renal failure/raw/high protein

[miamiferret2]

someone said something to me that scared me to death the other day. since then, i have been reading about the whole high protein/kidney issue and there are many conflicting opinions regarding this matter.
this person has owned many ferrets over the years. she lives in europe (england). she cut the kibble out roughly 10 years ago and she has been feeding raw since that time. she told me that she has seen a dramatic increase in death due to renal failure in her ferrets. she advised that alot of her ferrets have died of renal failure and cardiomyopathy. she told me that they are not living longer with the raw and that she is very frustrated. fyi, she does give supplements to her ferrets.
this renal failure issue TERRIFIES me as i lost one of my ferrets to renal failure. it totally crept up on us. heartbreaking. he was very young (less than 2 years old) and we never knew what was going on until it was too late to help him. i also had the misfortune of having one of my ferrets die of cardiomyopathy and i am 99.9% certain that this was due to a poor diet because i was stupid and i was feeding him bad food.
i see that alot of people on this forum either started feeding raw very recently and/or started feeding raw less than 5 years ago.
so I have alot of questions as to the long term health of ferrets and high protein/raw feeding. has anyone else had a problem with renal failure? cardiomyopathy? any comparisons to before/after commencing the raw food?
what are your thoughts on this "high protein" and kidney problem issue? it seems from what i have read that no one agrees on this. even veterinarians. do you think that high protein (such as the 45 to 50% that we see in commercial freeze dried) cause more strain to the kidneys?? i don't want to hurt my ferret. i love him very much and i want him to live a long time!

thanks and here is a picture of little Sonny waving "hello" to all of you. "HOWDY EVERYBODY!"

[jacksmomma]

I find it hard to believe that a high protein diet can be harmful to a carnivore. Yes, in humans high protein diets may lead to kidney and liver damage, or worsen an already present condition (more likely the latter). But we aren't carnivores. Unfortunately, something is going to kill our babies (it's horrible to say, but its true) and more likely what this lady is seeing is coincidence. A good indication that the kidneys have been damaged is protein in the urine. If you are super paranoid about renal failure (i'm sorry you had to lose one this way), check the urine periodically to make sure you aren't seeing proteins. I'm pretty sure there are some simple, at home colorimetric tests you can even do yourself. I'm a chemist so i know all the lab ones, but if I find at-homes ones, I'll update this.

****edit****
www.amazon.com/Rapid-Response-Urine-Dipstick-parameter/dp/B003VSMDOE <--- these are probably what your vet would use at the office to get a urine pH but they also test for the presence of ketones

[Heather]

I have dealt with renal failure in one ferret (for sure), cardiomyopathy in another. I presently am looking at possibly renal failure in Cpt Jack....but I know it's not the diet....Captain Jack and Loki both suffered renal failure as part of the side effects of adrenal. Mayhem was my cardiomyopathy fuzz, my only one I might add. Mayhem lived to be 8 or 9 yrs old....old age for a ferret. Loki was about the same 8 or 9 (his first adrenal attack occurred before I got him, at age 4). I will be doubting that Captain Jack will live that long, though he might surprise me. He's about 7 or 8 yrs old now. We will see if his "des" shot works when he gets it this week. These are ferrets who are considered old, they are farm ferrets who have had all sorts of garbage before I got them. Loki was fed Count Chocula cereal (why? because he liked it , his person loved him, just didn't know any better ), Mayhem was fed cheap dog food (dog chow ), Captain Jack...came with marshals ferret food.
I have and had over 30 ferrets come through here. All are fed a raw diet, an entirely raw diet....no kibbles, no supplements. So out of all those ferrets with all sorts of weird backgrounds, I've had 3. I understand being afraid of these, renal failure and cardiomyopathy but cardiomyopathy is a genetic problem more than a diet problem. It has nothing to do with high proteins. Renal failure can be caused by high proteins, but from what I've been led to believe it's actually caused by the biproducts of a cooked protein diet, not a raw one. I seriously would want to see what this lady was feeding and where she was keeping her little ones. There is a whole cornucopia of reasons why this lady might be seeing an increase in renal failures and I would start with what supplements are fed, are these ferrets vaccinated (this was not a common practice until recently), do they still have access to kibble, and what genetic problems is she seeing consistently in her lines. I've heard through the grapevine of a lady who is singing the blues about these two diseases consistently cropping up in her lines and she's introduced not just a natural diet but both angoras and black selfs into her lines. I"m not going to get into the whole breeding defects here or with anyone, but it's been suspected for a time that neither of these "types" of ferrets carry particularly healthy genes.
I'm sorry, if I was getting an increase in those two diseases in particular, knowing what I know. I would be (a) checking my genetics, and (b) checking for toxins.... Just my opinion of course
ciao

[miamiferret2]

thanks for your detailed reply. you have obviously been doing this for a long time so i trust your response and your judgment. I will continue what i am doing. i'm not going to stop giving him the freeze dried raw. he really loves it. eventually he came to a point where he just refused to eat the grain free kibble that he was eating during the first month that he was with us. so i recently stopped putting it out for him.
I was just paranoid when she said this so i started reading about it. to my understanding she is not a breeder. she takes in ferrets from shelters. could be that her ferrets had ADV or something. it is possible that they all had a virus and that has caused so many of them to fall victim to renal failure? who knows.

count chocula...wow... that is pretty bad.

[miamiferret2]

heather how about this one? do you think it will work?
my husband is going to think i'm nuts when he sees me checking his urine.... i can just hear it now...

www.anytestkits.com/products.htm

[Heather]

Might I make a suggestion, and this is entirely up to you and if you're already doing so then ignore
You mentioned freeze dried...Those that are feeding freeze dried,or any of the other dehydrated foods, please hydrate. These foods have the similar effect on the ferret as kibbles if water isn't added. These foods can be hard on the kidneys. The difficulty lies in that the ferret has to use it's own body fluids to hydrate if you don't. There lies the problem....they don't have any fluids to spare, same as any carnivore they function on the edge of dehydration. They're supposed to get their fluids from the meat that they eat. Just my two cents
If you take ferrets from shelters or do rescue you take what you get, the bad or poor nutrition, the bad breeding, the poor health. I could no more create a statistical analysis on the health of my brood based on diet than any other shelter. I cannot rule out the damage that was done before. It's that simple. I can improve their diet, I can help them be healthier but I cannot in any way repair the damage that was already done by poor care and nutrition.
Are you saying that all her rescues are coming up with renal failure? I would be checking what her cleaning solutions are?? Is she using EO's....that type of all of a sudden would have me looking to tox-screens.
I'm going to let some of our lab techies judge the product. I wouldn't know if it was a good product or not. If I want to test my guys urine, I just get some sticks from the vet. She always treats me fair
ciao

[maddiesmom]

Heather -- always a wealth of information. I really enjoy your posts I feel like I always learn something, so thanks!!


Here's one of my favorite links about too much protein being harmful... I just wanted to share
It's geared toward dogs, but I think a lot of the same stuff applies to other critters when it comes to food

www.dogfoodproject.com/index.php?page=protein_myth

I guess in really simple terms you can compare it to the engine of a car and the type of fuel you use. Just because you use high octane gas in a car that doesn't need it, it's not going to do any damage, but if you use poor quality fuel, regardless whether it is high or low octane, there will be buildup in the engine that hampers performance and will eventually lead to damage.

[miamiferret2]

I give him the re-hydrated freeze dried in the morning and I give him freeze dried as a chunky soup at night. During the day I leave out a bowl of dry freeze dried just in case be gets hungry while I'm gone. I have to do it this way because he has free run and he stashes meat everywhere. thanks for the info.

[miamiferret2]

I would reality REALLY love it if he ate these raw chicken wings that i bought for him. I brush his teeth but I want him to clean his own teeth with the bones and help me out a little. He wont eat it. He is 6 months old and already SO picky!! I had to freeze the chicken wings. Sherrylynne said it is bc he does not recognize them as food.
I need to take a break but i'll keep trying. Is there a magic trick to this??

[miamiferret2]

By the way, I am leaving for work now and I am leaving out a plate of rehydrated freeze dried. I usually take it away when he's done eating but today I felt bad for the little bugger. I don't want him getting dehydrated. I'm sure I'll find chunks of raw meat stashed everywhere....I don't understand why he stashes food. He is by himself. No one tries to take his food.

[Heather]

The need to "stash" is ingrained deep into their psyche. There is absolutely nothing you can do about it. It doesn't matter if they're solo ferrets or live in a large business. It's a survival instinct.
ciao

[vkp23]

I'm gonna but in here and say that I agree with Heather. Something in your original post SCREAMED toxins. I'm no bio chemist but knowing what I know of pre-eclampsia (spell check) in women, considering I almost died of it with my first daughter, the idea in it is there is something with the placenta at the end of pregnancy that causes a toxin like reaction in the woman's body causing high BP and kidney failure, indicated by protein in the urine. I personally was one day away from being in the ICU and on kidney dialysis. And you know what my doctor prescribed while I was in the hospital? Extra protein in my meals. So I got double any of the meats. If she's giving her ferrets tap water, considering what all they put in it, on a small animal it would likely cause a harder toll on a small animals body. We drink bottled water and give bottled water to our animals. Floride alone has been found to cause cancer and infertility in lab rats, yet they put it in our water and tooth paste any way. My husband and I switched our family to a non-floridated tooth paste, and since, our teeth have actually gotten stronger. He has even found that avoiding using as much tap water as he can (because we still used it in coffee and what not) has made his body acne go away not to mention made the coffee much more tasty. If I remember correctly they put more crud in the water in Europe. There really is no telling what all kinds of toxins this lady's ferrets have been exposed to.