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Post by zoologist on Dec 26, 2009 14:52:43 GMT -5
dang, i was hoping to make this easier on myself also, can you use dehydrated liver in place of regular liver? i heard ferrets like that...?
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Post by weloveourweasels on Dec 26, 2009 21:33:27 GMT -5
I use freeze dried beef liver instead of regular liver. I don't even know if they will eat them fresh I haven't tried since I have these. I bought them at petsmart and they are really affordable and all of my ferrets including Miss I Will Only Eat Commercial Raw Loki LOVE them. For some reason the aren't listed on Petmart's website.
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Post by zoologist on Dec 27, 2009 14:43:14 GMT -5
y'all, we had an intense break through last night!!! 1) Chewey ate liver.... willingly! i defrost a chicken liver, cut it in half and after chopping it up and giving it a day's worth of ferretone and some powdered kibble he couldnt stop licking it off of my fingers! yey! before he wouldnt even touch it, regardless of what was on it. soon i will start weaning him off of the kibble in the liver, but i may continue to make a liver gravy to pour over the chicken. we'll see! 2) Chewey is willingly eating larger and larger chunks of chicken breast, they're cut to about a 1/2 inch cube now 3)i decided to start getting Chewey used to wing meat, without the bones so i defrosted a wing i had previously de-skinned and given the tip to him. i cut off a chunk of the meat and he gobbled it down. i put him on the ground to play while i tried to chop the meat off the bone and he sat at my feet, then pawed my leg, so i decided to try him with some of the chopped bone. i gave him a piece of meat with the bone in it, but broken up and he made off with the whole piece like a bandit and i heard him crunching the bones underneath the couch! squee! so for dinner that night i chopped up the rest of the chicken wing, making sure the marrow was exposed and the pieces of bone were big but not too big and the next morning every. little. piece. was gone,,,, devoured! i think all that was left were a few small bone shards that had been licked clean of marrow! i'm so proud of my little bub!!! now to try different meats! in your opinion, what are the top 3-5 meats that are most liked by ferrets? not including chicken please
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Post by vkoslin on Dec 27, 2009 17:18:12 GMT -5
yay! He's doing awesome! Good work! The top meats for my guys are pheasant, beef heart, chicken gizzards, cornish hen, pork and steak They didn't love: turkey, liver of any kind, rabbit
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Post by sherrylynne on Dec 27, 2009 21:52:51 GMT -5
Oh, that is excellent news!!! Hurray for Chewie For mine, the top 5 meats are chicken, turkey, quail, rabbit, cornish hen. They used to adore pork, but have become a bit tired of it since I found a lot on sale None of these obviously include their whole prey which they adore most of all.
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Post by zoologist on Dec 29, 2009 10:15:32 GMT -5
Thanks guys, i will be trying new meats once i move to florida in janaury. for right now i'm just going to get chewey going strong on chicken and chicken bones Chewey will not be getting whole prey, even if they are frozen mice. with my love of rats and the pets i have now i just cannot risk it.
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Post by vkoslin on Dec 29, 2009 11:06:07 GMT -5
Hey, someone might need to back me up on this, but usually, don't feed more than one kind of meat per meal. SOme people even feed the same for dinner. I think it's more for "training" him to eat what's in his bowl. If you always give him an option, I.E. beef, wings, etc, for a meal, he will learn to be picky.
Mine didn't like turkey one meal, but MAGICALLY ate it the next day and devoured it. Sometimes they may just feel picky. Don't give up on meats that he didn't like. Beef, maybe. But chicken is a pretty sure bet witha lot of ferrets, so just because it wasn't touched once, you can try it and try it again! That's what made mine eat it. It's kind of like "Well...this is your dinner. Either eat it or don't eat it" (what my parents told me when I was a picky eater). Ferrets will learn they don't like being hungry!
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Post by zoologist on Dec 29, 2009 12:29:42 GMT -5
can i feed other type of bones or should i stick with just chicken bones?
thanks for the advice vicki, i was raised the same way so i'll have no problem using tough love on chewey!
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Post by vkoslin on Dec 29, 2009 17:54:34 GMT -5
You're welcome...I'm trying to just pitch in ideas that might help lol. As for bones, stick with poultry bones in general for always, and since Chewey's a beginner, make sure it's small poultry bones: IE: cornish hen, quail, chicken wings, other small chicken bones. Also, those will probably need to be chopped. He may find he lovessss those bones if theyre bitable I believe most everyone stays away from any beef/pork bones unless they are supervised, but unless Cheweys totally into bones, I'd still never feed them non-poultry bones.
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Post by sherrylynne on Dec 29, 2009 21:11:12 GMT -5
For bone, I feed chicken, cornish hen, quail, duck, rabbit, turkey neck, ox tail, pork riblets(the top end, and a lot of cartiledge). For whole animal- basically any animal chicken sized or smaller, or any non-weight bearing bone(ie:neck, tail).
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Post by vkoslin on Dec 29, 2009 21:59:54 GMT -5
oh yeah! rabbit, mice and all that!!!
ox tail is pretty thick and big, no? But the meat around it should be super tasty. I thought pork bones were bad? Does that pertain mostly to pork chop bones?
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Post by zoologist on Dec 30, 2009 23:26:38 GMT -5
tonight Chewey had chicken tenders, cut in half (largest chunks of meat he's ever tried) and sliced chicken giblets. he loved the giblets, yey! how often should i feed those? also should i start looking for chicken hearts or can he forgo those if i cant find them?
also, vicki, how do you get a butcher to cut a bone in half length wise?
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Post by sherrylynne on Dec 30, 2009 23:30:54 GMT -5
As soon as possible, you should get him used to other meats, so he doesn't just imprint on chicken! As for cutting the bones? I do it myself, with either a cleaver, or a large chef's knife And that's alright about the whole prey. He will do just fine with what you can buy in the store!
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Post by zoologist on Dec 31, 2009 13:19:58 GMT -5
i dont want to start trying other meats till i move to fla. i dont wanna find a great butcher in SC and then be screwed when i move how often should he eat bones? right now he is getting theme very other day and it seems too often.
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Post by sherrylynne on Jan 1, 2010 12:46:43 GMT -5
I give bone 4 days out of seven. 2 days, they get muscle meats, one meal organ meats, and the other meal that day is either bone, or whole prey, to help offset the more liquid stool of the organ meats.
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