Burgess Dwarf Hamster Harvest

[hannahbubble]

I bought my dwarf this yesterday as it was the only thing they had at the shop I went to other than their own brand muesli, which is awful.

Does anyone know which bits I need to take out?

[racinghamster]

I`m pretty sure this mix has corn and pea flakes in it? Anything yellow will be corn (whole corn and flaked maize). Pea flakes are flattened peas and are green, so just remove those.

If you look on the packet, it wll list `ingredients`. Post what those are and I will be able to tell you more, but I think the rest of the mix is fine. You can add-back other ingredients like:

Buckwheat (Tesco/healthfood shop)
Jumbo organic oats/porridge oats (Tesco/healthfood shop)
Canary seed mix (this also has linseed in it) Pet shops
Kallo organic wholegrain puffed rice (some Tesco stores/healthfood shops)
Hemp seed (Asda/healthfood shops)

But two of the above, the plain porridge oats and the buckwheat would happily replace the corn and the pea flakes you remove from the mix.

If it`s Pets At Home you went to, they only sell the `dwarf` Burgess mix and not the normal Burgess Hamster Harvest, which I use, but I still have to pick out three things from my mix aswell, the yellow corn/maize, pea flakes and banana pieces, which my syrian hamster gets instead!

[Silver]

I just thought I would add a link to the Dwarf hamster mix's I have made. This Basic Dwarf Hamster Mix is especially made for diabetes prone dwarf hamsters which are any dwarf hamster brought from a pet shop as well as Chinese.

Dwarf Hamster - Basic - £1.91 : ratRations.com (http://www.ratrations.com/dwarf-hamster-basic-p-930.html)

With this mix you do not have to take anything out so you know the hammy is getting the correct amount of Protein/fat/fibre. If you take things out of a dwarf hamster mix & add things into it you have no idea if it has the correct amount of Protein/fat/fibre your just guessing.

I get no money from the sale of these mix's so im not promoting it for my gain just the hammy's xxxx

[racinghamster]

Silver, I find ordering from Rat Rations can be pricey if just ordering one bag of something. I wanted to order a few things from the site but their P&P seems to outweigh the cost for me, which is why I buy alternatives locally if I can. It`s really the only way to replace some of the grains that need removed for the safety of diabetic prone hamters. It`s a balance really of finding out what the similarities are between corn and an alternative ingredient, so finding something that has the same or similar nutrients is sufficient. So it puts some of that balance back without depleting the mix. I`ve always done this even when I kept mice and rats and never had any issues. As long as the food is low in fat and higher in fibre with no added sugar, it should be fine.

[hannahbubble]

I found this also, I wanted to buy some of your mix but the postage was a lot for that one bag.

[Silver]

I agree the postage is expensive something I have no control over as it's not my business. What people have done me including is buy in bulk. Buy the smallest packet first to see if the hammy likes it & then buy in bulk.

RH,

I agree researching what to add back into the mix is fab, but unless you pay for your mix to be analysed then you really don't know what Fat/fibre/protein you are feeding your hammy's.

That's one of the reasons why I made this mix so people didn't have to guess anymore.

[racinghamster]

I do understand that a mix as a `whole` should be balanced, but if for example all the corn, maize and pea flakes were removed from a mix, you can then place these removed grains on a kitchen scale to read what overall weight has been removed and then weigh the same amount of another grain or two different grains in two parts and place these on the scale to get the same weight, so you can then add these to your mix as an alternative. The grains that replace the corn/maize and pea flakes may not be nutritionally exactly the same as the removed grains, but they will be healthier and probably more beneficial in the long term.

Buckwheat for example has had studies done on it with lab rats who were genetically manipulated to get diabetes (type 1 and 2) and the buckwheat trials proved beneficial to the rats fed buckwheat in regulating their blood sugars, but not the placebo fed rats. Buckwheat is not related to wheat either and is gluten free.

The shunamite diet for rats as an example is not a `balanced science`, but many rat owners prefer making their own mixes up rather than relying on basic rat foods, which can contain animal/vegetable derivitives and GM corn. Corn starts to turn to glucose the minute it is picked, which is why it should never be fed to diabetic prone species.

I basically weigh up the risks of replacing certain grains that I feed my two hamsters and am confident that the four or five `human grade` grains I use to replace the ones I know are potentially harmful, are the right choice.

These are (just incase anyone is interested):

Kallo organic wholegrain puffed rice (plain - not the honey coated one!)
Tesco organic jumbo oats
Buckwheat
Plain budgie millet and also Canary seed mix, which usually contains linseed, which is good for the coat.
Hemp seed

There are others I am currently looking at but have yet to decide on whether I need to add these or not. Variety is the most important thing when feeding small rodents and keeping them interested in their food. Moreso when they are ill or old. So switching a few ingredients from time to time, or rotating a mix can give them a new interest also.

Just to end, if you look at what`s in a hamster mix, there is often much similarities between mixes, with a few differences. Some will have lower or higher protein or fat/fibre content, but as you rightly pointed out Silver, you have to work out nutritionally the percentages in all of these ingredients, but percentages can also be added in volume, which can mean one cupful` of one thing and five of another. So unless we have a nutritionist`s brain, making a mix using volume is the easiest way, rather than trying to work out percentages. I don`t think there are many owners who would have that kind of knowledge anyway. In the rat world, it`s done through volume and adapted during the animals lifespan to account for low protein in older age, or souped up if the rat has a certain illness.

It`s really up to the owner`s own decision as to whether they want to make those changes, but in the case of the chinese hamster and diabetic prone Russian types, I would say it`s the best move you can make.

[Silver]

RH you said

but as you rightly pointed out Silver, you have to work out nutritionally the percentages in all of these ingredients, but percentages can also be added in volume, which can mean one cupful` of one thing and five of another. So unless we have a nutritionist`s brain, making a mix using volume is the easiest way, rather than trying to work out percentages.

This is wrong. When I started out making my mix's I went with the German websites that have been mixing there hamster food for many many years. I went with there "system" of a % of each group I.E Fat/Protein/Fibre which was made up from a selection of grains/seeds for each one.

Then people wanted to know what the analysis of the mix was. I had it analysed & im sorry to say that the fibre was very low, & the fat was too high despite this food being fed to many hammys for many years when you broke it down it was not at acceptable levels to feed hammy's a balanced diet every day. This was one of the reasons why it took me so long to make the mix's because I had to in effect start again, lowering some seeds/grains in the fat catagory & add more protein to get the correct levels.

To get the exact levels right it came down to changing 1g of a seed/grain or adding 2g of another, that's how fine the mix has to be to get the correct levels.

So I will have to disagree there with you RH xxx

[racinghamster]

Ah right, so you mean the weight or volume of each ingredient doesn`t have to be `balanced`? What I mean is, you look at the fattier content and add less of that and more of the things that have more protein and fibre? So your % of grains is thought through by looking at their `nutritional balance`, rather than just their weight in volume? I think that`s what you mean!

By the way, I`m only posting what I do personally with my mix to answer hannahbubble`s question about removing a few of the grains from her dwarf Burgess mix and give some ideas about what she might want to swap for those removals. I totally appreciate your mixes are far better than anything shop bought Silver and if they were available commercially, I would be in the queue to buy them! I`m just giving some simple ideas for replacements of grains that have to be taken away and what might replace these. I`m in no way saying I have worked out their `nutritional balance`, but merely looked at these other grains are good alternatives for anyone who may be having problems finding altarnatives to add and can find locally in their supermarkets, healthfood shops and pet shops. :)

[Silver]

That's right RH ;)

I understand why you & others give this advice & I understand that it's because you & others have had good results with these mix's, but I think it would be better if added onto someone's post that the mix of extra seeds/grains & taking out of seeds/grains is not a analysed mix like the commercial ones or mine are.

I would love to be able to get a commercial pet food manufacturer making my mix's & who knows perhaps one will become interested once they can see they are popular & are what people want xxx

[racinghamster]

Good point Silver. I`ve overlooked adding that information when I have posted about removing and adding, so from now on, I will state that by doing this, it is not wholly nutritionally worked out, but basically removing and replacing. So not an exact science so to speak.

I really wish the larger manufacturers would take on board your ideas Silver. They really should know (or be advised) that some of the grains they are adding to their commercial mixes could so easily damage a hamsters life by contributing to it`s diabetes (if it`s one of the susceptible species) and it would make commercial sense to ommit the corn, maize, peas and flakes they currently use and replace those with safer alternatives that have the same or similar nutritional values? I`m surprised that they don`t realise there is a need for this given that they supposedly use `science fact` to produce their so called healthy diets. They obviously don`t know (or don`t care) that some species like the chinese and the Campbells Russian/hybrid cannot (or should not) have sugar in their diet, even though carbohydrates are essentially turned to sugar in the body, these are not as harmful as something that is proven to be glucose forming like corn/maize.

They continually churn out new foods, yet they STILL contain the bulky starchy grains that we are fed up seeing on mixes.

[Silver]

Agreed RH xxx