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 meat. 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. (July 2007) This has changed over time. Generally they are free-fed kibble and have an evening meal of meat. We did feed them human-grade minced turkey/rabbit but they were getting tartar build up. See our health page for details of what happened. They now have a mixture of Vitalin ferret food and James Wellbeloved. In the evenings, they now get day-old chicks, pet mince, chicken necks, sometimes chicken cubes (from Tesco) and occasionally rabbit. They seem happy enough on this diet, along with the occasional egg. I have noticed that some ferrets enjoy raw meat better than others. Bingo really enjoys kibble/chicken soup. |
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Vitalin Ferret Food This is a new ferret food released in the UK at the end of 2003 - this is one of the best ferret foods in the UK and is highly recommended. It 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 contained chicken 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. Our ferrets seem to like it and have done pretty well on it over winter, maintaining a thick glossy coat and no excess weight. Currently only available mail order from Vitalin direct online. Ingredients: FRESH CHICKEN, chicken meal, whole rice, herring meal, whole
egg, chicken liver, sugar beet, vitamins and minerals. |
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James Wellbeloved Ferret Complete Recommended. One of the first UK complete ferret diets. Because it's so readily available everywhere I've chosen to feed this to my ferrets too. The ferrets seem to enjoy it. 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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Price Choice Pet Mince Convenient prepackaged minced meats that are ideal. All of the Prize Choice minced meats are carefully prepared from whole cuts of meat with some varieties including a natural bone content as well. Rather than mince our own rabbit etc, for mere convenience we have move onto these, which are excellent and available in many flavours. We feed our ferrets Chicken, Turkey, Chicken & Liver, beef and Rabbit dinner. |
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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 most 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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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 I've been told that the ingredients as still top quality. |
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Supreme Pet foods - Frankie Ferret Quite a new food in the market. My ferrets seem to like this one. Not always so easily available everywhere and works out more expensive than the Ferret Complete. 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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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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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. I can only get farmed rabbit which come skinned with no internal organs. 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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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 |
