Alitasha, BillyBob, TrichBezoar, Unagi's Switch

[ferretfreke]

It's no biggie. I can wait.

My babies are still doing great! Remember how opposed to eating mice they were? Well right now I'm out of mice (I have another rodentpro order on it's way) and they are all pissed off that they've had to eat chicken in place of their mice meals for the last week . The little brats. I think they actually like mice better than the chicks or quail now. Ferrets crack me up.

I'm showing all my babies at the Boise Ferret show this weekend. I can't wait! I hope BillyBob wins Best in Class again. I've never shown Alitasha or Unagi before so I'm excited to see how they do. Wish us luck! Hope all is well with you.

[cristina]

Yea I spoke with Heather and she couldnt get ahold of her either so she said to just hang in there and to let you know that you are graduated! congrats!!!

Thats great! I need mine to love mice like that!!!! I am so proud of their journey to eat mice, look where it got you! (Im jealous!! haha, mice are on my menu in the near future!)

GOOD LUCK!!!! ohh I wish I could go to a show!!! Im reallly jealous now!!! Have fun, oh and pics would be cool, I've never seen what a ferret show is like (only horse shows I go to )

[ferretfreke]

My babies did awesome at the show! Here's a link to the thread I posted of their pics.

holisticferret.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=ferretpic&action=display&thread=3241

[cristina]

oh my gosh u did sooo well! I want to go to a ferret show so bad now!

[ferretfreke]

I do hope you get to go to one sometime. They always make for a great day for me. Whether my ferrets are winning or not.

I do have a question. BillyBob has gotten chunky in the past month. In fact the judges were making fun of the junk in his trunk a lot . Normally he packs it on quite a bit for the winter, but he lost his winter weight at the right time and then just started packing on the ounces recently. He gained another 3 ounces in the past week! He's acting like he is always hungry lately. He is liking the whole prey too much now . He can't wait to eat. He chows his down then steals the others animal. He is still very active too. So my question is do you think this will balance itself out? Maybe this is another adjustment to his new diet? He is such a stinker.

[cristina]

Personally I think his body is still going through the change, I had some weight fluctuation with my little man as well for a while, then it did balance out.

Another thing to consider is how much rich food he is eating....is he eating too much rich foods on an everyday basis? If this is the case, try switching it up a bit more and feed really rich foods twice a week (although I know your pretty good with balancing a good diet so this may not be the case)

One more thing I remember Heather saying about one of her little guys is they can be piggies and litterally eat themselves sick at times....is he eating alot in a small amount of time?

[ferretfreke]

Hi Christina,

One of my boys, Unagi, all of a sudden won't eat any mice. He gags at them in fact when I offer him one. He still will eat most the other stuff just fine. By most I mean any fowl (ckn, chicks, quail, duck). He won't eat any rodents actually. When I put a rodent in the cage for them he will completely ignore it and look at me for something else. So his appetite has been fine. Last week all of the ferrets seemed kind of sick of mice so I gave them raw chicken stuff for a few of their mice meals. He ate very well then. The rest of the ferrets were more than happy to eat mice again after their break, but not him. I separated him from everyone last night and only offered a mouse so that I could see if the others don't eat it if he would eventually. It is still there. I wonder if it is because he threw one up last week.

I just tried waving it around in his face and he actually grabbed it from me for once and started chewing on it a bit, but didn't really eat any of it. Is this a common occurrence? Should I try offering a live one to peak his interest again? I just hate doing that because pet store mice aren't the best quality and I worry about intestinal parasites. I will however, if that's what it takes.

Nykol

PS so I went ahead and bought Unagi a live mouse because today would be the only time I could make it to the pet store. He was very excited and killed it right away then proceeded to eat it. He ate most of it and now he's puking it all up. Very frustrating! It just doesn't seem plausible to me that he developed a sensitivity to mice this soon. My frozen rodents are all from rodentpro so they are high quality. Any ideas?

[cristina]

Honestly I have no idea either, its a little mind boggling! I am going to post this on the mentors thread and try to get some answers for you....hang in there, I should have some ideas later on tonight

[ferretfreke]

I'm going to take him into work with me tomorrow. I was just looking at his past weights and he is lower than normal for him. There was more vomit in his cage when I came home from work and a mucousy stool with blood in his litter box. Luckily his hydration is okay. I'm worried about helicobactor or something like that. If it is helicobactor I want to nip it in the bud right away. I'm still interested in the mentor's feedback. Thanks again for doing that.

[cristina]

Sorry I didnt get back to you last night, it took a bit for some response....but some suggestions were eating too much and/or too fast but I really dont think its that. After you have him checked out and it comes out that he doesnt have it, Heather said take a break from the mice and feed everything else normally then go back to see if it has changed...also she was wondering if he eats rats and if he does, does he have the same reaction?

[ferretfreke]

It's okay I know it takes some time for others to respond. It's not an eating too much or too fast thing. He just doesn't do that. My vet said he could feel a small mass in his abdomen so we took x-rays and everything looked pretty normal. We are going to treat him for helicobactor just based on his symptoms and see if he improves. My vet doesn't usually do a biopsy to confirm that it is as that is very invasive. If Unagi doesn't improve then he wants to do a barium series. He wants me to feed something that is easily digestible. What do raw/whole prey feeders feed in this situation? My vet thinks that cooked will be easier on his system, but his support of how I feed them comes and goes. I'm kind of irritated at him right now. I knew he would try to place blame on the diet and I felt like he was.

I do feed the ferrets rats, but I don't know if Unagi will vomit like he has with the mice lately because since he's stopped eating mice, he's refused to eat the rats and guinea pigs also. When he was eating rats before he had no problems, but he also wasn't having any issues with the mice then.

Thanks for your help.

[cristina]

I am going to talk to heather about this right after I post....She has alot of experience with "sick" ferrets, so Ill let you know what she says....but this is what she had to say last night before you posted:

It does sound like it though. It's something that is always in the back of your mind but not something you want to voice out loud. She will want to find easily digestible foods. Not mice or rats...sorry. Prey though digested the best, is not easily digestible ... if that makes sense. It is the fur and such. I would try some ground meats with pumpkin mixed in to see if he can tolerate that, if not she may have to resort to feeding some meat baby food with carnivore care mixed in. I found though not raw, this combination is easily digested and seems to help upset fert tummies. It also doesn't seem to make them nauseaus during the feeding. As the ulcer heals and the little one starts showing more interest in food, then start feeding raw again, I would continue adding pumpkin to the food for awhile. Also, warn her that I've never yet had a ferret who was cured on the first run of antibiotics....I've always had to go into the second run (there's always a first time but to closely observe her little one just in case...I'm sure she will but just to be on the safe side)

[ferretfreke]

Well I don't think he actually developed an ulcer. The blood in his stool was fresh blood not digested blood suggesting colitis not an ulcer. I think I caught it before it got that far.

I'm also an instructor for the Vet Tech program at the college I graduated from. One of the attending vets there is a holistic vet so I spoke with her about what to feed Unagi and she basically said the same thing as Heather (she knows her stuff!). He loves feline canned Evo duck and she said that would be really good to feed him too. I've been mixing in the pumpkin and some carnivore care as Heather suggested. He's loving it. His stools and appetite have been just fine now. He's eager to eat and hasn't had diarrhea or any blood in his stools since I started feeding duck. No vomiting since Wednesday either. With such a quick response, I think I caught it quickly. I'm just hoping he's not stressing too much about being separated from his gang. He's not enjoying that part. He does get to be with them during free-roam time so hopefully that will keep his spirit up.

[cristina]

Well Im glad hes doing much better now, thats good you caught it early!!

[Forum Administrator]

Everything looks to be in order here. Now that you've completed the switch and had your feeding schedule reviewed, its time for you to officially graduate from the HF Mentor program and for us to retire this thread to the "newbie switch archive"!



No one (yourself included) will be able to post in this thread anymore once its been moved to the archive. Please begin posting your diet-related questions in the "whole prey" "raw" or "general feeding questions and discussion" area. We encourage EVERYONE that is archived to continue posting. Feeding a natural diet is a learning PROCESS, there is much to learn after making the switch. There is always lots to learn, and lots to share with the newbies on the site. If you feel comfortable offering the newbies advice, then by all means go ahead. The more help we can get, the better. If you'd rather lurk and not post, thats cool too, its just always nice to have our graduates stick around.

We (your mentor and I) will run a detailed "check up" with you (via PM or email) at the 3 month, 6 month, 9 month, and 1 year anniversary since "going natural" just to make sure all is going well and that you arent having any issues.

Congrats on all your hard work and on your graduation!!!