Hi all,

I posted much of this to the Ferret Health List - but as I have not
gotten any kidney healthy specific food brand recommendations there,
and as the food brand discussions continue here, I thought I would
cross post portions here in hopes of getting some brand name kibble or
canned type food recommendations on foods that are low in phosphorus,
qualify as "a kidney diet", and/or will reduce protein in general to
reduce phosphorus. (For MANY reasons I cannot and will not feed raw
live or frozen so please do not go there - I am looking for pet/human
food that comes in bags, cans, or ideas like cooking eggs)

The condensed/combined version of my FHL posts

This is my first post but I have been lurking for 2 years since I first
brought my 3 ferrets home from the ferret shelter and learning lots
from all of you. Thursday my son and I took our 3 ferrets in for a
well ferret check and came home with 2 healthy ferrets and a third who
the vet is concerned may be having kidney problems. Apparently all
three had elevated BUN but as we live about an hour from our ferret
knowledgeable vet and as we got to the appointment early (in case of
traffic) and the vet was running very late (due to pet emergencies) the
vet felt that the distance and the ferrets being frightened by being
in the carrier and in the car may have been the cause of the slight
dehydration in all 3 (we did have food and water in the carrier with
them). But our third ferret also had high creatinine levels (1.5 if I
recall correctly - I did not ask for or get a print out of the blood
work results) so we came home with a bag of Sub-q fluid and needles
and instructions to give 60cc sub-q once every two days to one of our
ferrets.

While the Vet tech did demonstrate and give me verbal instructions -
I prefer written so if anyone has any helpful tricks or advise on
administering Sub-Q I would welcome them. So far I have been pointed
to this web site http://mentisfugit.com/theferrets/subq/

I do have follow up appointment in 2 weeks so I am also looking for
anything I should be asking the vet and/or anything I should be looking
for to tell the vet about if I observe it. But in the meantime..... to
help me prepare myself and my kids..... is this as bad as I fear? Most
time when I hear of kidney problems in pets, the lifespan of the pet
seems to me to be in the span of days maybe weeks, but not much longer?
Is there any hope that with a couple of weeks of Sub-Q fluid our
fuzzball will be better? Could this be a false alarm and at our check
up in two weeks I will learn that all is OK? Is there anything else
that could cause this? Anything else I can/should be doing or watching
for at home?

So now on to my commercially available FOOD question - Currently I feed
my three, three-year-old ferrets a mix of EVO Dry ferret food, Totally
Ferret Active Diet, and ZuPreem Premium Ferret Diet. If indeed there
are kidney problems should I be looking at slowly adding a new or
different food to the mix with lower protein levels? Actually I thought
Totally Ferret had a Senior Diet, but now I can't seem to find it for
sale on any of the ferret web sites I normally buy from? Again I am
looking for any recommendations for lower protein ferret foods to help
with kidney problems in a 3 year old ferret (that will also work for my
2 other 3 year old ferrets who seem to be OK as they all eat together?)

I would also welcome any other advice or comments either on or off list
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Thanks,
Penny in Columbia MD

[Posted in FML 6930]