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Post by animalsgetrevenge on Jul 28, 2008 21:18:04 GMT -5
Two out of three of my ferrets are eating bone now but Ernie has decided he no longer like ANYTHING that I serve him unless its mush consistancy.
I have heard two different sides to bone meal and eggshells, but I would rather feed bone meal because if I bought a carton of eggs for the egg shells, the insides would go to waste! (We don't eat eggs in my household)
I bought a jar of HUMAN GRADE bone meal for my ferrets.
1. How much should I give him mixed with his food? 2. How often? Once a week? Once per day? Twice per day?
And if you stongly believe I shouldn't feed human grade bone meal, please let me know why :) I'm open to changing but I really don't want to waste the eggs when i can only feed them one a week.
Thanks beautiful ferret people!
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Post by josiesmom on Jul 28, 2008 21:43:25 GMT -5
I'm not advers to offering the human grade bone meal. I'd say give it to him with each meal, probably to the tune of 1/3 to 1/2 teaspoonful, possibly more because bone really is a large part of what a ferret would eat from prey. The drawback to the bone meal, is that it will not have as many nutrients within it as actual "live" bone or "wet" bone. Besides calcium there are tons of other minerals in bone as well as protein and blood and other nutrients.
But my main question is why is he opting for the mush? My guess would be an oral tenderness, often seen in animals that consistently eat soft foods.
He really needs to be graduated off the mush and onto more appropriate flesh and bone.
I'd move him from mush, to ground to chopped, to chunks to strips hunks to bony pieces to whole.
You might also consider putting his mush inside the "foraging cups" Mustelidmusk mentions. This can get him using his teeth and jaws to separate the "meat" from the "bone".
Cheers, Kim
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Post by animalsgetrevenge on Jul 28, 2008 22:40:27 GMT -5
Thanks for the quick reply Kim. To answer your questions, I am currently transitioning him to raw. I started the switch two and a half weeks ago and had them off kibble within 3 days. I transitioned to ground chicken meat/chicken organs to tiny chunks of chicken and then tried tiny chunks of CGH. Well, I think that simply pissed him off. My other two, Didjeridu and Ramona, were fine with it and are both eating meat/bone about half the size of my finger. You can read about it on my newbie thread: holisticferret.proboards80.com/?board=newbie&action=display&thread=764&page=1I ended up caving and giving him some mushed up kibble on saturday because he refused to eat anything else. He doesn't want eat small chunks of meat, instead he will chew them a while and spit them out on the cage floor. He will do with with half a bowl until he has gotten all the "juice"/"mush" out of the bowl and the cage floor is littered with tiny chunks of meat. Not a pretty sight! Any way... I figured it was better for he to lick up meat and organ mush with bone meal unstead of licking meat "juice" off of meat chunks. Any suggestions?
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Post by aleronferrets on Jul 28, 2008 23:19:16 GMT -5
I would suggest weaning him onto a commercial ground food if he prefers mush. Many of the commercial raw foods tend to be mushy but have the added benefit of being balanced with meat and bone. A few local petstores here carry Nature's Variety and some local health food stores may carry other brands. What is he doing is pretty normal and he eventually will eat small chunks, than bigger ones and than RMBs - it just takes time. I like commercial raw for making the switch between mushy kibble and raw meat. You can add a small bit to mushykibble, mix it up and the ferret is none the wiser. Over a few weeks time add more and more, until the ferret is eating pretty much the commercial raw. Then gradually start adding small chunks of meat and bone to that, before you know it your ferret willingly eats RMBs
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Post by josiesmom on Jul 29, 2008 8:19:22 GMT -5
Any chance at all that he has something lodged in his throat so he cannot swallow proper meaty items?
Cheers, Kim
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Post by animalsgetrevenge on Jul 29, 2008 18:13:20 GMT -5
I don't think there is anything lodged in his throat because he has kep this up since thursday or friday and is still eating some and pooping some. He also has no signs of a blockage. But of course you asking that scares me to death! I gave him lax this morning and will probably do that for a few days. It seems like this past week every day there is something wrong with once of my fuzzies. I'm getting paranoid!
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Post by Forum Administrator on Jul 30, 2008 15:22:24 GMT -5
Honestly I wouldnt panic, he is probably fine. Some ferrets just take a while to learn to eat bone. Dental issues is a possibility but if he DID have a blockage or something in his throat TRUST ME you would know (I just lost Sams to a blockage...NOT from bone...)
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