> He is a Sable Mitt Badger Stripe, 4 weeks old, male, and has curly hair.
> Even though he his smaller then the rest he is healthy and strong, It's just
> that his hair is very strange, curly and wavy like a new born poodle puppy (
> the best way to describe it), even his wisker's are kinky.  I've been
> watching him closely to see if the hair will start to grow and straighten
> out, but so far not.  I know that some Ferret's have hair through kithood
> that is very short and resembles velvet, but once they start to get their
> adult coats they look like any other Ferret.... Maybe this guy will
> straighten out.
>  I've been calling him "Mr. Motley",  and "Curley Butt" for obvious reasons
> :-)
>
 
There is a mouse mutant with kinky hair like you describe and I think
smaller then normal as well. The mutation was recently  found to be in one
of the receptor molecules (this is from memory so the details might be
wrong) for one type of growth factor. Perhaps your ferret has the same or a
similar type of mutation. If you are interested I'll see if I can find some
references.
 
[Isn't this the "Rex" gene?]
 
Max
 
[Posted in FML issue 0771]