baby bear and monkey

[tink80]

i found chicken livers today at the little town grocery where i have found hearts and gizzards before. they didn't have hearts today (i actually dragged the butcher out from the back) so i just bought a huge tray of livers for $1.60 (chicken this time) which i suspect will last a long time.
haven't used it yet though.
thinking bout tossing those chicken necks out tomorrow night with the trash.
boys have been eating cooked soup during the break.

[Forum Administrator]

Yay livers My guys LOVE livers. Bummer they didnt have hearts. I actually had such a hard time finding hearts locally that I started buying them online.

[tink80]

i made a batch of soup today using your recipe for supplemental raw except it didn't have the hearts because i haven't found them yet. if i find them i'll make them into seperate cubes and add them to current cubes. i also chose to add baby food for flavoring as i didn't feel like dealing with them getting used to the gizzard and liver and they have been on a break as have i and i didn't see a huge problem with that.
it's a decent size batch so i'm just going to do this for awhile. i have to admit it was a bit of a relief to see them eat up their kibble more this last week so i knew for sure they were getting adequate nutrition.

i've decided for their future we will only be doing supplemental. they will not go all the way.

to make sure they don't go back to just picking at their kibble i will either do this mix every other day or a small amount such as one ice cube for both once a day. i may even skip a few days here and there as the idea of them not getting enough nutrition has really freaked me out. i will just monitor their kibble intake and give the supplemental as i feel comfortable.

that is pretty much all we're going to be doing right now.

[tink80]

just wanted to say the boys aren't really getting their soup anymore.
i have been hearing you need to space kibble and raw out about five hours apart and i'm having trouble with them eating kibble at different times and timing it out right. i don't really like picking their food up if i don't know when the other one last ate.
i'm having doubts i'll be able to do this without making them sick.

[Forum Administrator]

I recommend that people space out kibble and raw because they digest at different rates. The THEORY is that in some ferrets, the kibble can slow down the digestive rate of the meat (in essence meat will get "backed up" behind kibble in the gut) and possibly cause the meat to stay in the digestive tract longer then its meant to, which in turn can cause a ferret to become ill.

There are people who feed raw and kibble together with no issues, so if you are comfortable doing that and your ferrets seem fine, then you can proceed and do that. I generally don't tell people to do that, but that is simply because I give GENERAL advice to people and some ferrets are exceptiosn to the rule.

If you really feel uncomfortable feeding raw and kibble together, you can feed soup for a day with NO kibble that day for a few times a week. That way they can still get their soup, and you can worry less

Let me know if that's an option.

[tink80]

hey, giuli. thanks for getting back to me.
i think right now i'd be more comfortable trying to space out their soup from kibble rather than do soup only on certain days. mostly because i have an odd schedule of 12 hours in cage, 12 hours free roam and i don't want them to go 12 hours without something to nibble on.
i'm somewhat easing back into soup at something like once to twice a week. basically, when i notice they haven't eaten their kibble for quite a bit and i'm around for the opportunity.
i never spaced it out before and it wasn't a problem but the theory has made me just nervous enough to not feel comfortable doing it all the time like i did before. then again, i've fed soup and had a weasel get up thirty minutes later and go to his kibble bowl *eye roll* so i'm just a little off kilter and stuck in the middle of worry and wanting them on supplemental regularly again.
as i suspected, it's me more than them that is the hold up LOL. i guess i'm in the midst of establishing comfort level AND scheduling issues and weighing what i really need to/or not need to worry about.
that whole theory really put a fright into me (and i'm already a paranoid mommy) so as you can see i'm still recovering, LOL. so i guess that is the update (more about me than my furkids this time, LOL).