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Post by weeksl08 on Aug 6, 2008 13:58:11 GMT -5
We are officially kibble free  which is completely exciting! I have been putting broken up egg shell, the egg insides and ground chicken in a food chopper but it does not gt the egg shell finely ground. I was wondering how much egg shell is too much? Also, this may be a dumb question, but should I take the egg yolk out since they are getting a whole egg a day (until I can get a mortar and pestle to grind the egg shell?) |
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Post by tss on Aug 6, 2008 16:23:10 GMT -5
I think Guili said one egg shell per ferret per day.
I would keep the egg yolk in there, they are really good for the ferrets.
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Post by weeksl08 on Aug 6, 2008 16:53:45 GMT -5
Ok good! I've been feeding 1 egg per 3 ferrets! I knew too much yolk was bad for humans, but had no clue about ferrets.
Is it possible for the egg shell to tear up their insides?? I've noticed a lot of shell in their poopies today.
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Post by ferretpalooza on Aug 6, 2008 17:22:52 GMT -5
I have 7 ferrets so I have a question about how to get that much egg shell. We just dont eat that many eggs, LOL would it hurt the calcium levels to freeze them until I need them??? any suggestion on where to buy a mortar and pestle???
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Post by weeksl08 on Aug 6, 2008 17:26:20 GMT -5
any suggestion on where to buy a mortar and pestle??? Ebay is good  |
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Post by josiesmom on Aug 6, 2008 18:09:57 GMT -5
Any local health food store will carry mortar and pestles. ANother option for grinding egg shells is a coffee grinder. ANother option for calcium source besides egg shells but will still need to be ground further is crushed oyster shells. These can be found in stores that sell exotic parrots. The birds use the ground shells for their crops.
You could probably also get a cacium source already ground from reptile houses. And human grade calcium from a pharmacy.
Being as calcium is a mineral it will not degrade if frozen. so have an egg cracking day,pulverize and freeze to your heart's content!
Cheers,
Kim
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Post by Heather on Aug 9, 2008 22:08:00 GMT -5
If you're looking for equivalents. 1 tsp of ground egg shell to 8 oz of meat is the given amount.
ciao
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Post by Forum Administrator on Aug 11, 2008 22:31:32 GMT -5
1. If you feed egg daily offer the raw YOLK and the ground shell (its the raw eggwhite you'll need to avoid (ONLY if you feed the egg daily) Ferrets have a much higher fat and protein requirement then use Hoomans so its totally fine to give them the yolk.
2. If you give way to much eggshell at once it can cause a pretty bad tummy ache. When Mizu (my b/f's ferret) was a baby I gave him WAY too much eggshell. I had to take him to the vet because he had a tummy ache. My vet gave him some pain meds, ferret lax, and some antibiotics (incase the shell cut up his intestines a bit) After a few days Mizu was fine.
If you ground the shell fine enough you dont need to worry about it cutting his insides. Bear in mind I gave Mizu like 5 ground eggshells! and like 1tbsp of babyfood! OMG! See, even I make mistakes! This was before I learned the "1tsp eggshell per 8oz of meat" or the 1 eggshell per day rule.
As Josisesmom mentioned freezing will not reduce calcium content.
Oh and incase anyone is interested here is some info on eggshells:
"1tsp of eggshell powder contains approx 1,800-2,000 mg of elemental or useable calcium in carbonate form. This is based on research findings that one large eggshell yielding approx one teaspoon of eggshell powder, ranges from 5,000 to 5,500 mg total calcium, with 39 percent being the useable amount."
From "Whole Health for Happy Cats" by Sandy Arora
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Post by Heather on Aug 12, 2008 10:34:52 GMT -5
As long as you feed the whole egg you should be ok. The egg is totally balanced. If you feel leary, or if your feeding huge amounts of egg then feed 1 egg, and a yolk. The problem reared it's ugly head when people started feeding their furbabies (dogs, and cats mostly but ferret too) the same way we feed ourselves. At the time people were eating the egg whites but not the yolks as they were afraid of driving up their cholesteral....the same problem happens when we feed lean meats to ferrets. They need the fat and the skin...we don't  Feeding only egg whites will make them ill. Feeding the whole egg is ok Ouch, that was a lot of egg shell....the actual break down is 2/3 tsp to 8 oz of meat....it's easier to do 1 tsp of egg shell to a heavy 8 oz of meat. If I use egg shell, I use the 1 tsp to the ground meat I'm using and then add my offal (hearts, liver, giblets or kidneys). Things I've discovered over time  ciao |
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