What is the most nutritious ferret food?

Question

I have had ferrets in the past, but they always smelled terrible. I now know that this is due to un proper cleaning, such as the ears and cage. I also know that the smell is due to a poor diet. I just rescued a baby ferret (with a broken tail). He is a Marshall ferret, so of course he is stuck on the Marshall food at the moment. I am planning on switching his food gradually, but I am wondering what the best food to switch him to is. I was thinking Totally Ferret, but if there are any other suggestions, I would really appreciate them. Also, any bedding, liter, or smell control suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Answer 1

You should mix a minimum of 2 different feeds together to ensure your ferret gets the proper nutrition. You should also feed a minimum of 2 feeds because if by chance you can't locate one of the feeds when you run out, you will have the other to fall back on (hopefully). Ferrets will not eat food that they aren't used to. So, when switching a ferret from one feed to another you should gradually mix in the new food.

Anyway, I personally like "Totally Ferret" and "Innova Evo"(Ferret or Cat). Both are excellent foods that ferrets love. "Zupreem" and "8 in1 Ferret" are also good.

Here is a chart comparing different foods acceptable for ferrets:

http://www.ferret-universe.com/care/food...

EDIT: Forgot to add- If you choose a feed that has fish in it, chances are your ferrets' f***s will smell a lot more. Fish also may cause runny poops. Fish is very nutritionous though, so if you can handle the extra smell then by all means, feed fish! :P

Answer 2

I've been asking myself this question since I got my first ferret over two years ago. I'm always reading, researching, and trying to find the best food out there for my ferrets to keep them as healthy as possible. I have Marshall and Path Valley ferrets, so in the beginning they were being fed a combination of Marshall and PV kibbles. I then switched to Zupreem, one of the Ferretstore.com brand of foods (which is now Drs. Foster & Smith), and Innova EVO feline (ferret version wasn't available around here). I then started looking into grain-free, high protein, low carb foods and came up with a bunch of cat foods on http://www.petfooddirect.com I also second http://www.stinkweasels.com It has a good variety of healthy ferret foods. My ferrets are now being fed Innova EVO ferret, Nature's Variety Instinct cat food, ZiwiPeak cat cuisines, Stella & Chewy's freeze-dried steaks and the Carnivore Crunch, AFS freeze-dried sprinkles, Wysong foods, and Zupreem (this is my least favorite of the bunch, but it's one of the better, easier to find ferret foods on the market, so I like to keep it in their mix just in case). I'd really like to get into feeding my ferrets a natural, raw diet, but I think the foods I'm giving my ferrets now are a good second option. Most raw feeders still give their ferrets kibbles on the side and supplement their ferrets' raw diet with some of the above things I mentioned. My basic rules when looking for foods - they should be grain free, low in carbs, high in meat protein, and I also try to stay away from foods with corn, tapioca, and potato, all of which are high on the glycemic index (ferrets are prone to pancreatic problems, so lower GI is better). However, some of the kibbles my ferrets get contain either potato or tapioca (Nature's Variety has tapioca, EVO contains potato), which is why I like to feed mine a mix. I would also recommend Natural Gold ferret food (I don't recommend using this as the main food source though, because the fiber count is a bit high) and Horizon Legacy cat food.

There's really a lot to know about ferret nutrition, and it's going to be hard to give them that perfect diet. Check out some of the Yahoo ferret groups and forums I have listed on my profile, they all helped me a lot and that's where most of my food info has come from.

Answer 3

The person above has given some great suggestions!

Well, really the best diet for a ferret is raw meat, but I understand that that can be hard to manage, and I feed kibble as well. For more info on feeding raw google Holistic Ferret board.

The best kibbles out there are Innova EVO, ferret or cat, 8 in 1 Ultimate, Wysong Archetype I, Natural Gold, Totally Ferret, and a few others.

The best is EVO. Totally Ferret is pretty good but with the other choices I have given you, you can do a lot better.

EVO dog red bites are really good too, especially since some ferrets have problems with poultry.

A really great site to get cheap ferret food is www.stinkweasels.com . John, who runs the site is a great guy, he does not sell any bad foods, so everything you get there is good for your ferret! :)

For more information on diet questions, visit www.ferretvillage.org.

Hope this helps!