Chicken feed as treat?

[RenK777]

Happy Wednesday! Quick question.... I feed our hammies Oxbow's Garden Select along with a small piece of fruit/veggie each day. But the GS is so boring. I do prefer organic feed which doesn't exist pre-made. So I'm going tolook into making my own mix at some point. For now, I was wondering if anyone ever feeds chicken feed to their hammies? We buy New Country Organic's soy free layer feed. In the winter, we order the version with corn. Would this be suitable as a treat each day to provide a little variety? I looked online and found one post that somewhat supports it but I don't know the poster so I don't necessarily trust the source. Our mice get chicken feed in addition to their mouse food and fruit/veggies and they're doing great. But that doesn't mean hamsters will as well :/ TY!

[alpacassei]

Chicken food is not a suitable diet for hamsters. Neither is the Oxbow hamster food. Oxbow’s foods are hay/alfalfa based which hamsters cannot properly digest, meaning they do not get all the required nutrients.

Most US owner feed higgins sunburst with mazuri lab blocks.

[AmityvilleHams]

I wouldn't bother with Mazuri lab blocks, nor would I bother with Higgins Sunburst. The best food here in the USA is Higgins Vita Garden, which has no fruit(which is best left as a treat for any species, ideally in whole fresh form if it is offered). It isn't organic, but it has no artificial dyes or flavors or other harmful ingredients while offering an appropriate style of food(leaning more towards actual whole food pieces rather than pellets or lab blocks).

In the layer feed you mentioned, I noticed that has menadione. That is one particular ingredient to avoid due to potential for causing negative health effects over time. You'd be better off sourcing high quality whole seeds, grains, etc yourself to add in. These should ideally not be ones found in the main diet(in this case the best as mentioned in the USA being Higgins Vita Garden), but it isn't necessarily horrible if they are(it just doesn't add as much nutrient variety).

[RenK777]

Originally Posted by alpacassei

Chicken food is not a suitable diet for hamsters. Neither is the Oxbow hamster food. Oxbow’s foods are hay/alfalfa based which hamsters cannot properly digest, meaning they do not get all the required nutrients.

Most US owner feed higgins sunburst with mazuri lab blocks.

I'm not surprised that the CF is an issue but I'm sad to hear the Oxbow is! I purposely picked the GS version because it had other fruit/veggies mixed in. But if that's not enough, I'll have to look into the one you mentioned. I found the Rodipet line but it doesn't appear to be available in the US Going to reach out to the company and Amazon and see if I can change that!