</font><blockquote><font class="small">Quote:</font><hr />
For the foreseeable future, in my judgment, experimentation/research with captive glider
diets is going to have to be carried out by the members of the glider community. It probably isn't reasonable to expect that much work is going to be done by the by the scientific community. It was like pulling teeth to accumulate a small fund to finance the GC study and we are still waiting on the detailed results of that study.
<hr /></blockquote><font class="post"> I totally agree with this. That's why I always wondered why it was suggested that
diet studies be left up to the professionals. I haven't seen much work on
diet come out of any "professionals"
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I hope that folks who choose to experiment with glider
diets do in a studied and disciplined fashion and keep their work out of the realm of the general community until it has been reasonably well proven
<hr /></blockquote><font class="post"> I just wonder what constitutes reasonably well proven? It has been said that Priscilla's
diet is not proven(which I do not agree with), and she has many many gliders that are obviously reproducing quite well and staying healthy. I'm just not sure what we as a community expect to see?
What should we use as goals to rate whether or not a
diet is successful and doing well?
Also, what are the problems that we see with current
diets, and in what ways should we look to improve future
diets?
As far as my dietary experimentation is concerned. I left my
diet out of the public realm for a year while I used it and kept tabs on the health of my breeding gliders and their joeys. I'm not sure what has been done with other
diets....
Everyone holds BML in such high esteem, but I'm curious, did it have any sort of incubation period where it was tested and evaluated prior to use?
This isn't to say that there wouldn't be any benefit from approaching
diet in this way. It would be optimal to be able to test a
diet in a controlled situation for a number of years before releasing it to prevent the possibility of "bad" info that might be absorbed by newbies, but I don't really think it's entirely realistic at this point. I don't know of anyone who has enough gliders or the time or the money or the patience to do such a thing and on top of it all not whisper a word to the glider community. The only people that you hear stating that their
diet has undergone clinical feeding trials are people that market glider pellets, lol, so you've gotta wonder how much they really know?
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I have to agree with Randy about just anyone jumping on the wagon and useing Big Ern's
diet. As BE stated his
diet is in the developing stages. Apparently he has done and is still doing research on it's effects.
<hr /></blockquote><font class="post">
I don't recall Randy ever stating this?
I'm sure it has been implied......
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just like to see that any dietary experimentation is done in a reasonably disciplined fashion as opposed to the "shotgun" approach used by some
<hr /></blockquote><font class="post">
Maybe this is what you may be thinking of?
lol, "shotgun approach" would probably not be an accurate way to describe the manner in which I approached my
diet, so I would think that Randy wasn't referring to me...
Titling my approach a "shotgun approach" would be a bit of an unfair assumption wouldn't it? I'd like to think that I applied some "discipline" to my dietary experimentation.
I guess my open attitude towards modifying it in the future might be allowing my
diet to be perceived as incomplete or poorly thought out, but that would be an assumption and also a matter of opinion since no one really(except for a few people) has the complete statistics yet!
I think it would be less wise to leave my
diet infinitely static and a closed case since we don't know everything about glider
diet, or do we? <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/thinkerg.gif" alt="" />
I also wonder how much "rigorous testing" has been performed on other
diets?
I would assume there must have been a lot, or maybe not?
It seems to me like they(designers of other
diets) took what worked, got some input from some people, and "modified" it to fit their situation, no?
Honestly I don't care to push people into making the decision to feed my
diet.
diet is something that people have to research and decide for themselves
More importantly I just want people to think and open up to ideas that I think are very important...
But....I also don't want to watch my
diet get shot down.
After one has facts and figures and science to work with, then by all means, feel free!
If I were to express my personal opinion, I'd caution against using other
diets, but that wouldn't be right, because what doesn't work for me might work well, and has for other people's gliders!
I can express however that on other
diets, my gliders rejected, cannibalized, and the joeys grew slow.
All of my gliders generally looked unhealthy and ate poorly.
I had to go to the
vet on a few occasions to get some of my gliders treated for UTI's.
My gliders were not very active or vibrant.
Since I switched, my gliders have not rejected one joey, or had to go to the
vet for any health related issues.
They're happy, and active and their joeys grow well and all is good!
I'd have a hard time imagining that this could happen if my
diet were unhealthy! <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/dance.gif" alt="" />
Bottom line, what works for some gliders does not work for all.
Research, make informed decisions, feed what you feel is right and what you feel will make your gliders most healthy, may it be BML, Brisky's, cat food, or my
diet.
The decision lies with the owner <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/thumb.gif" alt="" />