From:
maevemoped
Date: 2002-05-31 07:59:00 UTC
Subject: Re: what are people feeding ferts around the world?
I'm not an expert as I've only been keeping ferrets for 2 years. I
live in the UK where kibble is relatively recent implementation, but
generally accepted as part or the main diet for ferrets now (from the
ferret keepers that I know).
I feed my lot on a mixture of kitten food (Arden Grange), Companions
Choice and James Wellbeloved ferret kibble. A new one has come out
recently by Supreme Petfoods which I probably will exchange for the
CC. Mine are fed this freely, but in the evenings have a minced meat
meal of turkey or rabbit. Sometimes they get chicken liver or raw
egg. The meat is fed raw and the rabbit is minced along with the
bones. I've never had a problem feeding them raw meat - it's what
they'd get in the wild!. Once when I fed meat that was slightly off
(I didn't realise), they just refused to eat it - so they have a lot
of inbuilt sense.
The rescue centre that I got my ferrets from feeds whole carcass of
rabbit, pigeon and kibble. They just throw the whole body in. The
carcass as far as I'm aware is gutted left with bones, fur and
feather and the ferrets eat it down to just the skull, leaving
feathers etc but eating some. MMmmmmm...yummmm :-)
As far as I know ferrets in the UK are relatively healthy - I don't
hear of many cancers like in the US. One of my ferrets died of a
spinal problem/possible encephalitis and I do know of others with IBD
type symptoms. I have also heard that kibble causes problems wiht
neutered male ferrets urinary system.
Birch