Just thought I should clarify a couple of things. In Ferret List Issue # 1483, Michael Dutton writes: >Most foods will cause a secondary urine alkalinizing effect (i.e., less >acid). Certain cat foods have been made to avoid this to prevent urine >crystal formation. The problem is that these foods have vegetable based >protein as their main ingredient (c/d by Hills, CNM u/r by Purina, etc.) so >they are not the choice of diets for ferrets. Actually animal protein is the main ingredient in Hill's c/d Prescription Diet (at least it's the first ingredient listed: Poultry By-Product Meal, Ground Corn, Brewer's Rice, Animal Fat, etc). My vet told me it's a good food that can be used indefinitely, if that becomes necessary. For now though I've found some more of the ANF Tami, which they had been on for a couple of years before without apparent trouble. >Hills feline growth is meat based and has less of a tendency for alkaline >urine and that may be enough for your ferret. Another option is the use of >an urine acidifying supplement such as Methigel. I will look into both options. Thanks, Dr. Dutton. >From [log in to unmask] Thu Feb 22 12:10:03 1996 >1) Magnesium is the #1 factor/constituent of solids that "crystalize" or >precipitate in urine - magnesium should be shown on the bag to be less than >0.01%. If it is not listed, call the manufacturer. I think Monica means 0.1% here. All the foods I've been looking at were around 0.1% or a little lower (those that listed Magnesium anyway). The Hill's c/d states specifically that it's Magnesium restricted, and lists 0.08%. -- John Rosloot, Caregiver to Cassidy and Sammy With loving memories of my dear departed Buddy Technical analyst, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Regina Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada http://www.cs.uregina.ca/~john/ferrets.html [log in to unmask] [Moderator's note: At the risk of stating the obvious, I feel compelled to point out that it's not always easy to compute the primary source of protein just by reading the ingredient list. While ingredients are indeed listed in weight order, let's say the list reads "poultry, corn, rice, soybean meal, beef fat, ..." So, the food might be 55% poultry. Great. But it might be 21% poultry, 20% corn, 20% rice, 20% soybean... not so great. BIG] [Posted in FML issue 1486]