>Members of the mustelid family are all very similar in appearance, and a
>person not well versed in their wild (and non-wild) life may not be the
>best judge of what a "wild ferret" is.
 
Excellent point!  When BFFs were first found there were a number of
"tips" followed up by some folks I knew long-distance who were with the
WY F&G and involved in the project trying to save them.  I was told that
the tips tends to be AWFUL.  Interestingly, they found that the most
accurate ones (at least they were other mustelids) came form prospectors.
The worst came from ranchers who gave reports that were just plain all
over the board in terms of animal types.  The simple fact of the matter
is that most folks can't tell mustelids from vivverids (as in weasels
from mongooses) ferrets from weasels or minks (Think of all the rescue
calls that turn out to be those -- so many that a large number of U.S.
rescues have had such calls.), BFFs from domestic ferrets, or wild
polecats indigenous to Europe from domestic ferrets.  Heck, I've heard
pine martins called gophers...
 
>And those Navy folks may have in fact been referring to THE wild ferret,
>the black-footed type, which may in fact still have existed in small
>quantities in the wild as late as 1990.
 
BFFs were found in Wyoming when a dog brought a dead one home and the
person decided to have it mountd.  The taxidermist recognized it for what
it was -- a species thought extinct -- and called the F&G of that state,
and since then colonies have been established for preservation reasons
in multiple areas in the Inner Mountain West and Southwest although the
genetic variation of the remaining population is very narrow.  The single
best hope for successful reinstatement is likely a large preserve in
Mexico and the last I heard work to make that a site was on-going.  (BTW,
I know that they are in zoo setting in Canada but was anything done about
any trials on pika since they warren in large groupings in some settings
as food and attempted wild releases done?  Even BFFs are lousy hunters,
needing warrening food sources so that there is a lot of easily caught
game locally-- something which is pretty well lacking in most of the U.S.
since the purge of prairie dogs.)
 
>Also, anyone who says they saw "Wild Ferrets" may or may not have any
>idea what they are talking about.  Please keep in mind, there IS a
>species of WILD INDIGENOUS ferret in the US.  Also, how many times have
>we heard on this list of someone finding a mink and thinking it was a
>ferret?
 
OFTEN!  And short tailed weasels, and long tailed weasels, and... Heck, I
even recall someone called for a juvie that was either a martin or fisher
once but I don't think that report was here, ditto a report for a shrew
in a window well.  In general most people can't tell one animal from
another.  How many times have folks here referred to people thinking that
the ferrets they took out for walks were raccoons, monkeys, squirrels,
etc.  How many times have we had folks new to ferrets here thinking that
they were the same as mongooses.  The answer again is OFTEN (though not
as often now as when ferret were novel in the U.S.).  How often do we
hear ferrets referred to as big rats or rodents?  OFTEN.
 
Sure, there can be claims of wild ferrets spotted but they don't pan out
in the U.S. when they are checked by someone who actually can tell a
squirrel from a rat, from a ground hog, from a weasel, from a...
[Posted in FML issue 4029]