Chicken Liver for Protein?

[heidi]

I have been changing over my Syrian hamsters onto a new food (the Getzoo basic) but have ran out of protein. I usually use KatKins Freeze Dried Chicken, but it's very pricey at £16 for 2 (and you have to get 2!).

I decided to look elsewhere for freeze dried chicken, and thought I'd found some. It's just gotten here and it's actually freeze dried chicken liver, which is super obvious on the packaging, but I must've missed it. I assume it's fine, but always better safe than sorry, right? Composition is 100% chicken liver.

 

[elusive]

You could use it & it should be ok in very small quantities but just plain chicken is better. Does it have any other ingredients?

 

[heidi]

Should I mix it in the food mix, or purchase something else? It would need to be used as their main protein source as they refuse insects. It is just chicken liver.

 

[elusive]

Even dried chicken will go off so I wouldn’t mix in with the main food, if you just feed an appropriate amound they usually eat it straight away rather than hoarding it.
It is very high protein so you only need a tiny amount, what’s the protein level in your mix?

 

[elusive]

I should also have mentioned the vitamin A content is very high in liver, being a fat soluble vitamin that’s stored in the body you really don’t want to give too much as it can be harmful.
As an occasional treat it would be ok but not as a daily feed mixed in with the main mix.

 

[Maz]

If it's to supplement a mix that doesn't have any protein at all then a variety of protein sources might be better. Soya is the main one for giving high protein levels. I don't know much about chicken liver so maybe just the occasional one. You can use nuts for protein also but if the main mix doesn't have any protein at all, it would need to be worked out carefully. If it's just a low protein mix of about 12 to 15% then just additional supplements like nuts, mealworms and the occasional chicken liver treat should be fine, but it might be better to get freeze dried chicken if you can. Wlll they eat dried shrimps?

 

[elusive]

The Getzoo basic mix doesn’t have any protein foods included, I had a look at it but can’t see the analysis there (I’m sure they used to show that).
I know the Mixerama basic is 14.8% protein so doesn’t need too much adding to it but I suspect the Getzoo mix will be lower.
With a totally plant based mix they do need some complete protein with all the essential amino acids so I wouldn’t use nuts to supplement in that case.
Plain freeze dried chicken would be better than chicken liver, soya is fine & most hams seem to like tofu so that’s another thing that can be used & cooked egg white is another.
It is difficult with these basic mixes even if they do eat insects to know just how much of the protein foods you need to add.

 

[Maz]

Nuts are a good source of amino acids as well. Vegetarians have various protein sources. I didn't mean solely nuts, but nuts along with mealworms and other protein.

"Nuts are a rich source of proteins and essential amino acids"

Composition of Nuts and Their Potential Health Benefits—An Overview - PMC

The possibility that nut intake may defend human health is an interesting point of view and has been investigated worldwide. Consequently, nuts are commonly promoted as healthy. In recent decades, the number of investigations proposing a correlation ...

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

 

[Maz]

I also looked it up and as Elusive says there is no protein at all. I think it would be really quite difficult to achieve the 18 to 20% protein needed, fairly accurately. Maybe you could mix it with another hamster food that contains protein, and then supplement the protein.

 

[Maz]

Actually no, that wouldn't work either. To be honest I am not sure a protein-free mix is a good idea as just supplementary protein wouldn't be enough, it would need to be worked out very carefully. It might be better to give them a conventional mix and use the Getzoo one as additional forage for scattering.

 

[elusive]

Sorry I didn’t mean to imply there’’s no protein at all, just none of the things we think of as specifically protein foods, there will be some but it will be low, at least I assme the mix has some seeds & grains in it but as there are no igredients listed it’s very hard to know.

 

[Maz]

Personally I would stick to something like the Bunny Dream Syrian food, which is good quality and only needs a bit of protein supplementing. And keep the Getzoo one as forage. As Elusive says there is no breakdown of contents for that Getzoo food. If it's this one

Getzoo Golden hamster basic food 500g | Rodent food | Pet food

Getzoo Golden hamster basic food 500g | rodent food | pet food: Healthy nutrition as in nature For our Getzoo golden hamster basic food we have orientated ourselves on the extensive diet of nature.

www.getzoo.de

 

[Maz]

I don't think I'd recommend the Rodipet foods any more either, as they have reduced the protein levels to about 11% as well and rely on people supplementing the protein.

 

[elusive]

I was never too keen on Rodipet mixes, I do like the Mixerama foods though, the problem with all of these mixes though is that they do rely on insects to some extent for protein although the Mixerama basic Syrian one without insects isn’t so low it couldn’t be supplemented.
It also depends on the age of the hamster, for an older hamster with lower protein requirements it’s not so hard but for a young hamster it is difficult to get right.

 

[Maz]

I think it's one thing to supplement a slightly low protein mix of 15% but another thing to have to ensure sufficient protein overall which could be risky. The right levels of protein are so important - and as Elusive says, even if it relies on insect protein, if the hamsters don't eat the insects, they don't get the protein.

 

[Maz]

Did you particularly want that Getzoo mix Heidi? I really like the Bunny Dream Syrian one.

 

[heidi]

They have tried the Bunny Dream Syrian Expert, but my boys refuse any kind of insect. I've tried countless foods but they never get their protein levels if their on an insect protein based food.

Freeze dried chicken doesn't go off for a long time, so I have always mixed it with the main food. I keep the main food in an air tight glass container. This liver says it won't go off until 2025, so quite awhile away.

Crude protein for it is 68%. I'd be happy to mix other proteins, but have been buying my feed before from Cowboy's breeder. She made it in batches so not readily available, so I had to move to Getzoo Basic. They DO NOT ever eat insects. I've tried every insect on the market, but it always ends up going to one of my rescues instead.

Neptr is a senior now, I think he is 1.5 years old. Cowboy is getting closer to a year, as he is born in November.

 

[heidi]

The breeder balanced the food herself, so I have never done it on my own. I just can't continue feeding many good foods on the market because they just leave the mealworms. The thoughts of these bugs just sitting in their cages, never to be eaten, really grosses me out too!

 

[elusive]

With freeze dried chicken the best before date isn’t the issue but it can go mouldy so if gets stashed in a hoard you would need to check it to make sure that didn’t happen.

The main problem with the Getzoo basic is that it doesn’t tell you how much protein there is already in it, unless there’s something on the packet, so you don’t know how much protein to give.
If you really want to stick to a German type basic food the Mixerama one may be better & at least you know how much protein is in it then you could work out from there how much of the supplementary protein foods to give.

The only Syrian hamster food I know of that doesn’t depend on mealworms is Harry Hamster but I guess you’ve thought of that or don’t want to use it.
Neither of your hamsters are that old so they do need a farily good amount of protein but at the same time you don’t want to give too much as that isn’t good either.

If the breeder mixed her own food or supplemented another food could you ask her which food she uses & how she supplements it?

 

[Maz]

Ah yes, Bunny Dream has mealworms! According to this Getzoo page, they do the protein by weight and if you wanted 15% protein they say for every 100g of food you'd need 15g of protein. So based on that, if you wanted 20% protein you'd need 20g of whatever protein foods you were using, to each 100g of the Getzoo food. That suggests they don't actually count any protein in their "basic mix". A safe bet might be to have 18g of protein per 100g of food so if there is also some protein in the mix it would be fine if it ends up going to to 22% or 25% with 18% being a basic minimum otherwise.

I still don't quite work out how they can say that though, because you would think if 20% of a food was protein you'd need to remove 20% of the actual food to get 100%

It's further down this page. And if you don't like insects in the cage, don't read the bit about being careful with live insects lol!

https://www.getzoo.de/en/food/animal-protein

Another thing they suggest on there, as an alternative to insects, is fresh food protein like egg. They mention yoghurt but I can't see there's a lot of protein in that. Tofu might be better. Although from the brief bit I've read you'd need a lot of tofu to get 18 grams of food.

Will yours eat egg?