Good Morning,

Again, thank you to all that have been so concerned about our
well-being and those of our neighbors in TN and MS these past two
weeks. Thankfully, the weather predictors claim that we will have
a nice, calm, and uneventful weekend coming up. We do need it.

So much damage and deaths -- sometimes it can be incomprehensible.....
but we will survive and go forward. Hopefully the patchwork that we
have done will hold until the insurance company comes through with our
claim. But, there was some disturbance with this work to keep a solid
roof over our heads and will be a problem again once the final repair
begins.

And we all know that ferrets do not do well with disturbance and
instability in their home life. And, I can see this is a problem with
many of my kids in shelter and I was hoping for some advice. All this
scary weather and instability of their home life has left about half of
the fuzzits in my shelter with behavioral issues. Most of the ferrets
during the peak of the storms last weekend were buried under their
bedding and even after the storm systems passed, they could not be
coaxed out of their hiding places. Many of the ferrets are off their
food now, not loosing a lot of weight, but certainly not eating
normally. Many of them are drinking a lot more water than before. All
of them are dropping their coats in big volumes -- although we are now
entering our late spring/early summer months where this is a normal
event, but the amount of fur loss is not normal. Many of the ferrets
are digging at their litter boxes, their bedding, and the bottoms of
their cages. Some are not as affectionate as they normally would be.
Only one of my kissers gave me kisses this morning. My DMK's seem to
be really agitated to a point where they are tearing up their cages
daily causing me to be greatly concerned about that crew. And my
"spokesferret", Bond, has started to nip at me again.

About half of the kids are back to their normal behavior, but, alas,
many are not.

I am a bit worried about them as everything I do does not seem to be
working right now with many of them. I have decided to leave them alone
for a few days in a quiet, cool, dimly-lit ferret room. Of course, I
will be cleaning and caring for them normally but will not take them
out of their cages for a couple days, perhaps all of the noise has just
been too much. I will hug and kiss each one in an attempt to reassure
them that everything will be fine. But I do not know what else I can
do...and with the weekend fast approaching, I want to resume a normal
schedule.

I would appreciate any advice.

Thanks in advance.

Maren Doshier
Raisins From Heaven Ferret Rescue
Hernando, MS

[Posted in FML 6689]