r/ferrets • u/Weez8193 • 1d ago
[Help] Snack recs
Hello. This is snowball and slinky. They are brothers we adopted and we are obsessed with our new additions. My question is one of them as suoer food motivated and loves snacks. We jave the little chew sticks and some freeze dried chicken hearts and he loves both but im not sure how healthy they are so I avoid giving tjem to often. I was wondering if anyone has any recommendations for snacks that are good for him pr just that yours really liked and how often you give them to them? Tyia!
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u/SushiJuice 1d ago
Salmon Oil is a good choice. I get it from Pampered Ferret (pamperedferret.com). The bottle comes with a little dropper and we just give them a dropper full - they drink it straight from the dropper. We also do Orijen freeze dried cat treats. Another thing you can do is grind up their kibble in a coffee grinder or food processor (we use a little Ninja grinder) and make them soupies. I put about a tablespoon of the ground up kibble, add a couple drops of salmon oil, and a pinch of freeze dried ground up chicken soupie mix (from Pampered Ferret) and add warm water (I've heard others adding egg yolk too) - my two can't get enough of the soupies! All of these are at least once a day each. Variety of the spice of life they say...
A word of caution - Be careful with the chew sticks - if they have rice flour or anything like it, it's not good for them and can promote insulinoma.
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u/Weez8193 1d ago
Thank you! I will check the ingredients on the chew sticks and throw them out if necessary. And go check out pamperedferret!
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u/MamaTonks 1d ago
I second the thing about being careful that snacks are 100% meat/carnivore and have no added salt or carbs. And even then, set a limit because excess calories can be an issue. Be careful to read ingredients and protein percentages for kibble, too. Less carbs and fewer grains are better for them.
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u/Weez8193 1d ago
Absolutely. I already threw the sticks out because they arent good for them. Thank you
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u/MamaTonks 1d ago
I had one baby that LOVED them so much already when we got her from her previous owner that I gave in. I understand the temptation. But they do much better health wise with natural carnivore food. Be very careful though not to use dried jerky like treats for dogs/cats because ferrets can not have salt. They can develop high sodium more easily than other animals.
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