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After reading all kinds of stuff we decided to use the LGRS Suggie Soup diet but I don't see any calcium or vitamin supplement mentioned. I have the "Glider Gravy" and Glide-A-Mins from PP. Do I need to get different vitamins? Do I need to give them a calcium supplement even though the recipe for LGRS Suggie Soup has us put in calcium fortified orange juice?
From my understanding this isn't a diet that should be fed for long term daily feeding of a healthy normal weight glider.
It was designed to help underweight gliders
gain weight then they were placed back on a normal staple. So you may actually want to go have a look at those other recipes for a regular staple diet that will have a specific calcium and vitamin supplement in the recipe. The Lgrs Suggie Soup is a temporary diet for rescues and underweight gliders not meant for long term use.
As for the ratio of fruits and veg, that sort of depends on what staple you end up using and what the directions say for that recipe. BML has one of the highest ratio's at something like 5:1 so it relies on the fruit and veg to bring that ratio down closer to 2:1 for the entire meal. The fruits and veg it requires are high phosphorous foods peas, corn, carrots, green beans, mellon cherries blueberries apples.
If you don't use BML the variety of fruits and veg isn't as restrictive because the staple is already close to the 2:1 ratio so it doesn't need balancing.
The ratio means calcium:phosphorous so you want 2 parts calcium to 1 part phosphorous. If the phosphorous number is higher than the calcium number then it has more phosphorous than calcium and vice versa. That is not to say you can't feed foods that don't have a 2:1 ratio... 2:1 is a magic number like a unicorn it's hard to find a perfect 2:1 ratio. The best you can do is follow the recipe precisely and follow the instructions for fruits and veg to be fed with it
.
Gliders bodies needs a ratio as close to 2:1 as you can get to properly allow the body to absorb the calcium it's taking in. To much phosphorous prevents the body from absorbing calcium.
If you want to feed something like corn that is really high phosphorous feed it with something higher in calcium like collard greens to balance out the not so great phosphorous food... I can explain this better if it doesn't make sense I just have a headache right now and it's not coming out right.
There is no debate about the heat lamp and heat rock, they just don't need it. If you live in a cold climate ad some extra fleece to their pouch that is all they need.