Few basic questions

[ginnysmom]

I am new here so I apologize if this info is already given somewhere else.

If I were to switch to raw is a whole mouse the best diet for my ferret? I was reading in another thread that said that chicks aren't the best choice.

If I were to feed only mice do I need to supplement the diet with anything else?

I asked at the pet store about feeder mice and they said that I would have to worm my cats regularly (I was asking about my cats at the time) if I were to feed the mice because they would get worms from the mice since they were not raised in a good environment. I don't want to support this, the mice being raised in a poor/unhealthy environment I mean.

I haven't really looked into ordering mice online but I live in a pretty remote area in Newfoundland, Canada so I worry about getting them shipped in time (I am assuming they are shipped frozen). What is your experience with ordering mice?

Would it be easier to give a live mouse to get her interested in the whole idea before I go with frozen mice? I am thinking about getting superworms for her to see what she thinks. Do you think that will get her interested in raw?

She is currently eating Go! cat food, grain free, chicken turkey and duck formula www.petcurean.com/index.php?page_id=153

She has decided that she will only eat mushy kibble since she lost her friend almost a month ago. She is somewhere between 2 and 3 years old.

Can you tell me your experiences with switching an older ferret from kibble to raw?

Thanks!!

[Heather]

Ok, for one. If you're feeding a raw diet, you have to use a minimum of 3 protein sources. The same goes for prey. If you feed mice, you will have to come up with a minimum of 3 other prey or protein sources. I feed, mice, rats, rabbit and quail as my prey. I also feed my own special ground rmb mix, commercial ground and frankenprey (I don't want to miss any corners ) Adult mice are good single pkg but you need more than just that to cover your dietary needs
As for sourcing, that takes a little research. I don't know about your sources but here in Ontario the mail order mousy business isn't a going concern . The US has a much better deal with rodentpro and haretoday. Do you know any hunters, they're a great source of meat if you can get them, especially if they're hunting bird. I raise my own mice (stinky ), have a snake raising friend who raises rats, and have a touch and go supply of rabbit. So with some research, you should be able to cover your bases.
Worms...hmmmm...right...not . Only if those stinky mice have fleas. I've been feeding prey for about 4 yrs now...and feeding a raw diet for about 12 yrs....no worms and yes, I've had my guys tested.
Getting an older ferret interested in prey or any type of raw food can be a challenge and sometimes takes a bit of ingenuity. Check out our mentoring section (check out the vault and the graduates too), there's some interesting reading if you're interested in specifics on how to switch your little one. I presently do rescue/hospice so my guys are all older when they come in. The easiest to switch...the kits, they'll eat anything but sometimes the old timers will surprise you. Houdini and Shazam (6 and 7 yrs) switched in a weekend. Lady Babushka (9yrs) took 4 months of intensive work. Nikita (2 yrs) took a weekend. A lot of the switching has to do with how stubborn and how fixated on a particular diet these little ones are. Houdini and Shazam had almost been starved to death and were so thin they could barely stand up and were disgusting to hold.
If she's already eating mushy kibble try adding just a little bit (and I mean little bit) of ground raw meat. See if she will accidentally eat some .
I'm sure that there will be others who will pop in and offer some more information. You're welcome to continue to use this thread that you've started here to continue to ask questions and get yourself started doing your switch. You can also apply for a mentor.
ciao

[ginnysmom]

Thank you for your help

I don't have any sources really for anything but the grocery store here where I live I will have to go into town to get mice if I am going to go that route. I am sure that they can get rats too. So, would mice, rats, and chicken be ok? I can get chicken wings, hearts, and livers no problem here at the grocery store.

I have been considering getting chicken wings, hearts, and livers (and gizzards if I can find them) and then grinding it all up in the right proportions and giving it to my cats, or at least trying to give it to them. I guess that would be good for Ginny too?

If she doesn't want to eat a rat or mouse could I grind something like that too?

I am still not positive that I will give this a try yet but I would really like to find out more. I have to check the availability of things before I jump into it.

My dogs are big so I can't share what they get with Ginny and the cats. But, I can use my knowledge of feeding prey model raw to the dogs.

Thank you again for your help!

[Heather]

Yes, you can grind it up just the same as you would for cats. I use the same food for the cats and the ferrets. They're both obligate carnivores. Are your cats kibble or moist fed? If they're moist fed you're part way there already. I switched a 12 yr old siamese kibble addict.....time and patience. Took me 6 months and then another year to get him to accept it totally but he's now 22 so it works
When we use grocery store meats, any will do except smoked, canned or pickled. Pork, beef, chicken....whatever...oh duck, goose (those tend to be seasonal here), lamb is another good meat that is easily digested.
I know of people who have managed to switch their little ones to eating prey by first grinding the prey.....you just put the mousy in the blender but it works I've never done this but I know a couple of my students who I've mentored who did.
ciao

[ginnysmom]

Eww! Mouse in the blender! Haha! I will probably use the grinder if I do chose to do it.

Thank you for your help!

My cats are feed all canned food but nothing I can do will entice them to give raw a chance. I am thinking I might do what I said (grinding it all up) and then maybe put it in a little bag and float it in lukewarm water for a bit and see if that helps. Frodo, my DSH, is a huge kibble addict so I am glad that I got him onto all canned. He is a chub and the canned is helping but I would rather have him on raw. My siamese, Blue, is 13 and she still acts silly like a kitten most of the time. She won't even go near raw. I will keep trying though!

[sherrylynne]

To get my ferrets to eat whole prey, I started with pinkies, and simply chopped them up to add to the meat- they were already on raw by then. I've got one cat who will willingly eat raw(if no canned is out ), one who has raw treats, one who will eat it if she's hungry enough, and one who will go anorexic if offered anything but his chosen kibble
To get my cats to eat it, I just started mixing up a teensy bit of ground into their wet meal, and very slowly increased it from there.

[Heather]

That's how I got Samurai to switch. The hardest part of the switch was the conversion from kibble....he really couldn't care about the moist stuff. The hardest part was finding a moist that he would eat so that I could mix the raw into it. I eventually stopped even trying to find something that was good for him I just needed to find something that was really stinky and had no beef in it (beef caused projectile vomiting) It was garbage stuff, nothing that I would ever honestly feed but that's what I switched him with. The first week or so I fed maybe a 1/4 tsp of raw in the food. If there was more than that he would stop eating it. Once he would eat that then I added a tiny bit more...this went on for a year. Everytime that I moved too fast, he would stop eating and I would have to back off a step or two. It took a lot of patience but I got it done.
ciao

[ginnysmom]

I have tried mixing a tiny bit of premade raw food into the canned food that my cats eat (a few years ago, I can't get premade raw now) and they refused to eat the canned food then. I mixed in only a tiny, tiny amount, about the size of my pinkie nail, probably less.

I will try grinding up the stuff I mentioned above and offer it to both the cats and Ginny. In the past few days Ginny has decided that she would like to eat kibble again now, rather than the mushy stuff.

Thank you for your help

[sherrylynne]

Not unusual that she'd want the kibble. The carbs are somewhat addictive. Along with the sugars that come with carbs!
I've got a couple who, although they've been raw fed for a couple of years now would still take the kibble if they had a choice

[ginnysmom]

it makes me so sad to think about the kitties and ginny eating something that i know is not that great for them. it is just very difficult for me to get the things i need if i am going to feed them raw. i know it would be a constant battle to get them to eat it at first but i think that (at least with ginny) i could switch them. i just don't feel that i have access to enough variety to make a healthy diet for her.

i live in a SMALL town (~1200 people) that is about 250 km from the closest "big" city. i just don't have the resources

[sherrylynne]

Can you get beef, pork, chicken, turkey, duck, cornish hen? And liver and heart? If you can get 3 of the first on a regular basis, and the organ/heart- you've got it licked
And if you do any whole prey- many of them deliver!

[ginnysmom]

i can get all of the meat except for the cornish hen. but, i can only beef and chicken liver and chicken hearts.

if i were to feed beef or pork how would i get enough bone? i know with dogs no bone equals loose stool (or explosive, however you want to say it! ) and i tried ground egg shells but that doesn't give enough "fibre" for the dogs and they still get loose stools. i can't see a ferret being able to crunch a beef or pork bone.

[sherrylynne]

Chicken wings, necks, ribs, turkey necks, ribs, duck necks, ribs, calcium tabs/eggshells for the extra times you may not always be able to get enough wings/necks. You could give a wing or neck several times a week, and make up the difference in proteins with the other meals.
Sample weekly diet could be:
Monday: Chicken wings/chicken hearts
Tuesday: beef chunks
Wednesday: chicken necks
Thursday: pork chunks
Friday: chicken wings/ liver
Saturday: turkey chunks/necks/ribs/wings(they can eat the tips)
Sunday: duck chunks/necks

So you ever get into a city nearby? If so, check out for raw feeding petstores. You can usually get all the necks there with no problem. Same goes for getting some commercial raw for variety. They don't even have to be a "large" city. Some cities of 100,000 are also getting them, simply because people are starting to realize their pets are getting the short end of the stick when it comes to diet.
Do you have an actual butcher in your town? Or in a nearby town? Sometimes you can get the best deals there. Or farmers nearby who raise birds? Again- get in touch with them if you can. Find out, if you can, if there is a nearby raw feeding coop. You can usually find them on craig's list. People go in together to order in bulk, thus saving everyone money. You might have to travel a few miles to meet someone to pick up your order, but it would save you money and time in the long run.
It would take some research, and some time to find all the places, but it's definitely doable.

[ginnysmom]

i don't have access to any of those things the closest town to me is about 22000 people and doesn't have a raw feeding pet store. i can get turkey necks but that is it when it comes to necks and they are huge, about 1 lb each. when my dog was a pup he couldn't eat turkey necks and he was (and is) a big boy!

there isn't a butcher in my town or the closest town believe me, i have looked! i feed my dogs raw so i have searched and searched all the options i could find. there is a guy who raises and butchers pork but that is it. there is no raw feeding co-op. there may be one in st. john's but that is a 7 hour drive away. there are no farms that raise any animals near me. i was hoping to find a chicken farm but it is in st. john's.

i really am in the middle of no where!

[Heather]

Do you have access to internet orders? I'm guessing that you're on Canada's side of the border, so asking you if you can access rodentpro or haretoday is not going to happen but there are often local snake breeders who have knowledge of local raw feeding networks. These are often prey models but they can be great source of information. Are you in Newfoundland? If you want to feed raw to your little ones, there has to be a way around things so that you can feed a raw diet to the smaller carnivores in your area.
You can get by with feeding only the organ meats that you have access to. You can get "generic" heart, livers. It's the meat that is the biggest issue here. You can get beef, pork and chicken? This is 3 different proteins.
Frankenprey is all about making a faux beastie . So you cut up stewing beef (protein 1), you can get chicken livers (protein 2), beef hearts (protein 1), chicken necks or backs (these can be eaten easily by ferrets), wings (protein 2)...next day use pork (protein 3) with chicken wings (protein 1). Hit is lucky day 3 neighbour hit silly bunny down the road (protein source4) can use bone from said bunny as well (sorry if you have pet rabbits )
The thing is when I first started feeding raw, frankenprey was the order of the day. You create a whole beastie from the various parts that are available. We didn't have commercial food, we were the nut cases that were going to kill our pets by feeding them chicken bones and raw meat and eggs. Things have gone so far now, that it's become convenient and you need only order your raw food and it comes in little convenient packages when I first started feeding raw, that wasn't the case. I used to hand grind my chicken carcasses so that I could feed ground bone to my cats. You learned by observation how to balance your furkids diet so that it was appropriate for each of your furkids.
Keep asking questions, you can feed your smaller carnivores on the meat that you have available. You can give them a better diet than the kibbles they're eating. You have that ability, don't let anyone tell you otherwise. If you can create a good diet for your dog, you can do the same thing for your cats and ferrets .
ciao