I feed my kids.... Raven who I got at about a month old a year ago last week,   and his Grilfriend Starling whom I adopted from Father Natures Ferret Rescue about six months ago, Innova Evo Ferret Food.  I started on EVO kitten and cat food before I was made aware that Evo makes a ferret food.  Ravens stool was quite loose until I switched him over to EVO ferret food.  Since then he has been nice and steady.  He has not a lot of fat on him,  very muscular,  and very active.  Starling was found on the street before being fortunate enough to find her way to Father Natures, and was still quite skinny when I adopted her.  Although she eats up a storm she has averaged her weight out at about two pounds.  Her stool does keep bouncing back and forth from semi solid to quite loose,  but over all is doing great.  Her coat went from very course to soft as a pillow.  The reason I use the EVO is because from what I found it's as close to a raw diet as you can get without actually going raw.  It's also the most palatable food I have found so far.  It's a minimun 50% protein and no grain.  Of all the foods its the closest I can find to what I figured you would find in the wild.  I chose not to feed a raw diet for them because in all honesty I don't trust pet food companies.  If the meat isn't frozen right or treated right who knows what kind of parasite and bacteria and such we may be feeding our kids. 

Eagle pack, which is another holistic company, has recently introduced ferret food and I am still trying to get it from my distrubitor to try it out, but so far am unsuccessful.  If anyone has tried it please let me know how it worked out, and also what you feel is the best food to giving them. 

Wish that I can be in some other time and place..... with someone else's soul..... Someone else's face

Although my two older adopted ferrets are confirmed kibble eaters, they will snack on whole prey and meaty bone items.

Being as there aren't, as of yet, any studies done to prove ferret nutritional requirements, all the kibble manufacturer's claims of being "nutritionally complete" are in fact lies. How can something be labeled as "cpmplete" if the requirements are unknown?

Also, in order to formulate a kibble some sort of starchy binder is almost always used, this is often corn, rice or potato - plant products which the ferret's carnivorous system wasnn't designed to digest.

I checked out the ingredient list on Innova Evo ferret and they claim their product "mimics" the natural carnivorous diet; yet their ferret food lists several plant products as ingredients: potatos, carrots, apples, tomatoes, cranberries, alfalfa sprouts, rosemary extract, chicory root extract - things that SOUND healthy to us humans, because they ARE beneficial to US - butNOT for carnivores!

They do list turkey, chicken meal, chicken and herring meal, as well as chicken fat and herring oil which ARE good for ferrets' systems - I wish they'd leave the plant stuff out.

Chicken meal is better than chicken by products - apparently the by products are the beaks, heads, feet and feathers, while the chicken meal is the organs, meat and bones ground up.

price wise - I don't see much difference in offering your ferret a natural meaty bines raw program diet from a quality kibble diet.

Time wise a kibble diet IS more convenient - but it is easy enough to prepare a rabbit, cornish hen, chicken etc for freeze drying at home and the bloom seen in the ferrets eating such a diet is reward enough for the time spent in preparation.

But the difference in the ferret IS noticeable - with the ferret getting a carnivore's diet being the best.

Yes moving from a low quality kibble to a higher quality kibble will also improve the ferret's condition - but the true natural diet beats them all hands down.

Until some research is actually done to document the actual nutritional requirements of ferrets- the kibble mfrs can continue to make claims to be nutritionally complete without any repercussions.

Currently with my recent new 4 adoptees I am offering several varieties of kibble as well as whole prey and natural meaty items. The ferrets that have taken the quickest to the natural items have shown the best and fastest change in their coat condition, muscle tone and personality change. Their coats are softer, thicker, glossier, their personalities are more relaxed and attentive.

NO kibble can compare with a ferfet happily gnawing on a meaty chicken wing, or rabbit thigh or chicken neck. Nothing compares with the enrichment and satisfaction of a carnivore capturing and dispatching its own rodent prey or crunching a meal worm or cricket.

Cheers! Kim

Josie made me do it! I had to build this just for her! www.vanityferret.com []

As I am still not sure on the pinkies, and other type of raw foods for ferrets, I tend to stay away. I am doing my research on the subject before I will decide.

Proud Parents to Sarah, Jasimin, Casper, Taz, Patch, Beuregards, Demon, Scooter, Stripe, Ivan, Calvin, Hobbs, Nikita, Norma, Eistein Junior, Coco, Bonnie, Clyde, Stinker, Grace, China (Forever Toby- Rainbow Bridge Jul 07, Forever Ben Dec 07)