Edward Lipinski wrote:
 
>As you may guess, I'm not particularly keen on the nylon harness.  I agree
>with the English ferreters that you just can't beat the leather Figure-8
>one.  It's far superior to the nylon because it's not as "slippery" as
>the webbed nylon.  And it's so much easier to punch holes in it for the
>different sized ferrets (if you have more than one and they are different
>sized).
 
As far as I and a heck of a lot of my friends are concerned we wouldn't
give house room to a figure-8 leather harness - we hate 'em!  I tried one
once on Kurt, I found it really awkward to adjust - I thought I'd got it
right when Kurt wriggled out of it.
 
Now the H type leather harness is a much better design.  A friend of mine
makes some absolutely great ones.  Two qualities the cheaper one is riveted
and the other is hand sewn.  Just for a joke he made some 'studded ones'
for macho hobs.  (He actually used rivets for studs and they are flat
headed.) The owners of large macho hobs love 'em:-) I believe Todd C bought
a couple of harnesses off Thorr when he was in the UK last year.
 
I find it really easy to kit a ferret up in an H type harness.  I don't
bother undoing the neck strap once I've selected the correct size i.e. it
will pull over the head of the ferret.  I just slip the neck strap over the
ferrets head and then do up the body strap to the correct tightness.
However if the ferret wasn't being supervised I would ensure that the neck
strap was done up a bit tighter but then I don't leave my ferrets tethered
up without supervision so as far as I'm concerned the problem doesn't
arise.
 
We were camping once down in Lincolnshire and we had both Kurt and Bumper
tethered to a tent peg just in front of the tent.  Bumper was very busy
digging a hole in the sandy soil.  Kurt was lying down behind him watching
the excavation exercise.  We were ROFL.  Kurt had a little pyramid of sand
which was steadily building up on top of his head, every now and again a
little trickle of sand would make its way down past Kurt's ears when the
sand couldn't build up any higher.
 
Sheila
Bolton Ferret Welfare & Editor of The National Ferret Welfare Society.
Web Site: www.btinternet.com/~sheila/ferrets.htm  last update 10 April 1999
Waiting at Rainbow Bridge: Jill, Deanna Troy, Cameron, Carnath, Button,
Bill & Bobby.
[Posted in FML issue 2646]