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So you got your eye on that cute little critter in the pet store.  What is it?  It’s a baby ferret.  Baby ferrets are also called “kits”, but don’t be fooled by their good looks, owning one of these fascinating creatures can be a task.  How big do they grow?  What do they eat?  Do they bite?  These are common questions that might come to mind.  If you’re still curious, then read on.

Ferrets are born blind and into litters of around seven or eight.  Their mothers are overly protective as they spend most of their childhood sleeping in a pile and eating.  Born into a world of darkness kits finally start opening their eyes around two weeks as they begin their journey as natural explorers.  Welcome to the world ferret!

Bringing your baby ferret home for the first time might seem easy enough, but you need to prepare big time before you even adopt your new pet.  You should have bought a big enough cage with all of the necessary home fixins ready inside.  The cage should be airy – no aquariums! – and have solid flooring.  There should be a ferret hammock or bed available for your ferret to sleep in.  A few old towels or sweaters make excellent beds!  A litter pan, food, water and a couple of toys round out the list. 

Like adults, baby ferrets need to eat.  But a ferret’s diet is a little different.  They need a diet containing of mostly fats and meat based protein.  You usually can find specialized ferret food in your pet store or online, but a good high quality can food that is made up of at least 30% protein and 20% fat should do.  If you have a baby ferret, you should soak the food in water until it’s soft before feeding.  It’s also a really good idea to start mixing and trying out different foods, so your ferret will not be too finicky in the future.  Ferrets eat in small amounts multiple times a day.  Always have fresh food and water available at all times.  A good food and water dispenser can make it easier for you, but if you do use bowls, make sure that they are really heavy or fastened down so your ferret won’t turn it over.

Schedule a veterinary checkup as soon as possible and have your ferret spayed or neutered by eight weeks and fully vaccinated by 16 weeks of age. 

Be firm with your ferret from the beginning.  Socialize and correct any unnecessary biting, they can play rough, but your ferret will learn quickly.  Scruff train him well, this will be your ultimate discipline tool.  Feed him by hand once in awhile and let him get used to your touch.  Ferrets can get easily distracted; so do not feel like you’re being ignored, you can always bring the attention back to you with a new toy.

Be patient and be firm with your new pet and you will be rewarded with a bundle of joy.

All of us have seen or experienced it. You come home and your dog is so excited to see you that he jumps on you and knocks you off balance. While it may cute when the dog is a puppy, once they become adult, it can become a real issue.

Most dogs will jump on people at times. The frequency will vary with breed and by individual. One theory suggests that dogs use their nose and eyes to explore and that whenever they try to get close to a person’s face it is not to attack, but to interact.

If this theory is true, then one way to prevent jumping is to kneel down and interact with the dog at its level. Keep an eye out for excessive enthusiasm but let the dog explore your face. If you have taken the time to become the pack leader, you should not fear a bite by interacting in this way.

In the case of an older rescued dog, or an unknown dog, you should take proper precaution when using this technique. Keep a thumb inserted in the dog’s collar, just behind the neck and be prepared to jerk sideways, if necessary. Whenever possible, use a sideways jerk as opposed to a sharp pull backwards as the dog’s throat can easily be bruised. The movement is not meant to punish but to protect the owner and inform the dog.

You can also discourage jumping using off-leash training. Begin by having the dog stand in front of you. Using a sit command is very useful against jumping but your dog can’t sit all the time. Start the exercise with the dog standing as jumping usually follows standing or running.
Keep a close eye for any body tension that precedes jumping and when youyou’re your dog about to jump order a ‘sit’. At first, your dog will probably jump anyway. In that case, lift your leg slightly and bump the dog’s chest with your knee or thigh. At the same time, you want to thrust a palm near the dog’s face. Follow this by a sharp command: ‘off!’. (‘Down’ is a separate behavior.) Using a raised knee helps to keep the dog off and puts it off balance while the hand in the face both obscures its vision and discourages a repeat jump.

For more stubborn cases, enlist the help of a partner and do some leash training. Have your partner jerk sideways as you issue the ‘off!’ command as soon as the dog starts to leap. As you need to have the dog focus and obey you, you should issue the command, not your partner.
If you are working outside without the help of a partner, you can use a long leash wrapped around a tree or post. This will be more difficult and the jerk may be more back than to the side.
Another option is to use positive reinforcement techniques. With the use of a treat or a favorite toy, hold out the treat or toy above and slightly behind the dog’s head as soon as the dog starts to jump. This will distract the dog and puts it slightly off balance. It will also encourage a sit, just when the impulse was to jump.

Be patient and firm when training the ‘off’ command. Repetition and consistency are, as with any training, will be your key to success.  With time, most dogs will learn to control this natural behavior until and unless they receive permission to jump.

Your pet guinea pig depends on you completely for it’s food and nourishment. To ensure your furry little friends is as happy and healthy as he possibly can be you have to make certain he’s eating the suitable varieties of guinea pig food and getting every one of the necessary nutrients and vitamins. This information will make it easier to learn all you need to know to become a knowledgeable and loving guinea pig keeper.

The main food for your guinea pigs are going to be pellets. Young guinea pigs, under 10 months old, should be fed alfalfa hay-layered pellets. However, right after they reach 10 months of age you’ll want to switch them to timothy hay-layered pellets because alfalfa hay has elevated levels of calcium and high doses of calcium usually aren’t good for adult guinea pigs. A superb guinea pig pellet also needs to be hard and firm, making it necessary for your pigs to bite, chew and gnaw through it. Guinea pigs naturally enjoy chewing and gnawing on things so your little piggies will definitely love eating their hard pellets.

Ensure that you get pellets which are specifically formulated for guinea pigs and it is therefore a complete food, meaning it has each of the right nutrients in it. This includes an additional dose of ascorbic acid (vitamin C) which happens to be an important supplement to your guinea pig’s health. As in humans, ascorbic acid will not be naturally produced in guinea pigs. Deficiencies in vitamin C might cause your pet to develop scurvy. Should the pellet food that you’re feeding your guinea pig not be fortified with ascorbic acid, supplements can be bought in pet stores and can be put into their drinking water. Make sure you give your furry friend guinea pig approximately 20mg of ascorbic acid supplements every single day.

Guinea pigs also love to eat fresh vegetables, and vegetables are an essential supply of nutrients and vitamins. Leafy green vegetables help provide your pig with additional vitamin C. A summary of healthful vegetables that your guinea pig will like comprise watercress, turnip greens, swiss chard, spinach, mustard spinach, kale, dill weed, dandelion greens, cabbage, beet greens, cilantro, collards, and chicory greens.

I have discovered that the best food bowl for your pet is a heavy ceramic bowl for the reason that it’s hard to tip over while eating, and also the sides of the bowl needs to be high enough to hold back all dirty and contaminated bedding. Your guinea pigs needs a constant source of clean, fresh water, and the best way to make water available is by using a water bottle equipped with a “sipper” tube. Take care to always keep your guinea pig’s water bottle clean for the reason that can have a tendency to become contaminated and blocked as the guinea pig chews on the end of the sipper tube which often can backwash food particles up the tube.

This should be almost everything you might want to know about guinea pig food and feeding your furry and friendly companions. For anyone who is new to caring for guinea pigs then there are a lot of things you’ll want to understand about guinea pig care. So, click here now to pick up even more tips to ensure excellent guinea pig health.

Having a cat in the household is a very rewarding experience for cat owners, however sometimes behavioral problems such as biting can leave owners frustrated. If you have a cat that is more aggressive than you would like him to be, and you need to find out how to stop cat biting, then the following methods can help you to break kitty from this terrible habit.

Try these techniques to break kitty from her bad habit and learn how to stop cat biting:

1.) – If your cat is biting your hand do not pull away from her, instead push your hand towards her.
2.) – When your cat bites you, make a loud noise by pounding your hand on a hard surface while firmly saying “No”.
3.) – Blow air into your cat’s face.
4.) – After your cat has bitten you, put him in “time out” by placing him in a room by himself for about 5 minutes. The bathroom works good for this.

The above methods work very well for many cat owners that want to know how to stop cat biting. If you have already tried these methods and similar ones like it and you haven’t had the results you are looking for, then your cat may need behavior training. There are cats that are more aggressive by nature and they will need more advanced training to learn that this is not acceptable.

The concept behind behavioral training is understanding how cats think and what drives their actions. By learning this you can control your cats aggression and find out how to stop cat biting and other bad behaviors.

Your cat will learn how to associate certain behaviors with certain outcomes and you will be able to teach them this once you understand how they think. It is not difficult to learn how to stop cat biting for good and you and your cat will be happier once this unacceptable behavior is taken care of.

Feeding a dog should be taken with seriousness and a careful eye in reading ingredients and a strong backing of nutrient knowledge. Whatever food is given to the dog will later on manifest itself either through a healthy response of strength and energy or a downward turn of weakness and poor appearance. As people are concerned with what goes into their bodies, the same should carry to their pets. Probably the very basic rule of feeding a dog is “do not feed your dog something you would not eat yourself.” Although it must be kept in mind that not all human foods are good for dogs.

Scanning or going over the small print of ingredients on canned products may be helpful to a certain point but it would even be better to know what should go into a healthy meal.  Experts have come to a consensus that the best ratio of food is 40% meats, 50% veggies and 10% carbohydrates or even grains. Meats found in canned goods have already been pre-cooked and contain the protein needed by dogs. One must take note of what brands are certified by the animal health ministry of what should or should not be in dog food. Some cheaper brands may throw chicken beaks into the mix which is considered to be indigestible. Cheaper foods are known to add fillers to give more weight and volume into the cans but these fillers may consist of other foods that dogs may be allergic to such as corn or wheat. Grains are much more preferred due to its optimum fiber content to meet the digestive needs. Again, careful reading of the ingredients is needed for the first items may be meats but if careless owners just toss it in the trolley, they missed the other items that are more fillers.

How about playing it safe and sticking with veggies since meats may even cost more? A sound idea however dogs need the animal protein to be healthy as well as to enjoy their food. Although a vegetarian diet is possible, dogs may not take to it as well as people do.  When introducing new foods to the dog, it is a good move to see how it comes out later on. The feces of the dog should be firm not loose nor should it have blood or mucus.

Preservatives are present in canned foods but it would be wise to avoid chemicals such as BHA, BHT and Ethoxyquin for they may give cancer. Overall, the one of the best advice is to opt for the known brands as well as consulting with the dog’s veterinarian for more additional information that a printed can or media can give.