From:
"Shirley Hewett"
Date: 2006-12-08 10:56:07 UTC
Subject: [ferrethealth] Re: In appreciation of S. Crandall's timely response ECE
To: ferrethealth@yahoogroups.com
Edward, I think you raise a very valid point.
Any animal that is fed an inappropriate diet will be more vulnerable
to disease of any type.
It would be interesting to find out more about the diets of ferrets
and mink that suffer the disease.
>From what I have learned, no mink farms have ever fed a nutritionally
sound diet, just whatever is available and cheap. There needs to be
a distinction made between a "raw" diet and a "natural" diet. One is
raw and that's all. The other provides nutrients as close as
possible, and in a natural FORM to what the animals survive on and
breed successfully on, in their wild habitat.
I have not, so far, heard of a naturally fed ferret suffering from
ECE.
Shirley
> Is there any way you could recommend how to determine what any ECE
> infected ferret was eating as a constant staple food say 30, 60 or
90
> days PRIOR to the first symptoms of ECE being recognized?
>
> I have reason to assume . . . that the ECE causative agent(s) is
not
> a particular food substance present IN its food, but rather is a
diet
> factor that is NOT present, which were it present, would inhibit
the
> gut degradation characteristic of ECE.
>
> You may have known that ECE is quite common in farmed mink. Farmed
> mink are nutritionally starved right up to the time they are
> harvested. The question is: Is the "pet" mink reared on natural
food
> as susceptible to ECE as its ilk destined for a fur coat?
>
> And I ask also of the "pet" skunk the same query.
>
> I have reared both the mink and the skunk here with the many
ferrets
> and suffice it to say, no ECE ever.
>
> I entertain this hypothesis based on my rearing of ferrets over
time
> (1985) during which no ECE has been experienced and during which no
> or very little commercial ferret food has been comsumed, except
that
> which has been donated with an incomming surrendered ferret.
>
> As you may know the 3rd Koch Postulate has, to my knowledge, not
been
> satisfactorily demonstrated, insofar that innoculation of the
proven
> healthy(?) ferret with the suspect ECE organism has failed
> replication.
>
> Your comments please, everybody.
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