mazuri vs oxbow

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SusieJJ

SusieJJ

chinnies215
Joined
Jan 31, 2009
Messages
207
Location
Holbrook, MA
I ended up running out of mazuri - I was low and went to Petsmart to get some and they didn't have any :( They had the spot for it, but were out. So I ended up getting Oxbow and my girls have been on that for about a week now. Their poops are much bigger! I think I'm going to keep them on oxbow now, it seems to be doing good with them. Is this a reputable food? Is there anywhere to get it cheaper than $16 for 5 lbs?
 
Oxbow is a highly recommended food. And good luck on finding a "cheap" price for it. Check the classifieds here and someone May have it, but I'm not sure
 
I would recommend Oxbow over Mazuri any day. I have used both, along with a few other feeds, and my chins have done the best on Oxbow.

You may want to contact Sandi on here. She can ship you 10 lbs of Oxbow for around $20-ish.
 
I use Mazuri and have used it for 12 years. It's been a great feed for my herd and I would never use anything else. It's more expensive than other things, but the results I have gotten using it are well worth the price.

I'd call around to feed stores and find the larger bag. Even if you can't use it all before it gets stale around 5 to 6 months after the mill date, it will be cheaper than going to a petstore to buy it.
 
I never had any problems with mazuri, but had to switch to oxbow for the same reason. I have been very happy with oxbow and will keep my chin on it. I agree that her poops look bigger and healthier now on the oxbow diet.
 
My boys were on Mazuri for 3.5 months when I first got them, they had been on Nutrena when they were with the breeder but I needed something I could get locally and that's why I switched. In my case, my boys had smaller and a little moister poops while on Mazuri, as soon as I switched to Oxbow, there was a big difference for the better. To save money, I buy the 50 lb. of Chinchilla Deluxe directly from Oxbow. I don't sell it for a profit. I usually order a 50 pound bag once a month as I sell most of it to members here on the forum. I sell 5 lbs. for $9.99 and 10 lbs. for $18.99 and that includes the shipping cost to you. You can view my thread below.
 
People say that Mazuri gives their chins small, mooshy poops, but i don't see that at all. But, i have nothing to really compare it to.
 
I haven't seen that either. Is it possible that the Mazuri other people use is completely different from what I use? I see the small droppings with chins that come with petstore food all the time, their droppings are great within three days of being on Mazuri.

Mazuri from the petstore is different from what I end up with, I know that for sure. It's probably mostly that what I get is exceedingly fresh? It's SUPPOSED to be the same thing, but I don't know if it really is - the stuff from the petstore always has an expiration date way off in the future. I know that what I have would not be worth feeding if it were older than six months.

The rescues love the food...and they always put on weight and eat well and end up with their fur looking so great after about two months. I've just never had a reason to change....except for if my order doesn't come through in time...so I tend to make sure that I hoard a enough bags to get me through any times of incompetence on the part of people in the supply chain. (Because it's never MY fault, oh never...)
 
i use the petsmart kind, i didn't know there is a difference, but i still hold my case.
 
OK OK...I don't know for sure that there is a real difference...but to get it to sit on the shelf for so long, there'd have to be a difference, right? Oh I don't know... :D It just smells a little different and it lasts for so long. (I need to stop saying I know for sure when I just strongly suspect...LOL Do you guys have as much fun laughing at me as I have laughing at myself?)

I've known people that have used the petstore Mazuri with no issues at all...the chins do great on it regardless. :)

(Sorry I am crazy, Shubbles...)
 
I don't know what the stuff you use smells like, so maybe i'll have to buy both and smell them, lol. I guess maybe having it sitting on the shelf, might change it, but truly i don't care haha.
 
Susan, the Mazuri that I had used when my boys were on it was from a member here who bought it at a feed store. In my case, the breeder had them on Nutrena and they had healthy looking poops, but when I changed them to Mazuri, their poops changed to smaller and a bit softer. I waited it out for a bit to see if it was due to the change of feed but it never got back to what it was. That's when I switched them to Oxbow because I can't get Nutrena by me.
 
I wonder if the food was old or had been mishandled (allowed to sit in the sun, etc.), Sandi. Recently I went to pick up some rescue chins and they had all been on Mazuri but looked absolutely terrible. When we flipped the bag over and looked at the mill date the food was nearly 2 years old. Some feedstores do not care about the age of the product they are selling.

I have a lot of healthy poops here! :) By now this evening they're probably all over the floor.

Whatever works works. The Oxbow is a good feed and I have seen chins that have done great on it. :)
 
I don't believe the Mazuri was bad, as one of the reasons I bought from her is because she is a buddy here on the forum and is quite responsible. But again this is just my experience. Mazuri is a good feed as well and if it works then I wouldn't change it. :))
 
I've tried both mazuri and oxbow. I personally don't like mazuri, but I do feed it 50/50 with oxbow to 2 of my chins. Those 2 chins like having the 50/50 ratio of both and eat better, gain and keep weight on. When I try just one of either mazuri or oxbow for those 2 chins their weight goes down and they don't eat as much. I think their just picky stinkers.

My other chins get straight oxbow and love it. All but one came to me on mazuri. My first chin I got came eating mazuri but he didn't really eat much and seemed like he didn't care for it much so I got some oxbow to try. When I started mixing that in he would pick the oxbow out and leave the mazuri. His poops looked good so I went ahead and just fed him straight oxbow since he was picking that out anyways. Then I got 3 young females together who was also on mazuri. They did good for the first week or two and then started having soft poops. So I took them completely off pellets and only fed hay for a couple days. Their poops wented back to normal and wasn't soft. When I tried putting them back on mazuri their poops went to being soft again. By that time I'd order some oxbow to try since all of my chins seems to not really care for the mazuri. When I mixed the oxbow in with the mazuri the girls stopped having soft poop. They are now on straight oxbow and haven't had soft poops since.

All of my chins eat better and gained more weight with oxbow. I have a 10 year old chin that had overgrown teeth with spurs when I got who had ate mazuri all her life. After her teeth trim when she would try to eat the mazuri she acted like it was too hard or big. So since I was already feeding her critical care I went ahead and mixed in some oxbow pellets with her mazuri and she could easily eat the oxbow. I guess because its not as thick as the mazuri. She started digging into the food. She loves her oxbow. The other night I accidentally put mazuri in her bowl instead of oxbow. She went straight to it and picked up a piece looked it and through it back down. She then gave me a evil look and went into her wood hut. So I check her bowl and realized I put the wrong food in her bowl. So I fixed and she started chowing down on the oxbow.

I don't know for others but I order the 50lb bags of oxbow straight from oxbow. I have enough chins for it to get ate before it expires. And then I rebag it in smaller bags for proper storage. I get 15lb of mazuri from a local feedstore. If someone is wanted mazuri go to their website and check their store locator and call the stores closest to you. And even if they don't carry the mazuri chin food they could probably order it for you.

Also when I had my girls on mazuri the breeder I got them from fed mazuri but I think hers was old because it looked different from the mazuri I got from the feedstore. At that time I got the smaller 2.5lb bag from the feedstore that they had got in and was good for another year.
 
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A lot also has to do with where the product is milled. Also, some chins just react differently to it. I've never used Oxbow, I had no problems with Mazuri when I used it at first, but when I got Cuda and Monaco, they had to mushy poos. Switched them off and they've since been fine.
 
Well the breeder I got my girls from gets their mazuri from the same feedstore as I do. But the breeders mazuri didn't smell as fresh and was lighter in color. When I the 2.5lb bag and the 25lb bag bother smelt fresh and were darker in color. The 25 lb bag was milled in november and the 2.5 lb I got in august which was about 3 weeks after I got my girls. My girls got soft poops on the mazuri I got from the breeder and the 2.5 lb I got that was fresher.

I think that like people, some do better on foods than others. I'm not saying mazuri is a bad food. I personally don't like it since how my girls did on it. Plus so far I've not had any problems with the oxbow and since the oxbow is only about 20 cents more per pound than the mazuri, for me anyways, I'll continue to feed oxbow.
 
Their both good feeds. If you think one works better then the other then i would use that. It's just a matter of preference.
I use mazuri. Mostly cause i live in the middle of no where and i can have ace order it in for me but i have never had a problem with it. My chins love it, have good weight gain with it and its affordable.
Like i said before tho, its just a matter of preference. As long as your on a good quality pellet your chins should be fine
 
I've had absolutely no problem with Mazuri over the years and my boys' poops looked pretty darn perfect to me. Just b/c I felt like trying a more locally milled feed on the Island I did start using AlderPark pellets to see if there was any real difference as well as that's what my chins came with when I took them on, I do now find all the chins do look fluffier and all around a bit nicer than before. Now I do about a 3/4 AlderPark pellets mixed with 1/4 Mazuri pellets and all seems to be going really well and all five boys look nice, devour their food and their poops are pretty, lol.
 
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