questionable foods

[eric taylor]

Hello friends:wave123
I have read that coconut is bad for our little kids. Does anyone know how true this might be?
Secondly papaya, and finally pineapple.
I don't feed these regularly but on occasion I give a tiny piece as a treat. Have I been screwing up all along or am I reading to much?:dono
I wish all of you a Merry Christmas and a safe new year!
Love to all!!

[IrishHarps]

I feed pineapple to my flyer pretty regularly and she's healthy so far!

[Milo's Mom]

Coconut is fine in SMALL amounts...it can cause soft poops
Papaya is also fine, Princess Ellie loves it, but since it is a fruit it is a TREAT only.

I have no idea about pineapple, never tried it (probably cause I eat it all myself before it makes it to the squirrel dishes!!) :D

Merry Christmas to you too!!

[eric taylor]

Thanks ladies:)
I've been feeding it too, When I read that I thought oh crap! Just didn't want to hurt my babies. I give it about every 3 days or so. Pineapple too:) And the way I solve the "not making it to the food dish" problem is..... I take extra with me:) That way we eat together:thumbsup
I also read a girl was letting hers eat pizza!! What the heck??

[Milo's Mom]

Pizza? Ok, I know for a fact that is not a good idea! However, I will admit that on maybe 3 or 4 different occasions of the 2 years I've had Ellie, if I eating a slice of pizza while in her room, she is suddenly my best friend and I have been known to cave in and give her a SINGLE TINY piece of the crust. Maybe the size of a dime or less.

[Sweet Simon's Mommy]

sounds like the beginnings of a "True Confessions" thread to me:D

[CritterMom]

Papaya has a FANTASTIC calcium to phosphorus level - 24 : 5!!! I just don't feed too much because of the enzymes in it ( papain is the principal ingrediant of meat tenderizers!)

[eric taylor]

Lol confessions:) I love em!
This is educational to me. I'm slowly starting to understand the ratio thingy:D

[riefderrico]

Missy is soooo moody and temperamental when it comes to her food. Some days she'll scarf down her HHB and others she wants nothing to do w/ em. One day she'll be all about cauliflower and broccoli the next nadda.

The only staples she will consistently (so far anyway) eat is pomegranate and avocado (peeled and de-seeded of course) and lately she isn't too interest in the avocado.

I do go to the whole foods market every other week and buy seasonal local veggies and fruits. She gets a variety each morning (with her blocks). Last week I found some cumquats for her. Oh my gosh she sucked down half the container the first couple days, the next day or two she had a few, now nothin'. She is a picky, picky, picky girl...

[Kristin Ward]

sounds like the beginnings of a "True Confessions" thread to me:D
OK I confess that I give Honey teeny tiny crumbs of potato chips when I need her to sit still for a photo op:D

[eric taylor]

The confessions are a comin'!!
But I see them as info! I would have never thought of cumquates(How in the heck do you spell that?)
I guess I must say I had a small piece of plain bagel stolen and I just let her take it:(

[eric taylor]

sounds like the beginnings of a "True Confessions" thread to me:D
Every time I watch your video, I lose my emotions! Do you still have him? He has a really strong will, we all could learn from that!

[IrishHarps]

I never thought about kumquats! (that is how you spell it ;-) ) I'll get em next time I'm at the store!

Last 'bad' food that Momo got her hands on was a cupcake wrapper. My fiance and I spent a solid 10 minutes chasing her down and I got bit *hard* when I finally wrestled it from her!!

Lame but I would have just let her keep it, except for it was a spice cake and I wasn't sure if it was ok for her to have the spices (nutmeg is a hallucinogen in humans so I didn't know if it would get her high). Lol!

[eric taylor]

Lol Nutmeg??? Thats why my kids like it.
And the spelling of that just faded into the dark recesses of my little brain.

[IrishHarps]

Oh yeah! People have used it to get a high for a while. Side effect is that it can be fatal! But that is in large doses (you'd have to intentionally dose yourself with it to feel the hallucinogenic effects). But I thought since Momo is so small... who knows what small amount would have an effect on her? I have no idea.... I figured better safe than sorry! And I got bit good for it!!!

[IrishHarps]

Here we go! Off Wikipedia:

"In low doses, nutmeg produces no noticeable physiological or neurological response, but in large doses, raw nutmeg has psychoactive effects. In its freshly-ground (from whole nutmegs) form, nutmeg contains myristicin, a monoamine oxidase inhibitor and psychoactive substance. Myristicin poisoning can induce convulsions, palpitations, nausea, eventual dehydration, and generalized body pain.[15] It is also reputed to be a strong deliriant.[16]
Fatal myristicin poisonings in humans are very rare, but two have been reported: one in an 8-year-old child[17] and another in a 55-year-old adult, the latter case attributed to a combination with flunitrazepam.[18]
In case reports raw nutmeg produced anticholinergic-like symptoms, attributed to myristicin and elemicin.[17][19][20]
In case reports intoxications with nutmeg had effects that varied from person to person, but were often reported to be an excited and confused state with headaches, nausea and dizziness, dry mouth, bloodshot eyes and memory disturbances. Nutmeg was also reported to induce hallucinogenic effects, such as visual distortions and paranoid ideation. In the reports nutmeg intoxication took several hours before maximum effect was reached. Effects and after-effects lasted up to several days.[15][21][22][23][24][25][26][27][28][29]
Myristicin poisoning is potentially deadly to some pets and livestock, and may be caused by culinary quantities of nutmeg harmless to humans. For this reason, it is recommended not to feed eggnog to dogs.[30]"

[Squirrly_Girl_Mom]

My baby tried to steal my husbands beer once or twice :beer he had to keep changing hands and she just kept jumping back and fourth trying to get at the bottle :rotfl so i had to put her away lol i would shudder to think what having a drunk squirrel around would be like :shakehead

[eric taylor]

Lol you weren't kidding! That's so hilarious, I use it to cook quite often. I'll watch what I do from now on.

[eric taylor]

My baby tried to steal my husbands beer once or twice :beer he had to keep changing hands and she just kept jumping back and fourth trying to get at the bottle :rotfl so i had to put her away lol i would shudder to think what having a drunk squirrel around would be like :shakehead
I had a Lhasa that got a hold of a pitcher if Little Kings, we didn't know why she was acting the way she was until we noticed the pitcher. She was sound asleep for hours when she passed out. The vet we called just laughed, we were stressed, she said not to worry. But we learned that she can get on the coffee table and to put the drinks up higher from her.... doggie alcoholics!!

[eric taylor]

Oh yeah! People have used it to get a high for a while. Side effect is that it can be fatal! But that is in large doses (you'd have to intentionally dose yourself with it to feel the hallucinogenic effects). But I thought since Momo is so small... who knows what small amount would have an effect on her? I have no idea.... I figured better safe than sorry! And I got bit good for it!!!
What is Momo? A flyer?

[IrishHarps]

Yep she is my Southern Flying Squirrel :)

http://thesquirrelboard.com/forums/showthread.php?t=32877

[eric taylor]

And I take it that a squammy and a squaddy are squirrel mommy and daddy?
Why do you feed them live food?

[eric taylor]

That's an awesome post! I personally have never seen one up close, and Crystal has guided me many times and never really thought to ask what they are:(

[IrishHarps]

Live food? Do you mean like live worms? I actually don't, but I know the Skuls do. It's for protein :)

[Anne]

Flying squirrels are omnivores. I feed all mine wax worms several nights a week. I also bake chicken wings for them, they eat the meat and gnaw on the bones.

[eric taylor]

Yea, worms.... Don't they get enough protein from like the blocks?? That one I'm confused about. I'm sure not a doc but isn't protein, protein?

[IrishHarps]

They need a lot of protein - flyers are extra carnivorous compared to other types of squirrel. While they do get good protein from the blocks, that is basically like saying "can't I feed my kid candy all day long and just give them vitamins to make up for the nutrition?" Basically feeding protein daily keeps them happy, healthy, and with shiny fur, and is a vital part of a balanced overall daily nutritional intake.

Plus they love chewing on chicken bones... it is funny to watch!

[eric taylor]

Lol then you should post a video for us to watch:)

[IrishHarps]

While I don't have any vids of her eating chicken, I have plenty of footage of her eating just about everything else! Check out her YouTube channel at: http://www.youtube.com/user/MomoTheSFS?feature=mhee

[eric taylor]

Okey Dokey I sure will:)

[eric taylor]

My god girl! you have a lot of video's!!!!!! I see now why they are called flyers, but wouldn't a more appropriate name be glider? Never really knew how little they were either(but mighty!) :D Thank you, now I have an idea of what they are.

[IrishHarps]

Well they are called flyers, not gliders, because there is another species of animal out there called 'sugar gliders' that are very similar! Ya gotta have two different names for two different animals so they don't get confused (gliders are marsupials and their care and keeping is very different) ;-) Anyways, flyer is just short for "Southern Flying Squirrel," which is what the species is called. I don't know who called them that first... probably someone in the 1600's... you'll have to take up the issue with them :D

[eric taylor]

Lol I might be slightly old, but not that old:)
Your little girl is really cute.

[IrishHarps]

Thank you!

It's funny we should be talking about bad foods... just yesterday I was eating pizza and Momo was chirping up a storm in the other room. I go to check it out and - while it usually takes a solid few minutes to stop cheeping, the second she saw the pizza in my hand she shut up and launched herself as quickly as she could go to attack the pizza :rotfl

Yeah I let her have a bit of the crust.... there is no getting between a flyer and her prey ;-)

[eric taylor]

Pizza!!! Heck I'd attack too:)

[riefderrico]

Fun thread :thumbsup

Sorry about the spelling (always has been my worst subject :shakehead). Since we are on a confessions roll - A few weeks back Missy decided to steal my son's mint Oreo cookie! She NEVER steals food - it was soo funny. Came over sniffed it, snatched and hauled butt to the top of her house at lightening speed. I was too shocked and laughing too hard to do anything about it so we just let her go. And on one or two occasions I have caught my husband giving her a McDonald's french fry or two. :jump

[eric taylor]

Lol Make a break for it Missy:D
I've always wondered why the say never give chocolate to your pets. I guess the mint makes up for it:bowdown

[IrishHarps]

I think chocolate is supposed to be especially bad for dogs... something about the compounds in it?

Momo really likes mint too. Weird.

[eric taylor]

I might have to do a search for that??!!
Got the news last night my daughter is going into her 4 yr at Ohio State for veterinarian:) Awesome! She can put dad to work, and not cleaning toilets either:thumbsup