Hi Randy. So glad you are posting your observations in this forum. Many
others have noticed the same things. We should ALWAYS question things.
Always. Sometimes, yup, facts get mixed up with rumor or there are
exaggerations in some reports. We need to always sort the truth out.
But while doing so, do not loose site of the fact that even if some
things aren't true in a situation, that does not change the countless
other things that are true or change the general picture, ya know?

Okay so on to my two cents on your observations. I'm not denying the
things you listed could be untrue. I'm just going to give the other
side and possibilities drawn from my experience.

Can a ferrets eye get so infected it looks like they exploded? I have
an eye phobia so thank goodness I've never seen such a thing. However,
that said, I do know dogs can get horrific looking eye conditions
and have seen those on TV (before I had enough time to look away).
Infections that push their eyes almost clear out of the sockets.
Infections that make the eyes die off. Infections can make other
tissues on the body "explode" for a lack of a better word. That we do
know. During the worst of infections, tissue will either fissure or
tear so the infected fluids can come pouring out). The way they worded
things, leads the reader to beleive the eyes did absolutely explode.
And that's wrong to do that because they don't know what caused the
post condition they saw the eyes in. Now did they mean to use the text
just to be descriptive of their appearance? Who knows, but they did it
wrongly.

In the case of the "tools" used for neutering. I'd never believe what
was reported at Triple F for a second before I saw video tape of a
Rainbow Exotics employee neutering a rabbit. I would have never
believed before that a place would assign any inexperienced yahoo off
the street to conduct surgery.I would have never believed they'd use
things such as razors, time after time on a succesion of animals (so
you'd know they'd have to be dull). Like you said, it'd be dangerous to
the handler and it'd be very difficult and uncomfortable for them as
well. I never would have believed tales of people neutering an animal
without or with very little anestesia on a dirty workbench like thing
before. Well, we saw those everyone of those things on video tape
straight out of Rainbow. I did sit and watch that video. It was
validated and aired on CNN. Now? I'd beleive anything. Rainbow was
considered "reputable".

I'm with you in that I don't get the whole "heat issue" here regarding
ferrets and their intolerance to heat. That said, and despite me almost
loosing one of my babies from heat stroke just from being outside with
me for a bit (it was only like 90 or less), rescuers have seen ferrets
survive incredible heat well into the digits reported at Triple F
farms. The Doug McKay farm ferrets were in the sun outdoors in Ohio
year after year. Thousands lived through Eastern heat waves that topped
100 degrees. One of my ferrets was rescued in a back yard in Jersey
when it was reported to be 98 degrees that day by animal control
(Jersey and Philly get incredible heat waves). The question is how many
die from it before we find the numbers that survive it? For example how
many ferrets die off in such conditions before we find the survivors..
There are 6000 ferrets in Triple F. But thousands may have been lost
and accepted as regular loss before we found the 6000. I guarantee you
they didn't start with 6000 and end up with 6000. I know many, many
ferrets died at DMK's regularly. The strongest survived. Also most
ferrets didn't live until older ages there.

So, hope that offers you some answers.

Oh, juuuuuuuuuust a little thing to slip in there regarding the whole
"farm debate" that centers around this event. Many ferrets were exposed
to the same horrors at Rainbow Exotics as Triple F because there was a
demand for ferrets that did not come from the huge ferret farms such
as Triple F. PetSmart fueled a major demand for them. Why?? Because
they wanted to please ferret lovers and do the responsible thing by
boycotting large farms such as Marshalls and instead sell "well taken
care of private bred ferrets". They tried to do the right thing. The
responsible and "politically correct thing". Well, what many of us here
warn others about is that by completely shutting down "all" borderline
places farms (not places such as Triple F or Rainbow), is that we will
get much worse and crueler situations that we canNOT monitor or track.
It's a fact. It's also a fact that consumer demand will not change. We
may have never found these poor suffering souls at Triple F, had they
not been on the radar. It took a year to shut down DMK. A private
breeder who also bred thousands of animals. Why? They weren't under
the class and under the same eyes as Triple F. Triple F was exposed
and action was taken by authorities. It WILL be shut down or radically
changed in a much shorter time that DMK was... who by the way was never
"shut down" or "changed". Ferret people solved that issue and ferret
people alone. He was nearly untouchable by law. I'm torn on this and
always will be. Both sides of this argument are "true". I like to weigh
both sides and am not on either. I just thought I'd point out that this
is an incredible example of the one side's argument.

Wolfy

[Posted in FML 7177]