GliderCENTRAL

Wholesome Balance Chicken & Brown Rice Blend

Posted By: Anonymous

Wholesome Balance Chicken & Brown Rice Blend - 12/16/09 10:11 PM

Does anyone here currently use the Wholesome Balance pellet from SunCoast as their staple diet? I have been looking into new diets and I picked up a sample bag of this with my last order to SunCoast. My gliders really like it. I hide the pellets around their cage instead of using a dish and they absolutely love hunting for them. Feeding out of a dish just seem so boring now!

The only problem is that there is no info on the Ca:Ph ratios of this food. I emailed Lisa at SunCoast. She was very helpful but unfortunately this information is the private knowledge of the food developer, which is not SunCoast. She did assure me that the diet was designed to be balanced and they have been feeding it to their gliders for 2 years without any calcium deficiency problems.

So my thoughts are that if I use some of the veggie relish and fruit smoothie recipes listed on sweet-sugar-gliders.com and fresh protein sources along with this pellet as a staple, that should keep the diet balanced to their requirements.

Any thoughts?
Posted By: Anonymous

Re: Wholesome Balance Chicken & Brown Rice Blend - 12/16/09 10:27 PM

I use this with my gliders. They perfurred it to the zoo keeper secert sample I gave them. smile
Posted By: Anonymous

Re: Wholesome Balance Chicken & Brown Rice Blend - 12/16/09 10:32 PM

Yeah I wasn't too impressed with zoo keeper's because of the meat "by-product" ingredients. My gliders deserve people-grade food!
Posted By: SugarBlossoms

Re: Wholesome Balance Chicken & Brown Rice Blend - 12/16/09 11:35 PM

Originally Posted By: psyte
She was very helpful but unfortunately this information is the private knowledge of the food developer, which is not SunCoast. She did assure me that the diet was designed to be balanced and they have been feeding it to their gliders for 2 years without any calcium deficiency problems.


There is no such thing as "private knowledge" when it comes to ingredients in a food. There should be a complete breakdown of ALL ingredients and the values of each available for anyone to see. Personally, I will not feed anything to my gliders that I cannot get the complete information on.
Posted By: CandyOtte

Re: Wholesome Balance Chicken & Brown Rice Blend - 12/17/09 02:27 AM

The Wholesome Balance Chicken Brown Rice formula is not intended to be a complete diet. It is part of the SunCoast Diet and takes the place of Zookeepers Secret in the diet.

http://www.sugar-gliders.com/sugar-glider-diet.htm

Gliders still need to be offered a protein source, fruits and vegetables daily.
Posted By: Anonymous

Re: Wholesome Balance Chicken & Brown Rice Blend - 12/17/09 02:32 AM

Originally Posted By: SugarBlossoms
Originally Posted By: psyte
She was very helpful but unfortunately this information is the private knowledge of the food developer, which is not SunCoast. She did assure me that the diet was designed to be balanced and they have been feeding it to their gliders for 2 years without any calcium deficiency problems.


There is no such thing as "private knowledge" when it comes to ingredients in a food. There should be a complete breakdown of ALL ingredients and the values of each available for anyone to see. Personally, I will not feed anything to my gliders that I cannot get the complete information on.



Well the ingredients aren't private knowledge (that probably wasn't really the right term to use in the first place) and I don't see why she would withhold the information if she had it. They have a breakdown of the ingredients as well as the guaranteed analysis percentages. I could be wrong, but I think that's all that's required to be listed on pet food. I assume they could still have their own lab analysis done but I have no idea what's involved with that or how complicated or costly it would be.

I do see your point, though.


Also, I took a look at the HPW powder since that's the other diet I'm researching right now. I can't find anything that lists more than the ingredients and guaranteed analysis for this either. Is it on the box but just not listed on the web? Does anyone know how the ratios were calculated for this diet?
Posted By: hwh4ev

Re: Wholesome Balance Chicken & Brown Rice Blend - 12/17/09 02:34 AM

i feed the suncoast diet which includes fruits, veg. protein, vit.,/min. supplement, nectar and the suncoast
soft pellets and their hard pellet the chicken/rice.
like what was said above they need the complete diet,
not just the pellets.

regards,
nancy in detroit
Posted By: Anonymous

Re: Wholesome Balance Chicken & Brown Rice Blend - 12/17/09 02:40 AM

Originally Posted By: OtteMom
The Wholesome Balance Chicken Brown Rice formula is not intended to be a complete diet. It is part of the SunCoast Diet and takes the place of Zookeepers Secret in the diet.

http://www.sugar-gliders.com/sugar-glider-diet.htm

Gliders still need to be offered a protein source, fruits and vegetables daily.


Absolutely. You took the words right out of my mouth, haha. smile

Originally Posted By: psyte
So my thoughts are that if I use some of the veggie relish and fruit smoothie recipes listed on sweet-sugar-gliders.com and fresh protein sources along with this pellet as a staple, that should keep the diet balanced to their requirements.


Do you think this would work as a balanced diet? I'm not too fond of the idea of sprinkling calcium on the fruit every day like recommended by SunCoast so I like that the relishes and smoothies on that site are already balanced.
Posted By: konotashi

Re: Wholesome Balance Chicken & Brown Rice Blend - 12/17/09 02:52 AM

I don't know much about the SunCoast diet, so I can't help much in that area, but the HPW has a 1.29:1 Ca:P ratio, so you need to feed fruits and veggies with a lot of calcium, like papaya and bok choy (I think that's what it's called).
Posted By: Anonymous

Re: Wholesome Balance Chicken & Brown Rice Blend - 12/17/09 02:56 PM

Originally Posted By: psyte
Yeah I wasn't too impressed with zoo keeper's because of the meat "by-product" ingredients. My gliders deserve people-grade food!


I feed the suncoast diet and my girls love the zookeepers. As for it being non "people grade", neither are mealworms but we all seem to feed those and gliders in the wild eat baby birds which technically means they are eating animal "by-product"....just a little reality.

I sometimes throw 2 or 3 pieces of the chicken & rice hard pellets in with the zookeepers and they love those too. I think it's healthy for the teeth and gums.
Posted By: Anonymous

Re: Wholesome Balance Chicken & Brown Rice Blend - 12/17/09 04:46 PM

Originally Posted By: CalamityAnnie
Originally Posted By: psyte
Yeah I wasn't too impressed with zoo keeper's because of the meat "by-product" ingredients. My gliders deserve people-grade food!


I feed the suncoast diet and my girls love the zookeepers. As for it being non "people grade", neither are mealworms but we all seem to feed those and gliders in the wild eat baby birds which technically means they are eating animal "by-product"....just a little reality.

I sometimes throw 2 or 3 pieces of the chicken & rice hard pellets in with the zookeepers and they love those too. I think it's healthy for the teeth and gums.


Please PM me for the links

Meal worms and baby birds are not a by-product of the meat industry, they are a whole food. Granted they are eating the entire bird, but that is a fresh living animal that is part of their natural diet, unlike zookeepers where the main ingredient is Porcine By-Products. I'm not interested in feeding pig lungs, spleen, kidneys, brain, etc to my gliders. On the other hand, the main ingredient of Wholesome Balance is Chicken Meal made from Human Grade Chickens.

That sounds much more healthy and in line with what we know to be good for gliders.
Posted By: Anonymous

Re: Wholesome Balance Chicken & Brown Rice Blend - 12/17/09 06:38 PM

First let me say that I am not not not trying to be confrontational in any way but I just want to make my point about animal-by-product in food.

#1 - So the reasoning is that if a glider (or cat or dog) eats a live baby birds liver, spleen,heart etc. that's nature but if we feed them a dead animals liver (etc.) processed into animal food it's gross and bad???

#2- People DO eat "porcine-by-product" all the time. It's called Chitlin. Ever eat blood sausage in England or Ireland?? "Natural casing" hot dogs are stuffed into a sheep intestine. All by products by defination!

I guess my thought is that if an animal has to die to feed me or my animal I hope that all of the animal is utilized to its most useful purpose.
Posted By: Anonymous

Re: Wholesome Balance Chicken & Brown Rice Blend - 12/17/09 08:11 PM

No worries. I understand where you're coming from. My problem with it is that they use pet grade by-products in zookeepers, so the quality and health requirements are not what they would be if the food were going to people. Because of that, you can't really compare it to by-products people eat (which, to answer your question, I still absolutely would not eat either). This is what I meant by people grade food.

In addition to that, I do not know of anyone who feeds their gliders quality pork, let alone the left over entrails and organs from a meat packing company. This is why I have a problem with meat by-products but not with things like mealworms (which are admittedly pet grade food) or live baby birds. It may be perfectly healthy, I just feel there's just not enough data out there for me to be comfortable feeding it.

It's great if the whole animal is used and all, I just don't want to be the one using what I would consider the waste products.
Posted By: Anonymous

Re: Wholesome Balance Chicken & Brown Rice Blend - 12/17/09 08:40 PM

I just noticed my post was edited to remove some info I put defining what meat "by-products" and "meal" actually mean as defined by the government agencies regulating said products.

To put it in my own words, by-products are basically left over organs while meal is ground flesh and skin.
Posted By: Akane

Re: Wholesome Balance Chicken & Brown Rice Blend - 12/18/09 07:50 PM

By products that go in to pet food are largely not the by products we would eat. They have often been poorly handled and stored making them unfit for human consumption. Many are the undigestible parts that humans couldn't eat. Also our diets are not made up of mostly by products. These are extra additions. In a pet food with by products it tends to be right up at the top of the list making it majority of what your pet eats. Unless they've also added in the other parts of the animal seperately that would not be at all equivalent to supplementing with a little internal organs and far from feeding a whole food source like an entire bird.
Posted By: Anonymous

Re: Wholesome Balance Chicken & Brown Rice Blend - 12/22/09 04:09 PM

If you'd like to learn more about the pet food industry and what goes in pet food, and the terminology, there's a good book called Food Pets Die For by Ann Martin. It was an eye-opener. There are recipies in the back for home-made dog and cat foods, that could probably be adapted for gliders.
Posted By: SeemsFamiliar

Re: Wholesome Balance Chicken & Brown Rice Blend - 12/28/09 07:39 PM

I like the Wholesome Balance food and so do my suggies.

By-products while not entirely bad don't have a whole lot of proteins in them for the most part. The heart is a muscle and would, but eating brains is not going to be very healthy. The big problem is the processing of these things. They are often left out in poor conditions and may have started to spoil, contain maggots, and contain the tags placed on birds legs or cow's ears etc. that I'm sure we've all seen here or there. If it says "Chicken By-Product" then we know its the organs like gizzards and what not that came from a chicken. It's High Quality by products and meats. I have been told that Chicken By-Product Meal is made by taking a whole defeathered chicken then grinding and baking it. Not so scary. Poultry by-product is LOW quality. Did it come from a chicken or a turkey or a duck or a goose or what? And why is the company that is using it unsure of the kind of animal it used to be? Usually because they get this bizarre mixture from another source.
Originally Posted By: CalamityAnnie


#1 - So the reasoning is that if a glider (or cat or dog) eats a live baby birds liver, spleen,heart etc. that's nature but if we feed them a dead animals liver (etc.) processed into animal food it's gross and bad???

#2- People DO eat "porcine-by-product" all the time. It's called Chitlin. Ever eat blood sausage in England or Ireland?? "Natural casing" hot dogs are stuffed into a sheep intestine. All by products by defination!

I guess my thought is that if an animal has to die to feed me or my animal I hope that all of the animal is utilized to its most useful purpose.


So the point is not that it is a liver or heart but the way these things are treated. If you look at a high quality food label like Natural Balance dog food rolls, they clearly list Lamb lung, Chicken liver, etc. This means they obviously have taken care and quality into consideration and not bought a tub of poultry muck.

The wholesome balance now appears to be using blood and plasma in the formula which I'm not 100% sure, but don't remember from the other formula which contained soy instead of flaxseed oil.

I feed a diet that consists of fruits, vegetables, protein sources and offer Wholesome as a during day/snack food. If you pay attention to the Ca:Ph ratios of the parts of the whole diet you should easily be able to keep everything within good tolerance.

I wouldn't give Ca powder every day. They recommended that with lizards for a while, found that they were being oversupplimented, and many ended up at the vet. If you add TOO MUCH CALCIUM to a diet it will pull the calcium OUT of the body and cause the opposite than desired result. That's why we have an ideal ratio that we aim for.
Posted By: Anonymous

Re: Wholesome Balance Chicken & Brown Rice Blend - 12/30/09 06:13 PM

Originally Posted By: SeemsFamiliar
The wholesome balance now appears to be using blood and plasma in the formula which I'm not 100% sure, but don't remember from the other formula which contained soy instead of flaxseed oil.

I feed a diet that consists of fruits, vegetables, protein sources and offer Wholesome as a during day/snack food. If you pay attention to the Ca:Ph ratios of the parts of the whole diet you should easily be able to keep everything within good tolerance.

I wouldn't give Ca powder every day. They recommended that with lizards for a while, found that they were being oversupplimented, and many ended up at the vet. If you add TOO MUCH CALCIUM to a diet it will pull the calcium OUT of the body and cause the opposite than desired result. That's why we have an ideal ratio that we aim for.



Thanks for the info about how you feed the diet (this is what I wanted to discuss in the first place, haha!) I was concerned about sprinkling on the vitamins too since that seems like a good way to overdose them since you don't really know how much you're giving vs how much they actually need. Although, this could be an issue with other diets since I only ever see info on ratios and nothing on the actual amount of calcium they are absorbing. It's strange to me that no one ever questions this.

Also, regarding the ingredients, wholesome balance uses chicken meal. By definition, chicken meal is just flesh and skin which contains no bones or organs. It also has specific required protein levels defined by Association of American Feed Control Officials, unlike meat by-products.
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