THANK YOU, Dannee, Linda, and Sukie for giving us more and better
information in one place about raisin toxicity than we, your average
ferret slaves, have *ever* had to date!
 
People are saying that *one* raisin is a killer, and you are a bad Ferret
Mommy if you give it.  This has made a lot of raisin feeders feel angry
and hurt.  Now we can re-asess that because we have *better information*.
Doctor Kawasaki is thinking more along the lines that seven or eight
raisins at a crack is the upper limit of safety.  People are just going
to have to use their judgement about how close they want to feed toward
that upper limit, if they choose to feed raisins.  Nobody has all the
answers, but at least now there is a "yardstick" to measure our own
feeding habits against.
 
Let me re-state one more time that raisins are not, however, without
risks.  They are dried fruit, and ferrets can't digest them.  A potential
for a fruit blockage exists.  They are very high in sugar, think empty
calories, junk food.  For a ferret already having a tendency towards poor
blood sugar maintenence (think insulinoma) a raisin is a challenge,
perhaps an unhealthy one.  Unless you are literally going to brush your
ferret's teeth after each raisin feeding (I have personally witnessed Bob
Church brush a ferret's teeth, but his Kung-Fu is very strong.  It's way
beyond most of us.) you are setting your ferret up for the possibility of
dental disease down the road.
 
This issue has left a *lot* of hurt feelings in its wake.  People who
have fed raisins for years have been getting (the sometimes not so
subtle) message that they have been bad, irresponsible ferret Mommies
and Daddies.  When they have asked for more information, they have often
been given what has amounted to "because we say so.", and that is very
*frustrating,* sometimes down-right patronizing.  I don't think that
heavy-handedness was anyone's conscious intent, but that is sometimes
how it has come across.
 
As Linda posted yesterday:
>Sukie has mentioned that Dr. Kawasaki talked about raisin toxicity at
>the 2005 International Ferret Symposium(r) in St Louis last year.  I just
>wanted to clarify that this was not his formal presentation to the whole
>audience, but was a Table Topic given to a small group of people.  He
>provided a handout that some attendees may have gotten in their goodie
>bags.
 
This has lead to a real "bottleneck" in the flow of information.  People
ask "Well, what did he say?"  All too often the response has been for
someone who knows and respects Dr. Kawasaki to misunderstand the
question, rear up angrily, and say "You're smearing my friend!" *NO*.
People just want to know what he *said*.  I don't believe that anyone
meant to smear Dr. Kawasaki.  A frustrated poster's passion over the last
few days might have made it appear so, but I hope everyone can take a
step back and realize that sometimes the language we *post* is stronger
than what would use if we were just having an oral conversation.  This
'spark' all too easily starts flame wars, and we could all do without
that, I think.
 
Our best understanding of what Dr. Kawasaki *actually said* exists in
what Danee, Linda, and Sukie posted yesterday, because there literally
*is* no easily accessable transcript of what he said at the symposium.
If you feed raisins, I encourage you to go back to it, and read it
again.  I also encourage you to TELL YOUR FRIENDS who he is, and what he
*actually* said.  There is a LOT of raisin mis-information circulating
now, brought about by an information vacuum, an absence of *real*
information to refer to.  NOW WE HAVE SOME.  It's just unfortunate that
the tree had to be shaken so hard before the fruit of knowledge landed
in the grass for us!
 
And by the way, Ping is He volunteers himself as a test subject for hard
research.  He has an acute, personal interest in discovering how many
raisins it takes to *kill* a ferret.  His selfless commitment to science
should awe and humble all of us.  Tell Dr. Kawasaki.
 
Alexandra in MA
[Posted in FML issue 5190]