How do you get your ferret to eat a banana?

No, it's not a trick question :-)

Kaos is on double dose of her diuretic and, as we all know, diuretics leach potassium out of one's system. That leads to all kinds of symptoms like diarrhea, which she has, lack of appetite (which she appears to have, since she doesn't seem to be eating much these days) and weakness (which I haven't noticed yet).

I know bananas are a good source of potassium, so I got one and sliced a little bit up, mushed it up and tried to get her to eat it. She looked at me as if I had 3 heads.

OK, how about if I smooched it all up and mixed it with pet milk?

She didn't bother to lick the concoction. She just turned her back on me and walked away! * sigh *

So ... I did a quick check on the Internet and read that some ferret owners give their ferrets Nu-Salt so I will head out to the supermarket and see if I can get my hands on some here. Failing that, I also saw that kiwi fruit is an excellent source of potassium, as good as a banana, and I did see a bottle of kiwi juice yesterday so will get that and try her out on it.

Any other suggestions would be gratefully received :-)

I have been in contact with Kamila, the Online Pet Herbs lady, about a new TCM formula for Kaos. She's prepared something and it's in the mail so I will let you know how it goes. It's called You Gui Wan and will help flush out her kidneys as well as getting her to piddle more, so I'll be able to cut back on the strong Western diuretic. That's something I'm really looking forward to!

Kaos also has to continue with her other formula so hopefully the two working in tandem will get her over this hump.

And on a more personal note, I do apologise for being so quiet this past week ... apart from fretting about Kaos, I discovered I have an infection in my recently operated foot when I went to get the pins pulled yesterday and so am on antibiotics at the moment.

I've been feeling like I'm 100 years old and can't get enthusiastic about anything so am trying to shake this lethargy off and get back to normal.

I have so many fun things to write about both on this blog and on my site so really need to get back into the swing of things :-)