Angilique wrote:
>I hope that I helped somebody with writing this story to the FLM.  I would
>like to know if there are more people who tried to do the same thing with
>biting ferrets.  How did it work out?
 
I had a chuckle when I read of Angilique's experiences with her four biting
ferrets.  I don't know how she managed with four of them, but I certainly
had a similar experience with one we called Deliliah.
 
Delilah's owner brought her in to The Ferret Centre and said she was "a bit
temperamental" and if we didn't take her, he'd put her down.  Of course we
took her.
 
She was a very angry looking silvermitt so I took her home and placed her in
the condo we have.  I tried to hold her but she rewarded me with quite a
ferocious bite so I put on leather gloves, then oven mitts and tried again.
The little angel bit right through those and drew blood.  "Hmmm" I thought,
"this will be rather a challenge!"
 
Anyway, to cut a long story short, it took me 3 months (and many boxes of
Band-Aids) to get Delilah to be the sweetheart we knew she could be.  There
was a time, after the first 2 weeks, when I really doubted my ability but
Philip said if we couldn't make her into a "nice" ferret, we would have to
put her down so that gave me the motivation to keep trying.
 
At the end of all of this she'd scamper up to my shoulder and chew gently on
my ear lobe, as well as lick my face.  I think she had been shoved down a
rabbit hole when she was just a baby and that scared the bejeezus out of
her!  Happily we managed to relocate her with a caring couple and she is now
a very spoilt member of that family.
 
G'dooks from the land down under :-)
 
Nona
The Ferret Centre
[Posted in FML issue 1701]