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Post by mustelidmusk on Dec 20, 2008 12:37:11 GMT -5
I know a lot of people feed Ziwipeak to their ferrets. It's a jerky-like air-dried meat product. I recently started mixing a small amot of the Ziwipeak in with my brats' food for variety.
My concern is that the Chicory syrup is lately high up on the list of ingredients, which sugests that there could be a fair amount in the product. But, the list of ingredients is relatively small.
So I read up on chicory syrup. Here's what I learned.....chicory syrup is made from the root of the chicory plant. This is what conerned me because tap roots commonly store sugar. Sure enough, chicory syrup is used as a sweetener. It's supposed to have a lower glycemic index and therefor be better for diabetics.
This affects the blood sugar levels less dramatically than other types of sugars.
The type of sugar provided by chicory syrup is inulin, which is considered to be a pre-biotic. A Pre-biotic is a type of sugar that feeds the probiotics, which in theory, promotes a healthy balance of good bacteria in the gut.
You can find inulin as an ingredient in many foods, but the Ziwipeak smells like it's sweet, and it almost seems sticky.
OK, folks, I got desparate - I TASTED the stuff!!! (Well, some people do eat steak tartar :lol: ) It WAS sweet - more like teriyaky jerky. Based on my "analysis", I'll be sure to keep the ziwipeak as a very small percentage of my ferrets' diet!
I have NO concrete evidence that the chicory syrup in Ziwipeak could be a real issue for ferrets. I have NO idea if there's much chicory syrup in the product.... this is just my own paranoiad assessment.
-jennifer
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Post by animalsgetrevenge on Dec 20, 2008 15:23:46 GMT -5
Jennifer, you should be a CSI! I loved reading your thorough analysis  There is nothing weird about trying your pets' food -or at least not on this forum... I don't know how the rest of the world feels! When I was younger I tasted all kinds of pet kibble, treats, and canned food in hopes of finding why animals love their stinky food so much. I've been vegetarian/vegan for the the past 5.5 years so it has been a while since I've tried any of my pets foods... but trust me, I would want to know what my pets' food tasted like to make sure it was "edible" flavor wise. Heck, I tried bitter apple spray to make sure I wasn't going to hurt my babies! |
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Post by mustelidmusk on Dec 21, 2008 11:12:42 GMT -5
I've eaten plenty of kibbles over the years - but the non-heat-processed foods is a little different since I'm not into eating raw meat (except for some types of fish) - and as for the organ meats, I sometimes enjoy a bit of fine liver pate after I've had a half a bottle of red wine!!!! And Pate is cooked!!! Anyway, my "analyss" is anything but technical, and the amount of chicory may be absolutely fine....I really don't know - All I can say is I'm going by "gut feel".  I'm be usig the ziwipeak more like a treat - in small amounts here and there , it's probably fine. But I would be concerned about a steady diet of the stuff if it represents a major part of the diet. -jennifer |
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Post by sherrylynne on Dec 21, 2008 23:07:21 GMT -5
Hey, Jennifer- have you never tried steak tartar?  |
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Post by mustelidmusk on Dec 22, 2008 0:27:27 GMT -5
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Post by jojodancer on Dec 22, 2008 15:30:56 GMT -5
I was concerned about the ziwipeak myself before feeding it to my ferts. This was the dialogue:
From: jojodancer
Sent: Friday, March 21, 2008 4:36 AM
To: ziwipeak
Subject: RE: ZiwiPeak Ingredients Inquiry-- ferret inquiry
<stuff deleted>
Looking through the ingredients I noticed a few things that concern me
1) high ash content. A good ferret food would have less than 7% ash.
Obviously you know why, as your website states that it keeps ash low to
stop uroliths. You say that the high amount of meat in you food stops
the formation of uroliths, but I'm wondering if that is true in ferrets?
2) what really concerns me is the chickory syrup, though. Insulinoma is
called one of the "big three" ferret diseases (along with adrenal and
lymphoma) and is caused by high sugar/high carb diets. A ferret's
pancreas begins secreting large amounts of insulin, and never stops
producing it, so the result is incredibly low blood sugar, and eventual
death. The chickory syrup is a sugar, and contains insulin. Seems to
me it is a double whammy.
Ziwipeak's answer:
From: Ziwipeak
Sent: Monday, March 24, 2008 3:21 PM
To: jojodancer
Subject: RE: ZiwiPeak Ingredients Inquiry-- ferret inquiry
Hello
Thank you for your reply. The more I learn, the better I can understand
the requirements of Ferrets.
1 We are lowering the ash level in ZiwiPeak with a couple of minor
changes. The ash comes from the vitamins and mineral (unlike the ash in
other petfood which is just burnt product). I have attached a vet report
on ZiwiPeak which has a part on it. I am not 100% sure on Ferrets. I
would think that a base protein eater would have the same biology, but
need to learn more.
2 Chicory. We don't actually use that much, just for benefits level.
Would consider not using it for Ferret food. Noted.
And here is another interesting exchange with ziwipeak:
From: jojodancer
Sent: Wednesday, March 26, 2008 8:26 AM
To: ziwipeak
Subject: RE: ZiwiPeak Ingredients Inquiry-- ferret inquiry
I'm still concerned about the chickory syrup - syrup being more
sugary and sweet than the actual root. If you notice the ingredients in
the Innova EVO (ferrets) you'll see that it includes chickory root. My
apprehension with the chickory *syrup* is that it has, per your notes, a
high concentration of fructose. There is thought to be a link between
sugar and carbs and insulinoma. And giving sugary foods to
insulinomatic ferrets is a definite no-no since that actually causes
severe hypo-glycemnic crashes.
From: Ziwipeak
Sent: Tuesday, March 25, 2008 4:19 PM
To: jojodancer
Subject: RE: ZiwiPeak Ingredients Inquiry-- ferret inquiry
Thank you so much for this; greatly increases my movement towards a
specialty Ferret food.
Just to start, I may have not have explained well on a couple of points.
ZiwiPeak exceeds the AAFCO standards for their most rigorous standards.
Also we use dry chicory root, have been for months, changes to the
packaging take time!!
ZiwiPeak as you know is based on natural fall ratio; around 65% meat,
close to 20% organs and then additives like the mussel meat and vitamins
and minerals. We researched for a long time and in the end, we
(including you!) know that the natural balance can not be wrong.
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Post by spiritualtramp on Dec 22, 2008 16:19:28 GMT -5
That is really interesting --- were you in talks of getting them to produce a ferret-specific food???
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Post by jojodancer on Dec 23, 2008 8:53:17 GMT -5
Yep - They say they are working on it. They were goign to send a person to the IFC show in Melbourne, but it didn't work out. But a ferret-specific food is on the drawing table.
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Post by spiritualtramp on Dec 27, 2008 12:36:47 GMT -5
That's really great, and being on the inside, it's great that you can give input and critiques on ingredients.
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Post by nwheather on Dec 28, 2008 4:14:15 GMT -5
hhhmmmm......I don't think so....a lot of the deli meats like salami, prosciutto, etc. ar air-cured meats - but they don't have the "mystery meats"added in. Speaking of mystery meats , I will eat hotdogs, but those are cooked. I have not yet tried raw mouse  -jennifer Ewww, "yet"?? let me know how that goes...blech =) |
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Post by jojodancer on Jan 27, 2009 10:48:33 GMT -5
Just talked to ZiwiPeak. Added some more thoughts about their prodcts, asking if they could make it a bit thicker, since my ferrets seem to have difficulty picking the flat pieces off the floor. I also had some other questions. I asked them about the lack of "bone" in their ingredients - something that has bothered me a little. They said that "bone is included (other than cheap volume filler) in petfood for the Calcium is provides. Bones themselves provide very little digestible Calcium. In ZiwiPeak we include Calcium by a small amount of bone and the rest by high quality digestible mineral. Our pet nutrition experts tell me that Calcium should be between 0.6 and 2.5% and it is around 2% in ZiwiPeak." The third question arose on ferret.com where it was stated that ZP had to be removed after a certain time because it would spoil. This was new to me, and I read through all the literature again, and the bags (both the lamb, and the venison and fish). I couldn't find anything about safety if leaving it in a food bowl for too long. Since this is what I feed my ferrets, and tell others it is OK to leave out, I wanted to find out for sure. This is what they wrote back: "I haven’t specified how long ZiwiPeak should be left in a food bowl. It depends on temperature and contaminants such as flies etc. Provided it is not in direct sunlight or too hot, nutritionally it will be fine for days, the only concern I would have is contaminants. " They said they are still working on the ferret formula. I still find this ironic, seeing that ferrets are illegal in New Zealand. So yes, they are working on an optiomal diet for an animal that is considered dangerous to the NZ indigenous animal population. Does anyone else find this amusing??? |
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