The ferrets like their egg yolks and I like them runny, too, so we
often buy pasteurized eggs by
http://www.safeeggs.com/

given that the rate of salmonella in grocery eggs is so high currently.
(Website included because they list which grocery stores carry their
product and these are safer for ferrets as well as for humans.)

Ferrets are more resistant to salmonella than people but when they get
it salmonella is just as hard to treat.

Anyway, I bought a set of stainless steel Fusion Brand Poach Pods from
Amazon which turn out to work GREAT for easy preparation and to clean
up very, very easily. Then I learned that it turns out that the ferrets
prefer their yolks poached 4 to 5 minutes compared to raw, so today I
had some helpers, and that got messy! You see, they were not satisfied
with their own yolk portions taken from my eggs. Instead, they clean
their plates very rapidly and then they joined my plate on the bed
(where I was watching news while eating lunch) and they began slurping
what was left of the yolks and then using my side of the bed as their
napkin after carefully licking their chops. So, I ate more healthily,
with even less yolk than planned, my bed has interesting streaks on it
from becoming a dining implement, and we have some very, very, very,
very, very happy ferrets!

BTW, the rate of salmonella found on egg shells and in eggs got so
high that the federal government is imposing a series of safety changes
to the larger players in the egg industry which will affect mostly
the industrial sized operations, so for all but the small farms and
personal coops. They will turn on gradually over several years to
allow the industry to spread the equipment change costs over time.
Pasteurized eggs will likely still be safer because they have been
cooked at a low temp just long enough to kill bacteria while retaining
the texture and taste of raw, but it will make grocery store eggs
safer.

There have already been two stages of some other changes imposed on
the poultry and meat industry to reduce the abuse of antibiotics (and
therefore help lead to fewer antibiotic resistant bacteria) and those
medication changes will actually force industrial farms to have the
animals less crowded because without antibiotic abuse they can't have
them stuffed in the way they are now in industrial farms so it will
have some humane needs impacts, too.

Of course, with the horridly high temperatures and severe drought in so
very much of the nation ranches and farms in some areas are having to
sell off their livestock en mass this years so that will raise prices
once that glut has been used up, possibly next year, and hopefully
those affected farmers and ranchers will be safe from bankruptcy. The
last thing the animals need would be to have the industrial farms pick
up more assets.

For those with pets especially, another worry is that this may lead to
more product purchased from countries lacking controls. In the People's
Republic of China the lack of control over what the farm animals are
given is so bad -- due to deregulation -- that before international
competitions the athletes either need to get their foods from the meats
and poultries raised for the federal government big wigs (and those
farmers do have regulations/rules to follow) or they have to go
vegetarian for 2 weeks just to pass their drug tests. There have been
a number of news articles on this topic in the last few months,
especially in Britain, and you can find them online though I recently
put a link to one in this list for those who are interested.

Find two links for the paragraph above and the paragraph below in

http://pets.groups.yahoo.com/group/ferrethealth/message/17704

Meanwhile so much extra corn was planted due to the funding the ethanol
industry gets, even though corn origin ethanol uses more energy to make
the ethanol than the ethanol produces, that if enough of that corn can
be diverted to the food stream it will help control food prices.
Hopefully, that will happen because even though it would be hard on
some it would be better for the nation as a whole. A recent in depth
news report stated that something like 70% of pre-made food products in
the U.S. contain corn products in them, but did not say whether that
percentage was by weight, product types, or money spent. Corn prices
also affect the price and availability of flesh foods in the U.S. and
may also affect whether companies buy from countries without
regulations. Recently, on both the FML and FHL I carried the link to
the FDA Recalled Pet Food list. If you look at which ones had melamine
and look at whose jerky treats have been recalled you will find which
companies have a documented history of buying product from PRC.

Sukie (not a vet) Ferrets make the world a game.

Recommended ferret health links:
http://pets.groups.yahoo.com/group/ferrethealth/
http://ferrethealth.org/archive/
http://www.miamiferret.org/
http://www.ferrethealth.msu.edu/
http://www.ferretcongress.org/
http://www.trifl.org/index.shtml
http://homepage.mac.com/sukie/sukiesferretlinks.html
all ferret topics:
http://listserv.ferretmailinglist.org/archives/ferret-search.html

"All hail the procrastinators for they shall rule the world tomorrow."
(2010, Steve Crandall)

[Posted in FML 7499]