Well, what you do is, hand your ferrets a box of Uncle Ben's, and they will
push it around the floor till they open the flippy spout.  Then the fun
REALLY begins, as they leap into the spewing rice, sending it arching
through the air, sliding on it till they bump into to stove, and you know
where THAT rice went - underneath the big, heavy, appliance.  They play
in their rice on your kitchen floor, till it all disappears, into, behind,
and under things.
 
JUST KIDDING!  But that's how rice play really started, because someone's
ferret made a mess out of the stuff, and he swept it up and put it in a
box for them.
 
What you really do, is to decide where you can keep a rice digging box, and
buy the largest plastic storage container that will fit in that spot.  A
carpeted area is ok, as very little rice comes out, and a, it doesn't show
much, and b, is easy to vacume up.  Now that you have your container, and a
lidded one is the best choice, buy rice.  It comes in 20 pound bags at
grocery stores, Costo types sell it for about $4.50 a bag, other stores for
about a buck more.  You can start with a single bag, and add one each time
you shop.  Look on the bottom shelf of the rice section.  The one I buy is
called Homai, California Calrose Rice, comes in a white paper bag with a
yellow handle sewn on, and a bright yellow and red Chinese design.  The
grains are very large, smooth, and almost transparant.
 
My ferrets have 80 pounds of rice in their box, and play in it every day.
We keep a shorter storage box, (filled with heavy stuff, or it wouldn't
stay there, now would it?) next to the digging box, for the benefit of
shorter legged ferrets.  The amount of rice in the box should not exceed
half the depth.  Our box is about 30 inches long and 18 wide, and 80 pounds
of rice does not come up half way.
 
What ferrets do in the rice.  Probably #1 is basic snorkling.  They will
run forward, with their heads plowing through the rice.  They probably
close their eyes, I'm not down there, I don't know for sure.  They also
probably breath out while doing this, as I've never seen one come up with
rice in his nostrils.  Then there's excevation.  As they rush backward,
around and around the perimeter of the box, they are dragging rice with
them.  Their back legs are doing the rushing, their front one's are
clutching their armload of rice to their belly.  It's the instinct for
removing dirt from their tunnel enlargement.  Wrestling with friends is fun
too, and thisis when the rice flies out.  When they actually leave the box,
the rice is heavy enough it drops off them before they go over the side.
Ferrets who have just brought their heads out from a snorkle run, will have
grains of rice sitting on their heads, and this alone is worth the price of
the bag!
 
Of all the things ferrets do, I truly believe digging is one of the most
enjoyable to them, and I have gone fron aquarium gravel, to sand, to rice.
They might have enjoyed the sand as much as the rice, but the sand was
sticky (Toy's R Us) and clung to their fur.  After a couple of days, I
coundn't find the floor, and was tracking it all over the house.  It was in
their bedding, and I feared for the washer.  We've had the rice for about 3
months and it is WONDERFUL.
 
Georgia - the left coast one...
[Posted in FML issue 2780]