sick or stubborn ferret?

[morgana]

Gawd, I've only had my female ferret for less than 2 weeks and she hasn't been eating much. Do you think she is sick or in danger of becoming sick? Anyone ever had this problem?
I got a lecture from a guy who runs a shelter. They have 22 ferrets that they care for. He says she will die soon if she doesn't get proper food or excercise. I am trying, but she won't eat anything but the cat food I offered. What am I supposed to do with a finicky critter?

[Absolute Mischief Rats]

What brand(s) are you feeding her?  There are many high quality kitten foods that together can serve as an excellent diet for a ferret, but not just any "cat food" will do.  There is an excellent food comparision chart here: http://members.tripod.com/ferretmagic/foodlist2.html, and it should give you an idea of what foods are good to feed, and which foods you should avoid.  Also, a mix of kibbles is always recommended because ferrets can be picky, and companies can change formulas.

You can also try making her some of "bob church's chicken gravy:" http://www.trifl.org/gravy.shtml.  A friend of mine has more info regarding chicken gravy/"duck soup" here: http://ferretville.net/health/soup.html.

In any case, yes, ferrets do have short digestive tracts, they digest food in about three hours, so you really need to get something into her!  Even a jar of chicken baby food is better then nothing for the time being, and something like nutristat may also increase her appetite.  Also, she really should see a good vet as soon as possible to make sure that she is otherwise healthy, and depending on just how little it is that she has been eating/drinking, she may need more intensive care (sub-q fluids, etc).

If you have any questions, please feel free to pm me.  I have four of my own, and am also close friends with the person who owns that last link I posted to you (I believe she has 24 ferrets now, so if there's something that I can't answer for you, I'm sure she can! ).

[morgana]

Wow thank you very much. As to the vet, she actually was being held at a local clinic until I took her home. I tried the baby food, she didn't like it much but in the meantime I got her an 8 in 1 that she seems to be accepting. Plus, I started taking her for walks in the Petsmart and in the yard and taking her to work with me 3 days a week. She has actually shown me her goofy ferret nature and seems happy enough now. Looking forward to getting her a much bigger cage soon. Are there any tricks to guessing her age? She is a rescue so I have no history on her. She is probably in the 1.5 lb range, very dainty!

[Arlene]

Ferrets are notorious for being picky eaters!  I have 6 and feed them the food from theferretstore.com the original brand and they do very well with it.  I'm glad to hear that she is doing better.  As far as her age goes, the vet should be able to tell from her teeth.  BTW, ferrets, like rats, need ferret buddies to cuddle with.

[Bonnie]

Ferrets are very picky. Luckily when I adopted mine they took to the new food pretty quickly.  However, one of them, Bandit, still hardly eats treats. He was never fed treats at his old house, and he just dosen't care for them.  I've seen him eat them once or twice, with the exception of when I toss them in the food bowl, then I think he might just eat them by accident.

But I've never been able to get either one of them to eat wet food! Most of the sources I read reccomended this in case I needed to medicate via food someday, and they just wouldn't have anything to do with it.

I also read that it's good to mix 2 foods together, in the case that one is out of stock at the store when you need it, or the store stops selling it, so at least a picky ferret will have something to eat. I took a dietary chart I had when I was looking for foods and got the Ultimate 8 in 1 ferret diet and I mix it with Nutro Max Kitten food.  Seems to do pretty well for mine.

DEFINATLY look into getting her a fuzzy friend. I adopted Bandit about 2 months before I adopted Oscar, and I could definatly tell a difference in Bandit's attitude and energy when I added Oscar- Plus if there's days I can't take them out as much as usual, they have eachother to romp around their cage with.

I have this cage for them:

Minus the tubing. I love it.

And, if you haven't yet, Ferrets For Dummies is the best book I have found yet for ferret info. (And I literally read everything I could get my hands on when I was getting my ferrets!)