What do you think of this?

[Hedge_girl]

Nutrition guidelines (http://www.petshub.com/hedgehog/hedgehog-nutrition-research.php)

[PrettyHate]

I think that while quite thorough, some of the information is wrong- and that the layout in general is hard to follow. If I was new to hedgies and was using this as a basis of what I should feed my new pet- I could VERY EASILY get the wrong impression of what is suitable to feed.

It is hard to say if they are promoting the use of kibbles, wet food, or commercial food, and to me it almost sounds like they are saying seeds/grains are acceptable for hedgies- even though they arent the best kind of diet.

The suggested commercial food requirements look alright, but the fat content seems low- and Ive never seen a good cat food with only 5% fat. A "hedgie food" perhaps- but not a cat food- even the diet kinds.

They also do not mention anywhere about other kinds of foods (beside cat foods, commercial hedgie foods, canned foods, and insects) that can be supplimented into a hedgies diet. Things like fruits, veggies, eggs, canned baby food of various types etc could all be added.

Also Im not too sure what to think about the "all meat diet". Doesnt sound right to me. I think alot more info should be provided about what kinds of meats would be suitable and proper supplimentation into the diet. While something like an all meat diet sounds simple enough- im sure that is hardly the case.

They also mention that hedgies dont need alot of Vitamin A (which cat food is usually fairly high in). If they are going to mention that, then it should also be mentioned that cat food is higher in vit A, and dog food is lower in it. Therefore it is thought that dog food is actually better for hedgies than cat food is. There have been other posts where this has been explained- so i wont go into anymore detail.

http://www.chins-n-quills.com/forums/showthread.php?t=62733&highlight=dog+food for those of you that are interested in the "dog food" vs "cat food".

So in a nutshell that is what I think of the page. I would have copied ans pasted the sections im refering to...but it wouldnt let me.

It will be interesting to see what others think of it as well.

[Hedge_girl]

*nod* I know what you mean about the "cut and paste." Rather irksome.

I have the same reservations about the grouping of information (and possible resulting confusion) as you do. I was, however, very curious what was thought of the specific dietary breakdown.

Thank you for the dog food vs. cat food link. :)

[PrettyHate]

Which part is that exactly? Things arent labled on there very well ...

[Hedge_girl]

Specifically, the section under Cat Food was unclear, though I will agree that there did not seem to be a clear recommendation of type of food (cat, dog, insect, seeds, mixture of above listed).
However, these are apparently someone's notes from the presentation that Dr. Graffam gave. It is possible that her presentation was more clear. Fortunately (or not) this is not the primary link for hedgie nutrition on that site. It is just a link to hedgie nutrition research.

Main Page (http://www.petshub.com/hedgehog/)
What Should You Feed Your Hedgehog (http://www.petshub.com/hedgehog/what-to-feed-hedgehog.php)

[Steph]

Try to keep in mind this appears to have been written in 1998 at "Go Hog Wild" which was a long time ago. More research has been done, more breedings, etc... so new information will of course be out to challenge some of this. Overall it's ok information but hard to follow and I would definitely prefer a newbie read some of this than some of the other junk out there.

I think if you had the whole presentation rather than the outline it would make much more sense but I wouldn't take a lot of it as gospel if it was challenged with newer information.