Heck, I've eaten cheap canned dog food and dry cat food, and I sure wouldn't recommend either one of them for any species!



It might help to look at the ingredients of the different herbivore foods sold by mazuri. They start with a base of grains and soy. Just like some dog & cat foods.



Maybe it does no harm, but it seems to me that most canned pet foods are designed by first using a cheap, readily available base of soy/wheat/corn/oats and then adding enough vitamins and minerals to overcome the problems wit soy/wheat/corn/oats.



From www.mazuri.com



Tortoise diet:



"Ingredients

Ground soybean hulls, ground corn, ground oats, dehulled soybean meal, wheat middlings, cane molasses, brewers dried yeast, soybean oil, wheat germ, dehydrated alfalfa meal,...."



Reindeer diet:



"Ingredients

Ground soybean hulls, wheat middlings, ground aspen, dried beet pulp, dehulled soybean meal, cane molasses, dehydrated alfalfa meal, sucrose, soybean oil, dicalcium phosphate, brewers dried yeast,..."



Ferret diet:



"Ingredients

Ground corn, dehulled soybean meal, dried whey, sucrose, dicalcium phosphate, cane molasses, animal fat preserved with BHA, dried beet pulp, soybean oil, dehydrated alfalfa meal, calcium carbonate,..."



And mazuri recommends that you use it as the major part of the diet.



From www.mazuri.com:



"Feeding Directions

Feed 1-4% of body weight per Tortoise per day. It is not necessary to wet the diet, although this may help to acclimate tortoises to the diet. Feed consumption will vary with temperature. Feed with good quality grass hay. Fresh fruits and vegetables (less than 20% by weight of total diet) may also be provided if desired."



But nobody here does that.



And before anyone gets concerned, I'm not knocking anyone who uses it. I used it up to a couple months ago. Maybe there's something highly beneficial to each of the above species by scientifically re-arranging the amounts of soy hulls, dried wheat middlings, cane molasses and dehydrated alfalfa meal.



:->

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