Tikki, Mis, and Coco Switch!

[luci]

My kids really love the wing tips. They always eat that part first and only grudgingly eat the other sections. I still have to cut and pull the meat away from the bones to get them interested. They're stinkers.

It's so great that Tikki seems to love the babies. I'm sure it will go a long way in keeping her happy.

[Zoshi]

Haha, silly ferts... xD I wonder what it is about the wing tips that makes them so appetizing? Maybe they're nice and chewy at the end...

I have the other sections of the wings frozen for a little later... but my dad bought a chicken that he's cutting up and freezing for chicken soups, and he gave me the neck, heart, and stomach that came with it... Soo, Coco is going to get a third of the chicken neck tonight, and the rest of the chicken neck throughout the day tomorrow. Do you think that would be fine? She really, really likes it...

Also, I just gave Coco and Mis chicken stomach/liver/heart mixed into their food on Sunday night. I didn't take the liver from the chicken my dad bought, but I have the heart and stomach. Would it be too soon to give them the heart and stomach again? I could freeze them until the weekend if it is. The kids are still getting a bit of beef mixed in with their food.

Tikki is doing well, her poops are a bit mucousy-looking, but are looking better and better each time she goes. Occasionally there is seediness, but there's less and less of it over time. She's eating both her kibble and the baby food regularly and easily. :3

[luci]

As long as Coco is getting some meat too and not just the necks that would be fine.

I think you'd be fine to feed the chicken parts again. It's great that they're eating all that stuff. Where do you get chicken that comes with the stomach? I can just get the neck, heart, liver and gizzard around here. I guess I'm not very well versed in chicken anatomy, but they do have a stomach aside from the gizzard, yes?

I hope we can get Tikki gnawing on some bones here pretty soon. Is she seeming interested in what the kids are eating at all?

[Zoshi]

We occasionally get a good deal on chicken from a Polish store, and every now and then there's a stomach mixed in along with the gizzard, heart, and liver. It doesn't happen very often, but sometimes we get lucky. It's weird looking, though; it's more like a bulbous tube than what you'd expect a stomach to look like, I guess because they do most of their digestion in the gizzard?

I can get Tikki to give plain chicken licks, although she won't actively take it from me, but I'm getting ground chicken tomorrow for her. I'm thinking she's a little put off by the pieces, she's always more inclined to carry pieces off and lick them for a little bit before coming back to steal another piece.
I know she knows what bones are; I've given her bones from the thighs of roast chicken so she could gnaw the rest of the meat off of them (supervised). Hmm... I have a third of a chicken wing defrosting for tomorrow, maybe if I strip most of the meat off and put some baby food on it, I could at least get her used to the texture? And get used to the bone?

[luci]

Sure. Or maybe try the beloved wing tip. There's not as much bone, but the idea is to get her to work at it. Or do you have any ribs? Those are easy to crunch.

[Zoshi]

Okay, knock out Tikki's switch for a little while... She just had a really strange, mucousy-cloudy poop that looks pretty nasty. I'm giving her vet a call as soon as the office opens, and we might have to take her in to check up on her. She seems like she might have lost a little weight, from just holding her and looking at her, although the digital scale I have isn't picking it up...

I'll have more info later on.

[Zoshi]

Tikki is probably going to see the vet tomorrow; her poops have now turned seedy (again! at least they're not entirely yellow anymore), but that's the only change. She's looking all right, but she's still having seedy poops, and she's still a little lethargic, and that's making me a worried.

In other news, Coco and Mis finished their bowl of food (a cup of chicken and beef dusted with kibble and Stella and Chewy's) in just under 5 minutes. They were on their hammock when I put the bowl in, and Mis pretty much fell head first into the bowl when I held it up to give them a sniff. I'm crushing around a tablespoon of kibble for them (that is, whole pieces of kibble), and a quarter sized chunk of S&C's to dust the meat, but I'll go for a bit less of the kibble and S&C tonight and see how they take it. I also upped the size of the chicken pieces a bit, and they're both chowing down with no problem.

[luci]

Awesome for the babies! I'm glad they're taking it easy on you so you can focus more on Tikki. Does Tikki seem hydrated enough?

[Zoshi]

I know, right? At least one thing is going good, heheh... They're getting their night-time dish soon, and I'm sure they're more than ready for it...

Tikki seems to be hydrated, her skin isn't tenting, and her gums are moist (and boy did she like having me check that! xD). She's also perkier than she was on Saturday/Sunday. While she still prefers to chill out, she'll take a romp around the room and climb onto the couch to see what's going on. I'm still giving her the chicken baby food with pedialyte, and she's eating it pretty well...
Hopefully the vet will be able to give me some more advice about what to do...


More good news:


Yes, that is Mis, chowing down on a piece of a chicken neck. The kids got there night-time chow, and Mis jumped for it before Coco could even react, and pulled the neck piece out of the bowl and ran to the box/den as fast as his little legs could take him. He actually hissed at me a little when I was taking the picture, and he kept moving around so his big bottom would be blocking the entrance. xD I think the kids are getting ready for plain raw, there's barely any dusting on it, and the pieces are almost an inch square now.

And now that that's said, I wish you a good night! Hopefully, I'll have good news about Tikki tomorrow; the vet said I can show up at any time during the day, just to call ahead, so I'm going to do that. :3

[Zoshi]

All righty, Tikki went to the vet: Seems like she has a bacterial infection, probably of the colon (thus the reason for the weird mucous poops), so she got put on Amoxil for two weeks (it's bubblegum flavored!). She's not to have contact with Mis and Coco for at least a week, just in case they have any bacteria that they're carrying that could affect her. She's not going to be happy, I can see it now... Good thing is, she's looking chipper and perky, and she's not dehydrated. She's lost two ounces of weight, but hopefully she'll gain it back soon.
I'm going to have her switch postponed until I'm sure she's back in shape and isn't having any problems...

Coco and Mis chowed down on a chicken and beef mix this morning, around 1/3 beef and 2/3 chicken, with only a light dusting of Stella and Chewy's and they chowed down happily. I think I saw Mis go for the beef more than the chicken, and Coco go for the chicken more than the beef, but it might have just been coincidence. I got wing sections defrosting for tonight for them, we'll see how they deal with those.

[Zoshi]

Quick update: Coco and Mis are chowing down on both chicken and beef with equal vigor. Mis still occasionally looks miffed if there is no kibble or S&C dust to entice him, but once he gets a lick in he's good to go. Pork is also tempting to them, and they had a little of that tonight as well.
On monday I'm going to get them cornish game hens and divide them up for the coming week.

Hope everything is going well with you!

[luci]

Way to go, babies! I can't remember... did you say that they've eaten chicken liver too? So they're eating 3 types of meat, bone and organ? Just like a real raw fed ferret? Oh they're such good monsters!

Is Tikki getting better on her meds?

[luci]

Happy birthday, Zoshi! I hope the ferrets bought something really nice for you. Or at the very least put all their poops in the appropriate approved places.

[Zoshi]

xD Haha, thank you! Indeed, there were no accidents the past two days, so they gave me quite a nice present.

Okay, the run down:

Tikki is getting better, yesterday her poops started firming up and for the first time she didn't have seedy poop all day. She's still supposed to take her meds for another week and half... She's pretty much back to normal in behavior and such, so that's good. I don't know when to start thinking of starting her switch again...


Coco and Mis's List of Foods they've eaten:
Chicken, Beef, Pork, Lamb (since yesterday, it goes down pretty well). Chicken wings.
Chicken organs: Gizzard, Liver, Heart, etc. They just need them chopped up and dusted with Stella and Chewy's.

Also, I had a coupon for a free package of Nature's Variety Raw Medallions that was expiring, so I went out and picked up the Rabbit formula. They've been getting a little of the medallions dusted in Stella and Chewy's Chicken. They were a little iffy at first, but now they're chowing down on that as well.

I'm going to get them cornish game hens today for this week, and see how they do with those. :3

Also, I was wondering, would it be bad to mix meats when feeding them? I know people have their setups so that they feed only beef/pork/etc on certain days, but would it be okay to make meat mixes? Or is it easier to keep track of the meats if they're on separate days?

[luci]

I mix meats and haven't had a problem. I've heard some people say that you should feed organs with meat from the same animal, but again, I've mixed without problems.

I keep a daily journal of what I feed my critters and I've found that it helps a lot in making sure I'm feeding enough bone, organs, variety of meats, etc. It's not anything super detailed.

Good job! We'll get Tikki back on track after her meds. Are you giving her probiotics?