[My sister-in-law got the first two ferrets in the family.  When we got
our first two ferrets, we weren't going to descent them because of
our experience with her two: Minka (sable male) and Tia (pretty
very-light-coloured sable - almost silver).  (BTW: Minka died while being
neutered because the vet gave the wrong anaesthetic).  Neither of them
smelled much.
 
Also, our vet had suggested that our ferrets just be spayed but not descented.
He said that ferrets usually don't smell too bad, and we could have
the descenting done later if necessary.
 
So our first two (Mocha and Nicia) were fixed but not descented.  And for
a year and a half that was just fine.  No problems.  We didn't know
what ferret spray smelled like for well over a year (until an upset mastiff
pulled Mocha's cage off the vet's waiting room chair....)
 
Then Toby came into our lives.
 
Mocha hated his guts and tried to kill him several times... We kept them
separated until he got big enough to handle himself.  Even after Toby
was too big for Mocha to seriously hurt, they still didn't get along too
well.  Mocha took out her frustrations by starting to spray.  Like every
second day.  Toby occasionally too.  Sheesh!  Since we wanted peace in
our house, and we figgered that the main difficulty was the fact that Toby
was as yet not neutered, we had him done as soon as the Vet would let us.
 
Further, to make sure that the problem was over, we had both Mocha and
Toby descented at the same time.  Mocha hasn't had any problems with the
surgery.
 
Our regular vet called us last night to see how Toby was doing (you may
remember that he was down in a conference when Toby developed his
abcess and we managed to find some other vet that knew ferrets) and
ensure that the other vet had taken care of things properly.  Our
regular vet had seen his first anal sac abcess in a ferret two months
previously.  And he's been working with them for five years.  The
other vet (quite familiar with ferrets, but perhaps not quite as many
as our regular vet) had never seen one before.  And, they both told
us that this problem was usually spontaneous and had nothing to do
with the descenting - similarly with dogs and cats which have abcesses
far more frequently and are almost never descented (except *after*
they have an abcess).
 
In retrospect, it was perhaps not neccessary to have Mocha descented
now that Toby's an "it".  And perhaps not even necessary to have done
Toby - we know *most* of the spraying was done by Mocha, and the
rest in retaliation by Toby.  But, at least Toby doesn't smell as
much anymore.  (BTW: neither my wife or myself mind the smell much except
when they spray, further, our ferrets travel a lot....)
 
Nicia's *not* going to be descented.  We made that decision a long
time ago because of what she's been thru.  Besides, Nicia still hasn't
figgered out that she *has* scent glands...
 
My recommendation is the same as our vet's:
 
    - Even unneutered/undescented ferrets don't smell *that* bad!  And,
      if you give 'em a bath every week or two, you won't have any problems.
    - Don't automatically descent when being neutered.  Any problems
      with smell will probably greatly lessen.
    - Only descent if you have a real odor problem (eg: lots of spraying)
 
BTW: last we tried, none of our ferrets liked meat either - they've become
pretty fixated on Science Diet Feline Maintenance dry food.
 
                                        cl. ]
                                                                          
[Posted in FML 0008]