Dear Holly:
 
>I had to rush one of my ferrets to the vet this morning.  She had nausea
>and diarrhea - had completely stopped eating or pooping.  She was
>diagnosed with giardia.
 
Let's watch this one carefully - in my experience, Giardia does not
generally cause lesions this severe.  In fact, many ferrets with Giardia
do not show any signs at all - that is why I wonder if Giardia is a true
pathogen in the ferret.
 
Diarrhea, but not pooping, notwithstanding (that's a bit of an oxymoron),
and filtered water with no access to fish tanks, good sanitation, and no
other ferret sick - that's a tough call for Giardia.  Any possibility of
foreign body?  You don't mention how old this ferret is, but when a ferret
stops eating or drinking, and starts vomiting, and has some diarrhea, there
may be a foreign body rumbling its way through the gut, and hopefully it
hasn't stopped.
 
You may want to pose this question to your vet, and some Laxatone may be of
some benefit, and it certainly couldn't hurt, even with Giardia.  Did your
other ferret come up positive for Giardia - if one has it, usually all of
them do....
 
With kindest regards,
Bruce Williams, DVM
[Posted in FML issue 3287]