Farmed mink eat a number of by-products, and it varies from area to area. Some areas on the coastlines of North America their diet tends to be a lot of fish-based products, but these are what we call fish racks, that type of thing, where it’s all of the fish that is processed for human consumption is taken off, and then we get the by-product of that.

In the Midwest we have a lot of cheese. I’m from Wisconsin. There will be times when our mink will eat 20-25% cheese in their diets, and they’ll consume jalapeño cheese and pepper cheese. And in that case, this is all product that is not fit for human consumption. It’s trimmings. When you make cheese, when you age cheese, there’s mold on the outside and so they trim them all off and then in order to square it up to get your nice slices for the store, you get all the odd-shaped trimmings.

That’s the type of thing that goes into mink food. And then also the by-products from the pork and poultry and beef industry.

Answer by :

Dr. Hugh Hildebrandt, Doctor of Veterinary Medicine
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