I know everyone knows this, but please search your place twice today
to check for ferret hazards.  Rocko was not feeling well yesterday -
wouldn't eat or drink, and slept all the time.  Whenever I woke him
up, he was pretty bright-eyed, and would squirm and the like, but just
wasn't himself.  He'd produced two 'stools' composed entirely of sticky
orange mucus.  His hindquarters felt thin, but some fruit-flavored
Pedialyte in a feeder syringe helped that.  I gave him Petromalt too,
in case he was constipated, had a hairball, etc.  Before I took him in
to the veterinarian this morning, I checked his litterbox - and found 2
pieces of a wide rubber band in some more mucus.  The vet determined
that the rest of it was in the upper GI tract, under the ribcage, and
thus couldn't be felt in an exam - and no swollen abdomen.  Fortunately,
Rocko was still pretty lively (I think the rehydration with the Pedia-
lyte helped - thanks, Troy!).  Considering where the blockage was, I
didn't think it'd work its way out, so I told them to go ahead with
surgery.  He came out of it OK, with no tissue death in the intestine
due to the blockage.  The vet told me that he took a 5 INCH LONG piece
of wide, swollen rubber band out of Rocko's stomach and upper intestine,
and that there's no way it would have worked its way out.
 
I didn't even know that I had rubber bands that size around my place,
but it's amazing what the little weasels can find sometimes.  The vet
told me that he's seen cases of ferrets (mainly the young ones; Rocko's
only 5 months old) with fiberglass insulation, pantyhose shreds, towel
cloth, and rubber from shoe soles in their intestines.  I know that
ferrets are very bright, but please be extra careful to find everything
that could be a ferret hazard.  I was pretty pleased at how much I'd read
and learned about ferrets, and thought my place was pretty safe.  I'm sad
that it took an expensive (but worth it - time to add to the credit
card bill again) operation to show me otherwise.
 
His symptoms didn't exactly conform to what I've read about intestinal
blockage (no distention of abdomen; orange mucus 'stools' rather than
very thin to no stool), so please don't be afraid to at least call a
vet, or just go, if you're worried.  Remember that these are very small
creatures and can dehydrate/weaken quickly.  On that note, I'd recommend
keeping a feeder syringe and a bottle of fruit-flavored Pedialyte (the
expiration date on the one I got yesterday is May 1996) around in case
you need to rehydrate one of your little critters.
 
I'm getting him back on Monday, but I'm so sad that he had to go through
this!  At least he wasn't afraid there, but I'm wondering what he's
feeling like being there without me or Randall.  (He does like people a
lot, and everyone there thinks my guys are SO cute.)  So please check in
the most unlikely spots - rubber bands under a desk, foam filler inside
the ripped lining of a chair, etc.  You could save your ferret's life.
 
Sadder but wiser,
Denise
 plus Rocko (recovering, thank goodness)
      Randall (confused)
      Grumpy (teddy bear hamster; probably glad that there's only one
                ferret pulling the cover off of his cage lately)
 
[Posted in FML issue 0953]