Ferret Love

Similar foods

by ferretpapa Mar 12, 2023

I'm working on mapping which foods are most similar to each other. You can see this by clicking on any food and scrolling to the bottom of the page. The intended purpose for this is if you're feeding something that has gone out of stock and need to find a replacement. As we all know, ferrets are extremely picky, and getting them to try something new is difficult!

It will only show foods that are the same type (kibble, canned, etc.) and have the same primary protein source (chicken, duck, lamb, etc.).

From there it looks at all of the foods that match those 2 criteria and compares the meat, protein, and fat percentages, and the protein-to-fat ratio. So really, it's just comparing similar analysis but not ingredients.

For raw and canned foods, this is probably enough. These are usually 90+% meat-based anyways, so as long as they share the same primary animal protein, they should taste similar. For kibbles though, those filler ingredients like corn, potatoes, and so on have a huge effect on the flavor of the food.

So this is still a work in progress, the next version will also look at all the individual ingredients and see which ones they have in common.

Just remember though, ferrets will always be picky. Even if two foods are almost identical, they may turn their nose up at them. An example I've witnessed among my own ferrets is feeding the Ziwipeak chicken cat food vs. Ziwipeak chicken dog food. You couldn't possibly find two foods that are more similar. Literally the only differences are in the size of the pieces and the vitamin and mineral additives. But they'll refuse to eat one or the other.

So if your go-to kibble is out of stock and you're being forced to try something new, you might as well go for a healthier option.

How to know when your ferret is ready for euthanasia?

This is not an easy answer, and you know your ferret better than anyone. But I think there are some things I can share, since I unfortunately have a lot of experience with this.

First of all, ferrets don't die of natural causes. They don't die of old age, it just doesn't happen. If you think your ferret died of old age, it probably had some chronic illness that you just weren't aware of. Of course, there may be some rare exceptions to this, but for the most part, every ferret will have one or multiple types of cancer by the time it reaches old age.

A ferret's natural life expectancy used to be 10-12 years. These days, they're lucky to make it to 5-7 years old. So if you have a 7 year old, and it's slowing down, there's probably something going on inside.

How to control ferret odor?

Do ferrets smell? Yes, ferrets have a scent and each ferret's scent is different! I've had some that smelled like sweet molasses, others like corn chips, and some very musky like a skunk! I love all of their scents.

Typically when a ferret (or more accurately, a ferret owner's home) smells bad, it's not the ferrets themselves though.

Should I use a water bottle or bowl for my ferrets?

Water bottles are not great for ferrets. They don’t provide adequate water. And they were designed for rodent teeth, not ferret teeth - ferrets can damage their teeth on the bottles. However, I have not seen this very often. What's a lot more common is ferrets damaging their teeth on the cage bars because they're frustrated at not being let out. So if you have a cage, the risk of tooth damage is already present.

In a perfect world, a large water bowl would be enough for your ferrets. The problem is that some ferrets like to dig their water out of the bowl or knock the bowl over and spill the water onto the floor. So what to do?