Getting a ferret, or two! I want to feed them -good- food. Help!

[onedress]

Hey, thought I'd pop over to this forum since I'm going to get a ferret or two eventually.  The main thing I'm worried about with ferrets is feeding them good food.  I've heard that people recommend feeding them 85+% protein.  I don't want to feed them the standard cat food.  What do you guys recommend.  Does anyone cook for their ferrets?  What kind of meat is best?

I'm considering a mix of bagged food and ground meat of some kind.  But, since I don't really know what I'm doing, I'm hoping for input.

[FrauleinAsh]

Hi  there! Congratulations on getting your ferts! 2 is quite a handful for someone who hasnt had them before, they are extremely high maintnence!  OK, for me, I would say that Marshalls fert food  is the best fert kibble to get your fert, tho it is expensive! Im sure there are other fert foods that other ppl can reccomend that are of even higher quality, but they arent as easily attainable and would undoubtedly more money.

As far as scraps, my little Sasha wont eat anything I give her except her regular food, ferret (FERT!) treats, and maybe a piece of cereal here and there.

Much luck to you!

~@sh

[Punkygirl0101]

The best ferret diet would be RAW (Which is also the best dog diet, you can goodle  RAW ferret diet).

After that the best food to feed ferrets is a mixture of 3 or more HIGH QUALITY cat foods. (Cannidae, chicken soup for the cat lovers soul,Wellness,etc.)

[nakedrats]

Marshall's kibble is ok....but I like to feed mine something a bit better quality.  Raw is great, but hard to do, so see if that's something you want to do.  If so, I suggest buying frozen chicks to feed.  If not, I like to feed grain free for my ferret.  Innova Evo cat food is good stuff.  It's 50% protein 22% fat, which is better than the 30% protein 20% fat minimal requirement for ferret chow.  85%+ is wrong- fat is an important nutrient/energy source for ferrets and they need at least 20% of their diet to be fat.  Higher protein is good, but this should be replacing carbodydrates (corn, rice, veggies etc).  Ferrets are obligate carnivores and cannot handle plant matter.  All it does is give them insulinoma and make them poop more.  My ferret has insulinoma from before I adopted her and I bet it's from someone feeding her cruddy food that was half corn.  Believe me, you don't want to worry about your ferret having seizures.  It's not hard to find decent food if you just read the ingredients and nutrition content.  30% or more protein and 20% or more fat.  The first 2 (or 3) ingredients should be meat or fat sources.  I like to make sure there's a real muscle meat ingredient (i.e. chicken or chicken meal not chicken by products).  By-products can be ok and adds some good stuff like liver and other organs to round out the diet and give you a lot of good vitamins and trace minerals.  Don't flip out of it's expensive, PG gave you good advice on making a mix, and suggested some good brands to look for.  This way your ferret doesn't hook onto one kind of food and refuse to eat anything else.  I'm doing that right now.  She won't touch her Evo anymore and only wants Duk soup... she's the bad kind of spoilt princess because she's willing to not eat in order to get what she wants.

[rodent_girl_1985]

Marshalls diet is awful, it's basically the Ol'Roy of ferret food. Believe me, unless you want a sick and smelly ferret you do not want to feed them Marshalls.
There are many sites that list the best ferret diets, and marshalls is always towards the bottom.
I adopted my two ferrets almost two years ago, and they were being fed mashalls. I continued them on the food not knowing any better, but after a while I noticed that their poop was REALLY smelly. I found out that it was from the food they were on, it had too much fish in it.
I switched them to ferretstore.com's brand food, the natural one, and they are doing so well on it. Their poop has no odor anymore, and their coats are really clean and shiny. Plus it's cheaper than Marshalls.

[ferretluver11697]

MArshalls ferret food is very bad. It makes the ferrets stink more too. 8 in 1 Ultimate ferret food is good and Innova. Here is a website that you can get good food for ferrets off of:

www.ferret.com

And a ferret forum.

www.forum.ferret.com

[rodent_girl_1985]

MArshalls ferret food is very bad. It makes the ferrets stink more too. 8 in 1 Ultimate ferret food is good and Innova. Here is a website that you can get good food for ferrets off of:

www.ferret.com

And a ferret forum.

www.forum.ferret.com

Have you tried ferretstore.com's brand? It's really great.

[tattered_teddy_bear]

personally if i had the money, 8 in one is they best food my ferts have done well on.  Innova has been working well though. I wish they didn't enjoy marshalls food, but thats what all of my girls came to me on.  I wouldn't buy it for them, but i had to mix it in when my 2 recent girls came to me.  I like to do a mix of super premium cat foods, as it seems to have given me the best budget as i can feed my kitties the same thing.

=)

[Mis4Monopoly]

I recommend Innova EVO it is a great food to feed. Marshall definetely is a no no 

[JesB]

I feed 8 in 1 ferret food mixed about half and half with Iams in the orange bag, throw in a couple boxes of the 8 in 1 ferret treat and your done ...

I tried Marshalls once ... not only did my ferrets not like it, but it does make them smell worse

Also, marshalls is fish based where as 8 in 1 is chicken based, it's much much better for them

OH ... and the Furrovite supplement makes a good lil snack every now and then



I've never tried the Felidae stuff, or the Inova ...

I don't know about where you live, but where I live I can get everything for my weasel chow mix right at Walmart

the most expensive part is the Iams, but because I only have the 2 eating (plus my hedgehog) the 14 dollar bag will last for at least for a good bit

[nakedrats]

JesB's mix has adequate nutrition, but it is a bit high in carbs for ferrets.  When picking food, I like to see at least 40% protein and 20% fat, as these are the primary sources of energy for ferrets.  Ferrets cannot utilize plant/grain ingredients, so when a food has corn (really bad) or rice as one of the main 3 ingredients, you should know that it's all going straight to the litterbox and not providing any nutritional value.  It's not even that you're wasting your money on filler, just having a lot of carbs in the diet is making your ferret more prone to insulinoma.  That's why other people have suggested high protein foods like kitten formula kibbles or even better, grain free cat foods.

I've found this chart online and it's pretty useful for comparing ingredients of different commercial foods:
http://www.ferret-universe.com/care/resources/food_chart.pdf

Good ingredients are highlighted in Green, Harmful ingredients in Red, and Acceptable ingredients in Yellow.  A good  food would have no red ingredients in the first 3 ingredients, an excellent food would have no red ingredients at all.

[norahl]

I mix 1/2 8 in 1 Ultimate, 1/4 Innova (cat or ferret) and 1/4 Wysong.  The Wysong is very expensive, so some times it's been 1/2 and 1/2 of the first two which are at my WalMart.  My ferrets have no smell (non-ferret people have commented to me because the cage is right in my livingroom), their coats are soft and full, at 4 yrs, have never been sick, and still have tons of energy.  I buy from PetFoodsDirect on the internet and have to order about 3 times a year.

[Serenity]

i want to switch my ferret to a meat diet and I know that raw is the best way to go but is cooked bad for them or is it just not as good as raw.

Just wondering because I have access to a very cheap source of pre cooked chicken, beef, and pork where I work though i'm probably going to stay away from the pork.

I was just wondering if precooked beef and chicken would be a good staple for my weasle's diet.