>My quetion is about thier bathing.  Would temperatures of water just go by
>my judgment and also is there anything in ferret shampoos that I need to
>avoid buying.  I really want to take extreme caution raising a ferret.
 
A normal body temp on a ferret is higher than a human, so I make the water
warmer than I would if I were bathing a child.  I make it nice and warm and
they *definitely* like it better.  I used to bath them in cooler water but
they always fought to get out of the water.  When I made it warmer, they
stopped fighting so much and some would just stand there.
 
As for shampoo, it's a lot easier bathing them with something that won't
hurt their eyes.  I still try to keep suds out of the eyes, but at least it
won't hurt a lot like other shampoos do.  It's really creepy to have a
ferret looking through soap bubbles on their eyes!  Eeek.  Mine have done
that.  It obviously didn't hurt -- they didn't even blink!
 
Also, you don't need to bath them once a week or anything like that.  If you
change the bedding regularly, they really don't smell bad.  Babies need
bathed more often -- they get pretty stinky, but once they get to about 3 or
4 months old, they're fine.
 
--Barb--
[Posted in FML issue 2188]