You will find pretty much any ferret melatonin question you may have
answered by combining these resources:
 
http://www.miamiferret.org/fhc/melatonin.htm
and then
http://fhl.sonic-weasel.org
if you or your vet have questions remaining
 
When possible I have also brought the vet posts over to the FML Archives
(The FML Archive address is always in the header of every day's FML, and
that is always a good place to start.  Life's demands haven't always
allowed me time to bring over vets' posts, though.  You know how it is
for all of us here, we all have other loves and demands in our lives so
we do what we can when the situation warrants, or when the request is a
polite and kind and gentle one, or when we also need the answers, or... )
Read also about complete darkness, Lupron, surgery, etc..
 
Melatonin is not a cure but it might slow disease progression and it
seems to have possible use as a preventative.  As a preventative or as
a treatment for one who is not a surgical candidate it is best used in
conjunction with Lupron which can also be read about in detail at those
two sites, as can meds for some of the more serious secondary results of
adrenal disease such as anemia or prostate enlargement.  It will help
correct some of the effects of adrenal disease like fur loss.  As you
know, very few ferrets should die of adrenal disease these days because
there are so many excellent approaches to remove the adrenal(s) -- and
prevent Addisons episodes when both come out completely or too little
tissue remains behind to provide the needed adrenal products, to slow the
disease when surgery isn't possible or only debulking can be done, to
hopefully delay the age of onset, and because most such growths are not
malignant (but still can have life-threatening effects if they remain in
and untreated) and when they are malignant metastasis is rare as long as
surgery is not delayed, etc.
 
Todd, the new Tuft's protocol may be of interest to you.  Chances are
still slim, I am afraid, even combining his being in the prime of life
and the promise of this new (non-IV) chemo approach which is more gentle
on them.  I privately sent you some info from the archives and a contact
addy for your vet.  (Others can find the info using the FML and FHL
Archives but I quoted in full for Todd...) Sorry about the mistake on
my first sending.  With just Prednisolone and pain meds we've managed to
give elderly ones in our family with lymphosarcoma between 6 to 14 good
months.  Sorry you are going through that.  If you didn't get two mails
from me when you see this post write to me.
 
Chris wrote:
 
>A little word of warning here.  Being declared TB free and not having
>any TB in the country is not the same thing.  The UK has a BT free
>status but we have outbreaks of BT in cattle every year.
 
Exactly.  There are enough wild reservoirs (and enough that gets
accidently exchanged in things like sperm shipments according to one
source I read) that except for a few isolated islands in the Pacific
there is always some bTB around.  It's way, way better than 85 years ago
when bTB was common, but the disease breaks out pretty much anywhere.
One of the sources I read yesterday was on an epidemic of it among
northern Alp red deer, and I was surprised to find out that a number of
marsupials can get it.  In the U.S.  for a state to be declared "free"
of bTB it needs to have found no more than one herd have any number of
animals with bTB within 4 years.  The states here go back and forth
between that status and upgrades as break-outs occur.  In some places
there have been hiatuses where testing didn't occur only to find an
increase and that they should have been following up each year.
 
This is a rare but fatal disease for ferrets (or cats or dogs or humans)
to get (usually from raw milk or raw meat from an infected animal).
There's a lot to be said for the very, very, very many lives of many
species saved from a wide range or illnesses by pasteurization of milk
(and not just cow milk).
 
The basic statements about ferret diets in general are that there are
multiple decent approaches, but each does carry its own risk factors
just as it carries its own benefits, and that a huge percentage of the
claims made are based more on hypotheses than on any good hard numbers
or answered gaps in knowledge.  That doesn't mean that they are wrong or
right.  In this there simply is not yet a true general wrong or right as
long as the diet is a decent one that avoids the well documented health
pitfalls and it takes the needs of the individual into consideration when
that is a factor.  So, avoid the guilt train if you give a good diet
(kibbled or not, cooked or not, 35% protein from animal sources or much
higher, and without those chunks of dried fruit or veggies that can cause
blockages) because the best guesses by the experts vary -- and on top of
that can change according to an individual ferrtet's own health needs --
and despite claims none of us will know for sure what really will turn
out to be optimal until many large knowledge gaps are filled and those
are likely going to take a good many years to fill at the current rate.
So, avoid needless feelings of guilt but try work with your health
professionals to adjust diets for individuals as needed, and if you do
choose to feed any given diet know at least a bit about the possible risk
factors as well as possible benefits involved, and don't treat it as if
it is an infallible religion (and personally I figure all of those are
fallible, too, but that is just me) to preach about or to have to accept
as a matter of faith, but instead keep your ear to the ground so that
you can adjust as needed for things like individual needs, and current
disease rates and types in your food source if you feed raw.
(Ultimately, I think that we'll find that diets will be chosen for
individual needs with basic foods and then some added special ones, or
special supplements, or special preventative meds adjusted for different
individuals' personal vulnerabilities but that is likely to be enough
decades away that I'll be moving to dust then.) Learn and adjust diets
as you learn from the ever changing pool of information but don't beat
yourself up if you feed a different diet than someone who comes on too
strongly for you; let the guilt train leave the station empty.
[Posted in FML issue 4781]