My ferrets all get pork occasionally too. As long as it isn't cured (ham, bacon) or smoked and isn't "enhanced, solution added, color added or preservatives added).
I can't afford "organic for myself and truthfully am wary of things labeled "organic". As you've likely figured by now, reading several of my posts, I do NOT think there is "truth" in advertising. Advertising is meant for one thing - to SELL a product, promoting that product as better than another.
Organic chicken is often touted as "hormone & antibiotic free", yet by law REGULAR chicken must be raised "hormone & antibiotic free". Organic chicken is often advertised as "free range", "never caged" which conjures up images of a chicken in bright plumage happily clucking and scratching for food across wide open expanses of open sky prairie. Which is exactly what the ad campaign is supposed to do!
www.channel4.com/food/on-tv/the-big-food-fight/free-range-chicken-gallery_p_2.html "Government standards permit a stocking density of 38 kg/m² in intensive farms. Free-range standards limit this to 27.5 kg/m². For an average 2kg bird this equates to 19 birds per m² in an intensive farm and 13 birds per m² in free-range farms." That's only 6 less birds in the same square area! Not exactly what I'd consider a big improvement!
I for one am relieved that modern science has helped farmers grow more crops on less soil, helped create disease resistant crops, have developed livestock that grows fast and produces more and have kept those animals healthy from parasites throughout their short lives! Without such scientific improvements there would be a LOT of human corpses around!
Animals raised for meat
This is an article that puts "organic" in perspective:
www.spiked-online.com/index.php?/site/article/2691/Why would quality beef need "15% solution added"? To increase the actual weight of the meat without actually being a bigger cut of meat!
Why would quality pork need "color added? Because pork is a grey meat and advertisers have conditioned us to believe that grey is unappealing - pink is better!
Why would quality salmon need "color enhanced feed"? Because real farm raised salmon flesh is pale when compared to live caught salmon, yet live caught salmon stocks are practically annihilated and certainly cannot support human populations that devour them (never mind the wild animals that REQUIRE them for sustenance).
Why would quality chicken need "broth added"? Humans LIKE salt, broth has high sodium, this makes our taste buds think the meat tastes better.
These are all ways to get less than quality items into the market in order to sell them! Farmers are NOT injecting the chickens with broth, nor are they making bowls of broth for the chickens to drink! No the PROCESSING plants inject the broth into the rendered meat!
Farmers are NOT, actually CANNOT sell livestock that has been treated with antibiotics within specific time frames of that animal being sent to slaughter! Milk from sick cows being treated with medicine is discarded! Typically right straight from the cow and into the manure slurry! If a farmer puts tainted milk into his bulk tank and ships it to market the samples taken from EVERY batch of milk collected will identify the culprit farmer and that entire bul tank is dumped! The farmer does NOT get paid for the hundreds or thousands of gallons of milk his UNtreated cows produced! There are always sick cows on a farm needing milking, or cows that have just freshened and this milk is discarded too. THese cows are always milked last, and the milk collecting pipes are diverted to a discard tank.
Cattle and hogs intended for slaughter if treated medicinally are prevented from being used for human consumption. But these tainted carcasses are NOT prevented for use by animal food processing!
Humans have been scientifically genetically engineering livestock for as long as we have been eating them (by hunting them). By the same token we have been genetically engineering the plants to feed those animals since we started farming them. And our companion animals and working animals have also been genetically engineered right along with the livestock, crops and hunted animals.
Its not the SOURCE that is adulterating our foodstuffs- it is the processor! Even in the case of livestock fed tainted feed products - those feed products were adulterated not at the source, but by the processor in order to maximize their profits!
As natural feeders we need to educate ourselves to read labeling and interpret it correctly. We have to see through the misleading statements and advertising "fluff". It is entirely possible and the ferret owner's choice to feed totally "organic", but these "organic" sources need not be labeled as such and priced accordingly!
Cheers,
Kim