Puppy Milk

[Essentia]

It has come to my knowledge that a well known rescue has given advice to a pet owner who contacted them about a newborn kit who isn't eating. This advice is to supplement the kit with puppy milk. I was told about this more than a week ago, and I never asked the question here since I didn't want to get involved....but this is irking me , and hasn't really left my mind since I found out about it. I can't imagine how a puppy and a chin are even remotely similar in dietary needs so I wanted to ask the breeders here if this is something that is ever done. Or recommended? Or just outright ludicrous?

 

[tunes]

Some people use kitten and puppy milk and say it's fine. I personally would never use anything other than goat's milk. There are bound to be nutritional differences between a formula for an herbivore and one for a omnivore, and I prefer to stick with the milk that is meat free.

 

[RDZCRanch]

I also heard this story Crysta...except for one extra detail. The rescue told the person to put mother's fecal matter into the puppy milk as well as it contains good bacteria. While chinchillas DO produce some poops that contain good bacteria and are therefore good to eat(cecal matter versus fecal matter) the chinchilla will EAT the cecal matter as it is coming out of their anus...they don't let those drop to the floor of the cage. The FECAL matter drops to the cage and is not good to eat...otherwise we'd have no chinnie droppings to clean up.

I've never used puppy milk but I did use kitten milk before I discovered goat's milk. I found with kitten milk it was ALWAYS a fight to get them to take the milk...the goat's milk I just have to get them to take the first drop and then they can't get enough of it. For Kitten milk I had to use the cans...they HATED the powder and wouldn't even consider it. For the goat's milk I can use powder or canned with the same results.

Knowing what we know about our chinchillas and their dietary needs...it's quite obviously better for the chins to be raised on another herbivore's milk if mother's milk is not available to them.

 

[Essentia]

That's what it was! I knew I was forgetting something about it (the fecal matter part). Thank you for remembering that Tab.

 

[Brittany_Lynn]

I also heard this story Crysta...except for one extra detail. The rescue told the person to put mother's fecal matter into the puppy milk as well as it contains good bacteria.

:vomit:
:barf:
I have never heard of any animal needing milk supplemented with POOP. Even if someone swore to me that I should do that, I'd have to refuse, because there is no way a wild chinchilla (or any animal for that matter) is getting milk + poop out of its mother's nipps.