I thought I'd share a recent happy reunion too.  A stray was turned into
our shelter about a week ago.  It's only about half the time that we are
able to locate the owner, so our hopes weren't overly high when this
little girl turned up.  However......
 
It turned out that a truck driving couple had been visiting their nephew
and just as they were leaving in their rented car to go pick up their
truck, they discovered that one of their two ferrets who travel
everywhere with them had gotten out of her carrier and then out of the
window they had left cracked open.  (One of those gray Seattle days, so
heat wasn't a concern.)
 
The truckers had to arrive at their destination in Chicago on time and so
had to leave, but sent their nephew to look for their little lost girl.
The nephew went door to door in his neighborhood and the following day,
about 10 blocks away, ran into someone, who knew someone who had found a
ferret.  He then contacted us.
 
This would normally have been an instant reunion, but...we'd had two
strays turned into us in the same general area and so wanted the people
to ID their ferret.  After a couple of phone calls, we got in touch with
the drivers who had access to e-mail in the evenings, so we sent them a
photo line up .... and they were not able to ID their ferret.  They had
no photos to send us and their ferret wasn't microchipped.  They couldn't
recall any unusual markings, she was just another sable.  While we
certainly want to return ferrets to their rightful owners, we also want
to make sure that they go back to their actual person.
 
The truckers explained to their company that they had to return to
Seattle, because they'd accidentally left something valuable here and so
would be a day late in returning to their home base for the next load.
When they arrived and looked at the 50+ other ferrets we had they still
were not absolutely positive that the stray ferret was theirs, but when
we put their male ferret out to play with our stray, the two of them
positively identified each other!
 
They were shocked that they had not been able to positively identify her
after having lived with her for over a year.  But how many of you could
do that if your ferret was lost?  It's easy to think you could, but if
the time ever came, could you really.  Please take photos of your
ferrets, to have on hand.  There's really no two sable ferrets who look
alike.  They all have slightly different markings and only a photo will
point these out clearly.  But the safest way to ID your ferret is with
a microchip.  Then there is absolutely no doubt.
 
This driving family had both of their ferrets microchipped, before
continuing on their way to pick up their next load.  And they lived
happily ever after.  :-)
 
"The End"
Sandi
Best Little Rabbit, Rodent & Ferret House
Seattle, WA
www.RabbitRodentFerret.org
[Posted in FML issue 4542]