Moths eggs in 8 in 1 ferret food

Question
QUESTION: Hi dear Jacquie !

Did you ever experience moths eggs and larvae in the ferret food ? I am buying 8 in 1 ferret food, which I always thought was a high quality food. I recently find maggots in my ferrets poop. And then I realized that they are moths flying about the cage. I look in the bag of food which recently arrived and sure enough is loaded with probably million of eggs and small growing larvae.
    I hope this does not have a ill effect on my 6 ferrets and I am grossed by bringing this into my house.
         Olga

ANSWER: WOW, OLGA!!!

This letter shocks me!  No, I have never heard of this before.  Hopefully (and I'm sure you have) you have removed the food, washed their bowls, etc.  Strange, because just the other day a friend on my Facebook Ferret Group (THUNDERING FERRET PAWS) remarked that her 8-in-1 Ultimate food was not out of date, but smelled a bit rancid. She was asking if anyone had noticed the same......and I had just noticed that mine was smelling  bit just 'not quite right'.....but LIVE LARVAE AND MOTHS???   I sncerely question the cleanliness standards under which this food was packaged, which then makes me begin to question everything produced iunder the 8-in-1 name!

I hope you have been feeding a mixture of at least two foods...and this is a perfect example of why we recommend feeding a mixture of different foods, as ferrets "imprint" on their food, which means they may not recognize other foods as being food!  If you have, now is the time to toss out ant that has the disgusting food mixed into it; then feed only your other mixture without it.  PLEASE do report this to the "satisfaction Guarantee" contact information on the bag.  Hopefully you can provide the company with ant identifying numbers on the bag - check by the "use by" date for other factory identifying numbers, etc.  You will be helping ferret owners eveywhere by reporting it. Most likely they will issue avrecall and have it pulled from the shelves.

Now, before you do get too freaked out...in egards to your ferrets health and this food, the larvae or moths themselves will not hurt the ferrets....grossl but ferrets are obligate carnivores, which means their tummies are made to eat whole, raw live "meat" of any knd and, if in the wild, a ferret might have a bit of fun chasing a moth around, then eating it...so not to worry. It just sounds disgustng AND it should not happen in,packaged food with supposedly higher standards.

If your ferrets only are used to this food, some ways you may be able to help them eat a new food (we usually begin a food change by slowly introducing a new food little at a time in the old food, lessening the old food each time until the diet has completely changed over to the new food).  You probably don't want to do that in this case....but IF your ferrets will not eat a new food (maybe Totally Ferret?), you can try buying a small NEW bag of the old food and feed it, mixing little at first, then more and more of a new food till you get them completely changed over to the new food.

There is a great list of ferret foods here:    http://mdferretpaws.org/care/food_treats.html    They list their foods with a 10 being the best, lower the number, the worst the food.  That being said, I have found that some good foods, ferrets just won't eat, so no matter how good it is, if they don't eat it, it is a waste of money and time.  Knowing you need a good, palateable food NOW (if you don't already have them eating a new food), I would strongly advise watching ALL FERRETS CLOSELY for a week or two and be sure they don't start losing weight. If one or more refuse to eat a new food, it IS possible they will starve themselves, not recognising the new food as food, so please watch closely.  Do NOT use things like NutriMalt or those sweet 'weight gaining' type foods - they are sugary and can cause insulinoma.  Stick to real MEAT food, NOT sweets.  Some of my ferrets best liked foods are Path Valley original chicken (crunchy) food (careful they have more than one food now and my kids hate and will not eat the new ones), they love Totally Ferret (again, the original adult mix - crunchy)....kit mix if you have babies, it is just higher fat content.  If all else fails, get canned baby food chicken or turkey MEAT ONLY, not "dinners", warm and let them lick it from your fingers - you may have to touch some inside their mouths to make them taste it at first....put a bit just behind their canine teeth (the long ones). You may need to do that several times before they will lick it from your fingers.  This is also a great treat for ferrets....ALWAYS MEAT, never sugary treats...read labels...if it has sugar in it, cross it off your list.  DO WATCH ALL FERRETS TO BE SURE THEY ARE EATING AND NOT LOSING WEIGHT while this is going on.  With six, it is easy to get overlooked with a problem like this...so just do be careful..

My kids have all hated Zupreem, Masuri and  some other highly rated foods, a common complaint among many ferret owners., so maybe not the best to try initially to change them over onto.....but it seems most ferrets will take to Innova Evo, Totally Ferret, and  Path Valley....or, again, buy another bag of Ultimate and just examine it carefully before opening inside your home and feeding it.

Please do report this to 8-in-1, for you and for others too.  I would like to invite you to join me and a lot of other well experienced ferret owners on FACEBOOK  at THUNDERING FERRET PAWS...any member can approve you. It is an open group, limited only by all posts must be ferret related....hope to see you there.  Will be interested to see what you find out about this food problem.  I hope you don't mind if I anonymously share your discovery with those folks so they can be aware and watching their food also.

Thanks so much for writing....please feel free to write anytime, or...see you on the group!

Sincerely,
Jacquie Rodgers

---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------

QUESTION: Hi dear Jacquie !
     First thank you for your time and detailed answer about moths in 8 in 1 food. By all means share with everyone. A lot of people would probably think their ferrets have worms. I looked at the webside about ferret food you gave me and realized that they put  the rice in  8 in 1 food.  
    That is most likely the source of Indian meal moth. That also means it can contaminate your pantry, which is gross. I appreciate that you helped me to figure this out. It was pretty scary. You are right of course  about that changing ferret food to different brand is hard.  8 in 1 is number 10 on the chart, but it looks like that they starting to slack.
  Thank you again and your all advises are greatly appreciated.
         Olga

Answer
Hi again, Olga:

Thanks for the kind words!

As always, the topic of ferrets, especially their food requirements and food availability, is ever-changing as more knowledge is gained.   Thanks to some folks on the ferret group on Facebook, I was told there is an updated food chart....which upon examination, appears to have a lot of new foods that weren't available when the MD Ferrets Food Chart was assembled.....check out this NEWER, more updated version.....

         http://moredooks.herobo.com/search.php?chart=ferret

.....BTW, I have 8 -in1 Ultimate as one of my ferret's foods too, thinking it was a really good one, but upon looking at the new foods available and ingredients lists and comparing to the older "great"  foods, I am going to try to get my ferret over onto a few of these newer, much more advanced ferret foods.  Hopefully you will decide the same for your little one.  There are some really awesome foods with NO GRAINS at all in them!  I think animal nutritionists are finally deciding there ARE better choices for ferrets and enough ferret owners paying attention to what our kids nutritional requirements are to cause change......I was shocked at the fantastic nutritional differences!  Thanks for your question, it got ME looking at what else is available, so YOU were the one who actually helped me this time, and that's what ferret owner interractions can do for our kids!

That's one reason I love the Facebook ferret group.  New advances in ferret care are continual!  Folks get info from a variety of places (no one can be everywhere and on top of every single change) and I am never too proud to think I know it all, nor to keep learning.  :-)  Thank YOU!  :-)

Sincerely,
Jacquie