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Post by Deleted on Mar 30, 2017 15:30:44 GMT -5
I still have a lot of questions that I cannot find the answers to. I am wanting to start the raw diet, but still confused on portion sizes, basic nutritional needs, etc. 1. I read that they arent supposed to have more than one liver a week because of possible build up/too much of a specific vitamin. If that is the case, how do people who feed their ferrets whole prey every single day? Do they take out the liver in all animals except one a week?2. How much exactly of everything (oz) are they supposed to be having a day and a week? I know about the 7-9 bone in days/week, 1 heart, etc but how do I portion things out before freezing them just for a day. I have 3 ferrets (2 males 1 female), so give them a each 2-3 chicken wings a day for one day, and like 1 chicken neck each and some rabbit chunks the next day? How many ounces of muscle meat are they supposed to have on muscle meat days? oz of organs a week? oz of bone in a week? Also the chart says 1/4 liver, 1/4 other organ, or 1/2 heart. Do I literally cut 1/4 of a liver or other organ? 1/2 of a heart??? or is that meaning in ounces? How many ounces? What about doing all the organs one day a week?Still very confused  3. How should I go about freezing the meals? Putting one day's worth of food in each baggie and put one in the fridge to thaw overnight? Can I mix all the meat and put it in one bag? meaning can I put rabbit chunks and chicken hearts together in one bag? 4. I bought chicken thighs last night and feeling the bone I know that they are WAY too thick for them to eat. I know you can break them, but im still not sure. What about turkey bone in? What can they eat without smashing the bone? What do YOU feed your ferret on a weekly basis?
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Post by LindaM on Mar 30, 2017 16:07:37 GMT -5
1. Yes and No. Yes, too much liver can and does lead to a Vitamin A toxicity. So be wary of giving things like liver treats especially. We don't go by "1 liver" really, as livers aren't always the same size either. We weigh out a portion and work off of weight. In a balanced Frankenprey menu, you will have 1.5 organ meals, half of that weighed portion will be liver. In a percentage, liver is 5% of the ferret's diet.
1.1 Whole prey is entirely balanced, it's the ultimate raw diet. These tend to be given as is.
2. Depends on your ferret, which is why I said, a kitchen scale is a must have. And you will for the better part of a whole year figure out their averages, since seasonal changes affect those amounts (eg. eat more in winter and less again once spring starts). As does gender and age. Males tend to eat more than the females. Adult male average is anywhere 2-5oz (usually 2-4oz, but some do a bit more) a day, and adult females average is 1-3oz a day. So keep a journal of how your ferrets are eating, that way you'll know how much to give, it can take a bit of time to get constant amounts written down. Weigh before you give a meal, and weigh after to see how much was eaten from it and write it down. You may even have to separate ferrets for meals for a bit to get averages for each of them, or keep a close eye on them as they eat.
2.1 Actually, 1.5 heart meals a week. Since the organ meal is also 1.5 meals a week, we tend to do 1 heart meal, 1 organ meal, and 1 meal of 1/2 heart, 1/4 liver, and 1/4 other organ.
3. I like to portion out everything. I also have a chest freezer for extra storage, but even when I didn't I still followed this method: I portioned out into little containers of 2oz and 4oz. Those are easy to work with, especially if you have 2 or more ferrets. You can portion bigger once you figure things out though. I just grab enough bowls of each thing for meals that I needed, sometimes I used more than one container between the two of my ferrets.
3.1 Do not mix your meats together. There's many reasons for this: A) Ferrets sometimes have food sensitivities to certain proteins. B) Ferrets will have favorites and will pick those out and ignore those they do not want, and thus may not get enough of a certain thing. C) It's harder to keep track of how much of everything gets eaten.
So keep each separate. Hearts by themselves, muscle meat by themselves; each protein by itself, etc. I used separate containers or baggies and marked them with colored labels stating the protein (eg. rabbit, duck, chicken), the consistency (eg. soup, slivers, chunks) and the type (eg. muscle, heart, organ, bone-in).
4. Chicken thighs are too tough, they are a weight-bearing bone, you need to smash them with a hammer/mallet. Easier bones will be chicken wings or even easier to start off cornish game hen, or quail, but quail is a new protein and can take longer because of that too. Turkey bones are mostly too dense, you can use turkey necks (must smash) and wing tips I believe.
4.1 My menu is a bit different than most raw feeders. I do a split up diet of Frankenprey and rehydrated FDR or Frozen Raw Commercial. For the Frankenprey, mine get rabbit, duck, chicken, beef, pork, quail, frog legs, turkey, lamb, etc. as proteins. They eat others too from the FDR and Frozen. Quail, Frog Legs, Rabbit, Duck, Cornish Game Hen, Chicken wings, and Chicken, Duck & Turkey necks are great for bone-in.
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Post by LindaM on Mar 30, 2017 16:33:06 GMT -5
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Post by Sherry on Mar 31, 2017 10:19:10 GMT -5
I still have a lot of questions that I cannot find the answers to. I am wanting to start the raw diet, but still confused on portion sizes, basic nutritional needs, etc. 1. I read that they arent supposed to have more than one liver a week because of possible build up/too much of a specific vitamin. If that is the case, how do people who feed their ferrets whole prey every single day? Do they take out the liver in all animals except one a week?2. How much exactly of everything (oz) are they supposed to be having a day and a week? I know about the 7-9 bone in days/week, 1 heart, etc but how do I portion things out before freezing them just for a day. I have 3 ferrets (2 males 1 female), so give them a each 2-3 chicken wings a day for one day, and like 1 chicken neck each and some rabbit chunks the next day? How many ounces of muscle meat are they supposed to have on muscle meat days? oz of organs a week? oz of bone in a week? Also the chart says 1/4 liver, 1/4 other organ, or 1/2 heart. Do I literally cut 1/4 of a liver or other organ? 1/2 of a heart??? or is that meaning in ounces? How many ounces? What about doing all the organs one day a week?Still very confused 3. How should I go about freezing the meals? Putting one day's worth of food in each baggie and put one in the fridge to thaw overnight? Can I mix all the meat and put it in one bag? meaning can I put rabbit chunks and chicken hearts together in one bag? 4. I bought chicken thighs last and feeling the bone I know that they are WAY too thick for them to eat. I know you can break them, but im still not sure. What about turkey bone in? What can they eat without smashing the bone? What do YOU feed your ferret on a weekly basis?
1. Frankenprey diet is based on the whole prey model. It is simply separated out over the course of a week, instead of daily as it would be with whole prey  2a. For that it will take some time to determine how much YOUR ferret will eat Once on full raw, for a week you will weigh what you put in, and then weigh what is left over at the next meal time. Each of those will be added together for the full week(what you put in x 7, and what is left over x7). Subtract what is left from what is put in, divide by 7 and you will have an average per day. Example- let's say you put in 4 oz per meal(8 oz per day), and what is left is 2oz per meal(4oz per day). Multiply the 8x7= 56oz. Then multiply what you pull out(4oz per day) 4x7= 28. Subtract 28 from 56 gives you 28oz per week. Divide that by 7 and you have 4 oz per day for an average. It seems complicated, but it really isn't You have now just found out your ferret eats an average of 4oz a day and can plan from that. 2b. You would base your heart and organ meals on a percentage of the weekly feeding(10% heart, 5% liver/5% other organ), or you can just feed a full meal heart, a full meal liver/other organ. And then later in the week, a full meal of half heart, half liver/other organ. 3. I tend to stick with one type of meal in a bag. Otherwise when you have multiples(or even a single picky ferret) they will simply eat what they like and leave the rest. And yes, I do one meal per bag. 4. It will take them a while, but yes they can eat chicken thighs and drumstick bones I do however, crack them up for them so they can taste/smell the marrow. Weight bearing bones from anything larger than a chicken will be too dense. This will include duck and turkey. And bones from larger mammals are also too dense. I feed based on the Basic Frankenprey Diet here holisticferret60.proboards.com/thread/146/meat-bone-organ-weekly-menu What they get depends on what's on sale  but the more variety the better. |
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