News

Ferrets Anyone?

Teresa Medeiros wrote to us in July telling us her Ferret Story which we thought just had to hit the website news section.

Teresa writes:

I just wanted to share with you all why ZiwiPeak Cuisine is proving so important to us.

Over the past several years, we have had the joy of owning several ferrets in fact 16.   At the current time, I have 7 fur faces and have always fed them the dry food called Totally Ferret which was recommended by the local "Ferret Aid Society".

While I truly love having Ferrets as pets, I have however, encountered quite a lot of medical problems;  adrenal gland disease and insulinoma.   Several of my Ferrets were receiving monthly injections for the adrenal gland and several were being monitored for insulinoma.   A few of the Ferrets receiving the injections were no longer responding and we were considering the next course of action as well as looking at what our options were to deal with the insulinoma. 

I was not completely convinced to move forward with the traditional medical choices offered and started investigating alternatives.   I found quite a bit of information on the higher incidence of these medical problems in North American Ferrets compared to their European counterparts.

There are different theories as to whether these problems are genetic or diet.   As I could not do anything about genetic, I opted to investigate the diet route.   Research told me that Ferrets are true carnivores and cannot properly digest grains, vegetables or fruit.

I ruled out live food as the Ferrets probably wouldn't know what to do with it.

The pet food stores have a wealth of product available, but much of it contains grains, fruits or vegetables.   I even had one store tell me that it was the same as a wild diet.   I'm not sure where they're getting their information from but there is a difference between eating a rabbit who has partially-digested vegetable matter in it's stomach or intestines to adding a carrot to chopped up chicken meat.   I even tried buying a whole chicken and cooking it and grinding it myself.   It turns out Ferrets are terribly finnickty eaters.

It's hard to get them to switch.   I tried several different frozen and wet products.   None of these were my favourite choices as Ferrets eat often and they love to store their food away.   I wasn't crazy about the thought of coming across week old chicken under the couch.   I needed a dry product so I could free feed. 

I continued keeping my eyes open and finally came across your dried ZiwiPeak product for cats and started using a combination of the lamb and venison recipes.  

After many months of weaning the ferrets off kibble, this is now their entire diet.   I can't tell you how much of a difference this has made.   They have never been healthier.   None of the Ferrets are receiving any injections for adrenal gland now.   All the hair loss has grown back (except my oldest).   Their coats are beautiful and they are stronger, more active and alert.   I have one old Ferret who had quite extreme symptoms including total hair loss, a strong offensive odour, lack of energy, aggressive behaviour, odd fixations and bouncing between extreme fat gain and extreme weight loss.   She is now a totally happy, strong and active Ferret, except not all her hair has come back.  I am  told it may never grow back but we'll wait and see.

Thanks for helping me with your ZiwiPeak Cuisine food for my Ferrets and I look forward to them enjoying a long, healthy life.

Teresa Medeiros,

Burlington. Ontario. Canada.