FAVOURITE FOODS
| This is a list of foods that I have preference to feed to our ferrets. It is only meant to be a guide and does not necessarily form the best or ideal feeding regime for ferrets. It has been proved that a near-as-natural diet is best, but I need to balance a diet that is convenient not only for me to obtain, but also fits into my lifestyle and budget. It is so important to feed the best diet that you can to your ferrets - it is the building block of health and vitality. You are what you eat.
In general, ferrets need to be fed a high protein diet consisting of good quality raw meat and bones. They should not be fed any dog or cheap cat foods as they consist of mainly carbohydrate. However, quality dry ferret or kitten food can be fed. If feeding meat make sure it's fresh and thoroughly defrosted. What we feed our ferrets. (March 2009) This has changed over time. Generally they are free-fed kibble and have an evening meal of meat. Feeding them human-grade minced turkey/rabbit gave them tartar build up. See our health page for details of what happened, so we give them chicks which help prevent this. They now have a mixture of Vitalin ferret food and Dr.John's Merlin ferret food. In the evenings, they get day-old chicks, turkey mince, rabbit and pet mince. They seem happy enough on this diet, along with the occasional egg and cat milk. I have noticed that some ferrets enjoy raw meat better than others. Bingo really enjoys kibble/chicken soup and Willow loves bunny. |
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Uncle Jim's Duk Soup Recommended supplement ***** I bought this from Companions Choice just to try when one of my ferrets was ill. I made it up per instructions, but it is strongly flavoured and my guys wouldn't touch it. However, this winter has been really cold and a couple of my guys seemed a little under the weather (two of them suffered very bad flu-like symptoms last year) so I wanted a supplement that might perk them up a little. This time I just sprinkled a teaspoon or so over their evening meat meal or warm mushy kibble and it's gone down a treat. The ferrets really seem to like it now and I think our guys have perked up too. Ingredients: Chicken By-Product, Desiccated Chicken Liver, Primary Grown Yeast, Norwegian Kelp, Flaxseed, Micro-pulverized Bee Pollen, Garlic Concentrate, Cod Fish, Lecithin, Lactobacillus acidophilus, Vitamin E, Vitamin A, Niacin, Biotin, Folic Acid, Vitamin B12, Vitamin C, Iron Sulfate, Copper Sulfate, Zinc, Potassium Iodide, and Sodium Selenite. |
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Vitalin Ferret Food Recommended ***** This is one of the best ferret foods in the UK and many ferret owners concur. Many ferret kibbles contains yukka, an ingredient meant to cut down on odours which kitten foods don't contain. I also like the ingredients as I was told that it's made with chicken and not just poultry meat meal (basically slurry) and rice, without filler such as wheat and corn, which is better for their digestion. It also has a higher protein content which is better for ferrets and because it's made with fresh chicken it does work out expensive, but for their main food I feel it's worth it. Our ferrets seem to like it and have done pretty well on it over winter, maintaining a thick glossy coat and no excess weight. Available mail order from Vitalin direct online or other pet shops online, but not found very often in the shops. Ingredients: FRESH CHICKEN, chicken meal, whole rice, herring meal, whole
egg, chicken liver, sugar beet, vitamins and minerals. |
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Dr. John's Merlin Ferret food ***** Due to price increases for JWB, I have now switched to this food to replace it - I've been using this since the end of last year and we are very happy with it - our ferrets seem well on it - I mix 2/3 Vitalin and 1/3 Merlin. Relatively inexpensive food (half price compared to JWB) - but uses artificial preservatives BHA and BHT - there's is some anecdotal scientific evidence that they may cause cancer. Although the packaging states minumum 14% chicken, I wrote to the company and they said their food was comprised of 33% Chicken, 3.9% Turkey and 2% Chicken Liver which sounds good to me. To me the ingredients don't seem much different to JWB! Ingredients: Poultry meal (minimum 14% chicken), wheat, poultry fat, flax seed, soya oil, chicken liver meal, rice, yeast, egg, potato, fish meal, vitamin premix, zinc sulphate, yucca extract, zinc chelate, sodium selenite, iron suphate, manganese sulphate, copper sulphate, calcium iodate, cobalt sulphate. With EEC permitted antioxidants. |
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Farmed and Wild Shot Rabbit I stopped giving the ferrets rabbit meat some while back as we found it too time consuming to mince a whole rabbit ourselves, and our ferrets don't seem to want to eat whole portions. I also was concerned about the welfare conditions of farmed rabbit as much comes from China and France where conditions can be pretty terrible. I am pleased to say that I have found a supplier of rabbit meat in the UK who produce whole bone-in minced rabbit as well as wild minced rabbit with offal - so our ferrets now have bunny back on the menu. I contacted them and they said that the rabbit welfare is important to them - I've seen no photographic evidence but they said that their rabbits had a chance to move around in groups - which is far more space than most farmed rabbit! I am very happy with the quaility and would far prefer to use this than the Prize Choice pet mince whose quality/freshness isn't that great in my opinion. Try it yourself at www.woldsway.co.uk |
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Day Old Chicks These are a by-product of the poultry industry where cockerals aren't needed and are culled. They are sold specifically for the pet trade and can be found in better or larger pet stores in frozen bags quite cheaply. Do not feed chicks exclusively as they do not contain all that is necessary for a balanced diet. We now feed chicks and all of the ferrets love them. We needed to feed the ferrets something to stop tartar build up and chicks seem to do the job. We chop off the head and feet, and chop each chick into half so that each ferret gets a bit and nothing is left hanging around the cage. We want all the meat to be eaten in one sitting. Other poultry If you can get hold of it and your ferrets will eat it, try pigeon with feathers or chicken wings. Chicken or turkey necks are good and contain the correct ratio of bone to meat. We can't get our ferrets to eat chicken wings or whole prey. |
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Duck Soup Duck Soup is a 1933 Marx Brothers' anarchic comedy film. "Duck soup" is a slang phrase meaning something easy to do. When Groucho was asked for an explanation, he quipped, "Take two turkeys, one goose, four cabbages, but no duck, and mix them together. After one taste, you'll duck soup for the rest of your life." This 'soup' mix is really useful for feeding hidden medicines in and for convalescing ferrets. Also really lovely mid-winter when the weather's really cold for warming the ferrets. If you Goggle 'duck soup ferrets' you will come up many recipes. Our recipe is the easy lazy person's:
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Other Ferret Kibbles Ferrets are becoming more and more popular as pets in the UK and the number of available kibbles have increased accordingly. Below is a selection of some of those available. | |
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Arden Grange Kitten food The opinion is that this WAS the best dry food you can feed to your ferrets. Unfortunately, they have revised the ingredients and instead of fresh chicken as the first main ingredient it now used poultry meal. So it's presumably no better of worse than most ferret foods. So I've stopped using it. It may still be worth trying as they say that the ingredients as still top quality. |
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James Wellbeloved Ferret Complete Recommended. One of the first UK complete ferret diets. Because it's so readily available everywhere and I used to feed this to my ferrets for many years - I have only just switched due to price. The ferrets seem to enjoy it. 2008 - it seems very overpriced compared to some of the newer foods that are available. The good thing about this is that it does not use artifical antioxidants. Ingredients: Turkey meat meal, ground whole wheat, soya oil, herring meal, greaves meal, turkey gravy, poultry fat, sugar beet pulp, natural potato protein, full fat linseed, vitamins & minerals, extract of yucca, antioxidants natural vitamin E and vitamin C. |
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Supreme Pet foods - Frankie Ferret My ferrets seem to like this one. Difficult to come by and works out more expensive than the Ferret Complete. 2008 - this has been repackaged as Supreme Selective Ferret food, but I believe it is the same food as Frankie Ferret. Supreme's advertising: FRANKIE FERRET FOOD is an extruded mix which includes 37% poultry meal, wheat, soya oil, fish meal, turkey meal, sugar beet pulp and potato protein. Vitamins and minerals have been added to make sure your ferret stays fit and healthy. It has two flavours (chicken and turkey) in the one pack, and two shapes - unlike any other food. The two flavours make it more interesting for your ferret and the two shapes help control the tartar which naturally builds up on his teeth. |
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Alpha Ferret Feast The ingredients seem very similar to JWB and is cheaper in price. High chicken protein content. Contains BHA and BHT. Many ferret owners are using this instead of JWB due to price too. I thought the kibble pieces were too large for one of my tiny jills. Ingredients: Poultry Meat Meal (min 26%), Whole Wheat, Fish Meal (min 15%), Whole Maize, Poultry Fat, Prairie Meal, Brewers Yeast, Beet Pulp, Whole Linseed, Minerals & Vitamins, Ext. of Yucca Schidigera with antioxidants BHA & BHT. NO artificial colourants or flavours. |
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Chudleys Ferret food I think the ingredients are poor. I wouldn't personally feed this to my ferrets. |
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Supa Ferret Excel Not tried this, but looks pretty average - as good as many of the others. |
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Companions Choice Many of the welfares seem to like feeding this to their ferrets. In a taste test my ferrets didn't like it and as I could only get hold of it by mail order I've stopped feeding it to my ferrets. I thought it had too much fish in it which might make your ferrets smell more. Companions choice analysis: protein 39% (chicken, fish, egg yolk & skimmed milk), fat 21%, fibre 3.5% omega-6 omega-3 ratio 4.83:1.0, cap ratio 1.7:1.0, vitamin A 20,000 IU/Kg, vitamin D3 1,500 IU/Kg,vitamin E 200 IU/Kg, copper (cupric- sulphate) 16mg/Kg |
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Iams & Eukanuba kitten foods These top quality kitten foods are recommended for feeding to ferrets by ferret owners. The ingredients are superior to many other cat foods and the ferrets seem quite attracted to it. I place it in their roll-a-ball, so that when they play with it the food treat falls out to keep them amused. Iams Kitten ingredients: Chicken (>26%), maize, animal fat, wheat, poultry meal, sorghum, fish meal, dried whole egg, dried beet pulp, poultry digest, brewer's dried yeast, potassium chloride, DL methionine, salt. Eukanuba Kitten ingredients: Chicken (>40%), chicken liver (>15%), brewer's rice, fish meal, maize grits, chicken fat, dried whole egg, dried beet pulp, chicken digest, brewer's dried yeast, potassium chloride, sodium chloride, DL-methionine. |
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Other foods | |
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Fresh rabbit Undoubtedly our ferrets favourite food and the most natural. This is the basis of a wild polecats diet. Many people people feed a whole portion of rabbit including fur, bones and internal organs - this is the best way. Since start 2009 I've found a fantastic supplier of bone-in rabbit meat. I feed it minced or chopped up, raw with bones as this means the ferrets cannot run off and hide chunks of meat in their bed. This means that at one meal sitting I know exactly how much each ferret has had and no stale bits of meat will be left rotting. Mincing the rabbit is good when introducing ferrets to meat. However, once given mince ferrets will become lazy and not eat chunks very readily. Try asking at local butchers - rabbit is actually difficult to come by and probably at the more cosmopolitan ones you might find rabbit, expect to pay about £3 for a whole rabbit. I've also found a pet mince with rabbit and chicken which is already minced. The ferrets will eat this, but aren't overly keen. |
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Fresh Turkey Because I can't get hold of fresh rabbit all the time and mincing takes a while, I also feed minced turkey from the supermarket. They get this an evening meal. Not as favoured as rabbit, but they like to get stuck in anyway. When I feed raw meat my ferrets get really excited - heads down, tails up, chow down until the plate is licked clean. Now you only see ferrets nibble at the dry stuff. Imagine you were fed the same stuff day in, day out - you'd get bored too. Feeding raw meat is not only good for ferrets, but also gives them something to look forward to and adds variety to their diet. I have also heard that people feed mince lamb and beef. See below for how to get your ferrets to eat meat. I occasionally supplement it with a little chicken liver or egg. |
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Price Choice Pet Mince Convenient prepackaged minced meats that are ideal and easily available from larger pet shops including a natural bone content as well. We used to feed these, but I worry about the quality and freshness as sometimes they seemed to upset our ferrets tummys and they'd get loose stools. Once defrosted it's just looks like watery slurry. So now getting the thumbs down from me. |
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How to get your ferrets to eat meat (if they aren't used to it) Ferrets imprint on food types from birth to about 6 months old. At these ages they get taught and decide what makes yummy food. Nowadays, many ferrets are fed only a complete dry food and this is all they will recognise as dinner. It can be difficult to persuade your furry that anything else can be more yummy. Use mince meat and everyday at dinner time, try putting small pieces in his mouth or smear it around his lips. He will have to lick it off, but initially he'll probably spit it out again or act like your poisoning him. However, if you do this everyday he will get used to the idea and taste and little by little he will start thinking that this stuff is good. We are currently using this method to convert Bailey onto meat. Currently, we feel he's a little on the thin side - you can see that his sides go in over the back of his spin - not enough padding. When he's on a meat diet he will start filling out and looking really well. Casper was a skinny, runty looking ferret, but he loves his meat and really pigs out - given enough meat he would eat until he was sick! After two weeks Bailey is starting to take small mouthfuls from the feeding bowl. It is difficult for him with the others in such a feeding frenzy to get to the bowl. |
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How to mince meat with bones The Hard Way The Easy Way |
