. Examples, Chicken, Beef, Lamb, Goat, Rabbit, Mice, Rats, Guinea Pigs (Cavies), Frog, Salmon, Sardines, Tuna, Anchovies, Turkey, Quail, Cornish Game Hen, Venison, Elk, Buffalo, I could go on but I think you get the picture. Now there is a little bit of a caveat here, Chicken and Cornish Game Hen are not different enough genetically to really be considered a different protein for balancing of a diet purposes. In order to provide the basic balanced meal plans, your menu should include at LEAST three different proteins. We covered what counts as different now we need to cover why it needs to be different and that brings us to the balancing part of the lesson also. Nutrients and micro-nutrients and macro-nutrients those are the reasons variety is important. Each and every different protein we give our little carnivores provide different amounts and types of these amazing and important things and each and every one of those amazing things helps nourish and develop different cells of the body and brain. Makes sense then if we can provide them with as many different types of these magical things that we will be giving them the best chance at being healthy, right? Now there is another aspect to balancing that has nothing to do with nutrients or variety but is the muscle/organ/heart/bone balance. We use the model that resembles what they would eat in nature. Proportionally, their diet should be a minimum of 10% heart, 5% liver and 5% another organ like kidney, brain or pancreas, about 10%-15% bone (requirements can vary based on the individual ferret), with the remaining 60%-70% being muscle meat.
Here is an example menu for a week of a full frankenprey diet. Monday am: edible bone in meat Monday pm: edible bone in meat (or muscle)*
Tuesday am: edible bone in meat Tuesday pm: muscle meat
Wednesday am: edible bone in meat Wednesday pm: heart
Thursday am: edible bone in meat Thursday pm: edible bone in meat (or muscle)*
Friday am: edible bone in meat Friday pm: ½ heart + ¼ liver + ¼ other organ
Saturday am: edible bone in meat Saturday pm: muscle meat
Sunday am: edible bone in meat Sunday pm: ½ liver + ½ other organ
Basically, per week this works out to: 9 meals bone-in meat 2 meals muscle meat 1.5 meals of heart 1.5 meals of liver and another organ
You may wonder why we do not recommend that you feed a balanced meal of bones,muscles,heart and organs for each meal, the answer is that in households with multiple ferrets it is impossible to tell if they are all eating the variety they need or if one or two are eating all the hearts or organs. Looking forward to any questions you may have about this!
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nannah
Junior Member
Raw and Whole Prey Feeder
Posts: 232
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Post by nannah on Oct 14, 2016 18:49:12 GMT -5
ahhhh awesome!
okay, here's my mock frankenprey model:
Monday am: chicken wings Monday pm: pork rib tips
Tuesday am: turkey necks Tuesday pm: beef muscle meat
Wednesday am: cornish hen Wednesday pm: beef heart
Thursday am: sardines Thursday pm: pork muscle meat
Friday am: chicken wings/legs Friday pm: 1/2 beef heart + 1/4 beef liver + 1/2 beef kidney
Saturday am: turkey necks Saturday pm: pork muscle meat
Sunday am: cornish hen Sunday pm: 1/2 beef liver + 1/2 beef kidney
is that ok? I'm gonna try to find a place online that'll let me get sardines and a place that'll let me get organ meat, because I don't have a lot of options where I am, and I'm going to need reliable sources for these. I won't be able to go back to that city where I originally found the sardines all the time. I'm at least glad I have a very reliable source for beef hearts - and right in my town too!
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Post by FireAngel on Oct 14, 2016 21:12:44 GMT -5
Monday am: chicken wings Monday pm: pork rib tips Tuesday am: turkey necks Tuesday pm: beef muscle meat Wednesday am: cornish hen Wednesday pm: beef heart Thursday am: sardines Thursday pm: pork muscle meat Friday am: chicken wings/legs Friday pm: 1/2 beef heart + 1/4 beef liver + 1/2 beef kidney (Should be 1/4 kidney)Saturday am: turkey necks Saturday pm: pork muscle meat Sunday am: cornish hen Sunday pm: 1/2 beef liver + 1/2 beef kidney Looks great other then the one noted on. Hare Today is a great website and where I get my sardines and goat and duck and all kinds of stuff.
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nannah
Junior Member
Raw and Whole Prey Feeder
Posts: 232
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Post by nannah on Oct 19, 2016 15:27:29 GMT -5
how can I transition to the weekly model instead of the daily one?
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Post by FireAngel on Oct 19, 2016 23:06:56 GMT -5
Oh do you thimk knowing that would be helpful?!!! Oh my goodness I am so sorry I flaked on that one. Instead of making the soup, give them only muscle meat one meal and bone in another and so on and so forth. Follow the menu you posted above. Then post here and let me know how it is going. Again I'm so sorry, I did not give you you any direction on that! :slap:
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nannah
Junior Member
Raw and Whole Prey Feeder
Posts: 232
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Post by nannah on Oct 21, 2016 13:58:32 GMT -5
haha! it's ok!
I have another incredibly stupid question for you. (don't say there's no stupid question bc I know this one's stupid) would you recommend me getting 44lbs of meat from hare-today or just 10lbs to start off? I'm not sure how to transition to the weekly plan - in my own house, like to plan and freeze and stuff. Rather than transitioning the ferrets, this is more transitioning me, haha. what would you suggest?
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Post by FireAngel on Oct 22, 2016 9:06:04 GMT -5
Get the amount they say will guarantee it will stay frozen, so I think it is about 50lbs. If you are feeding 4oz a meal for example then pre portion everything into 4oz packages and freeze. I also make an organ soup for my beasties. This ensures they all get all of the organs and keeps them used to the soup texture. So the meal that is half liver and half other organ would be a soup for you. Make sense? Here is this weeks lesson, a nice and short one for you!
EGGS The incredible edible egg is not only good for us but for our little beasties also. One whole egg (shell included) is a complete meal for them. We often use a raw egg scrambled up to help with passing fur through their digestive system. The rule is one egg per ferret per week or two eggs during shedding season. Quail eggs are smaller so they can have up to three of these a week if you are able to find them.
That's it, questions?
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Post by FireAngel on Oct 23, 2016 11:12:16 GMT -5
I didn't realize starting a weekly menu plan was such a stressor for you, I'm sorry. Lets break it down to steps, 1) Make your weekly menu (which you have and it looks good) 2) Make sure you have on hand all of the ingrediants on hand for that menu (much like you would make a grocery list for your own weekly meal planning) 3) portion out meals 4) freeze them (you can leave out the next days meals in the fridge) 5) thaw the next days meals in fridge 6)feed as per your weekly meal plan. Here is a picture of my set up in my freezer for the week, and a farther away view yes half of my large chest freezer is stocked with food for the ferrets, but I have six of them so you will not need that much space for their food storage. That is also about 3 months worth of food for them. I hope this helped you and you feel clearer about how to switch over to the frankenprey menu. If not please don't hesistate to ask. I will never make fun of you for asking a question.
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nannah
Junior Member
Raw and Whole Prey Feeder
Posts: 232
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Post by nannah on Oct 23, 2016 23:28:27 GMT -5
Ahh, thank you so much for elaborating. ((I'm autistic, so this & the pictures help a lot)) I'm gonna have to fight my mom for freezer space for sure, but tomorrow I'll start cleaning out one of our freezers to help make room. that thing hasn't been cleaned for . . .. a while. ok, I think I'm grasping this better now (I don't even know why I was confused before, only that I was :S ).
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nannah
Junior Member
Raw and Whole Prey Feeder
Posts: 232
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Post by nannah on Oct 24, 2016 16:18:33 GMT -5
also, what's a good way to get ferrets used to eating egg?
I've tried many times to get my little ones to eat egg, and they've always eaten around it, or turned their noses up at it. I've tried raw and hardboiled, etc. have any suggestions?
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Post by FireAngel on Oct 25, 2016 20:54:27 GMT -5
I'm glad that seemed to help you. The best way to get htem to eat egg is to finger feed it to them first, scramble it up and get some on your fingers and then rub it on their gums. Once they get the taste of it usually you will not have any issues getting them to eat it from a bowl after that first time.
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nannah
Junior Member
Raw and Whole Prey Feeder
Posts: 232
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Post by nannah on Oct 28, 2016 15:53:00 GMT -5
thanks! I fed them some egg this morning, and Kinga did not like me shoving it in her face, haha, but she did lick some off my fingers. it was tough getting her to try it out of the spoon/bowl, though, and she's still resisting. but surprisingly, the used-to-be most resistant Misio dove right in without me having to make him taste it off my fingers! I just set it down and he was like "ey what's this mmm" when some of it hung onto his mouth though, as eggs do, he was like AAAAA. it was so funny.
how long can raw eggs sit out, if I leave it?
oh, also, random question. are duck/chicken/etc. feet considered bone-in meat? they seem like they don't have much meat on them.
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