>I've been wondering lately about what happened when my pogo passed away.
>when he had adrenal surgery and came home he was doing wonderful for the
>first week and then as some of you call it ???  he crashed.  and was in
>so much pain that he asked to be released.
 
Were his electrolyte levels checked?  When both adrenal glands are
removed completely, or one is removed but the other has atrophied, or
when Lysodren has been used there can be too little of the adrenal
products available for survival.  In these cases a comobinaiton of meds:
Florinef or Procorten (to control electrolyte balance), and Prednisone or
an alternative (for hydration, etc.) are given.  Ashling has been on
daily Florinef and Pred for about 2 and 1/2 to 3 years now.  She still
can grab a clicker and climb up the closet to stash it around 8 feet in
the air on the top shelf.  The meds work wonderfully for her.
 
One of our little guys (Hjalmar, many years ago) was either the first or
the simultaneous first ferret to use Florinef.  (Dr. Bock in Colorado was
researching it at close to the same time and may have begun about then, a
bit before then, or a bit after then, but Dr. Bock had not yet published
so the idea and trial was independent.) Hjalmar send home actively dying
but not in pain.  He was expected to be gone within a few hours.
Instead, as a last ditch effort the vets figured "Well, we can try this;
at this point it won't hurt".  The upshot was that he rebounded within
hours instead of dying within hours.
 
>They were rescued and we adopted them.... Both are on the thin side and
>we are trying to fatten them up, we are giving them nutrical , endless
>amounts of totally ferret and a huge bowl of water to rehydrate.  Is
>there anything else that might expedite their weight gain .  I haven't
>tried the gravy yet and am planning to use that.
 
This has been said by many of us before over and over and I'll say it
again: *IF* the ferrets are healthy and active do NOT try to fatten them
up.  If they are malnourished or fighting an illness and the vet wants
them to up their weight that is another matter, but there is nothing
wrong with low fat levels.  Obesity, on the other hand, DOES often have
a negative impact for ferrets.  Over and over again, we've noticed here
that good muscle levels are the best predictors of an active and long
life.  Of course, we do take in ones with serious problems so some of
those are too health compromised to add much muscle or control their
weight well.  The person I know who has the longest lived ferrets
consistently -- despite the origins -- provides a lot of exercise and
is in a position to have real dream situation for ferret exercise;
otherwise, the care he provides sounds like it is the same as most of
us here (food available, water changed daily, careful vet care, etc.).
I suspect he may be doing even more that is right but just takes his
actions so for granted that he doesn't yet know what these things are.
Good muscularity -- the absence of sarcopenia which is poor muscular
level and tone -- is harder to achieve if a ferret is over-weight.  In
fact, the two things (excessive fat and too little exercise) spiral
together in bad ways.  If ferrets are healthy and active then let them
remain as thin as is natural to them.  Don't force feed such individuals
and don't go to high fat, high calorie approaches for healthy, active
individuals.  If a ferret has extra tissue let it be muscle instead of
fat, whenever possible.  That still provided tissue the body can use if
it has to during an illness instead of body fat, but it is healthier
over-all.  Good muscularity can be very important to health, so getting
them too heavy to exercise well can be counter-productive to health, and
overweight carries its own downsides beyond that.
[Posted in FML issue 3984]