Hello everyone, long time since I posted as I haven't even had time to
read these as I should for 10 months now.
 
Just a few comments from todays:
>I need a LARGE GATE to keep my ferrets in their safe room!  I can't find
>any.  The doorway it has to block is 62 inches wide, and
 
Well, I vote for Plexiglas as it does not destroy the beauty of the home
nor makes it look like stall doors inside.  Do you need an archway 62"
wide?  If not, there are metal posts self standing heavy enough they cannot
be pushed over.  Decide where you want your human doorway and then set up a
post (ideas, make the doorway at one end or the other OR go creative and
put 2 posts where you have your entry in the middle - even using wrought
iron to the ceiling with the scroll work would look nice) attach Plexi to
the door frame and then to the post as perment, on the other side of the
door frame attach another sheet via hinges (to carry the weight) and latch
it to the post so you can come and go - suggestion too is to put magnet
fasteners AND spring hook and eye latch - magnets so you don't have to
fasten and unfasten as you come and go but if you have a "creative" ferret
who knows he can open it, you have your backup system to unlearn it, best
to start using the hook-eye till they get used to it then use the magnet
locks.  (WELLLLLLLLL she didn't say cheap, she asked for a way)
 
For Troy Lynn and alternate toys - if you can block off areas with some
different toys in them, then every 5 to 7 days switch ferrets in those
areas, they will busy themselves with discovering who has been where
while they were out of that area and the rest discovering the toys in
that section - ferrets wake up in a different world every 7 days anyway.
Alternate toys, don't give em all at once (I should talk.) get more tubes
and build a permanent structure, get the 4" sewer pipes with holes in them,
very thick, and build a gym.  The tubes are 10' long, hard to get home
without a van or pu, and the elbows I think are 99 cents to $1.49, lots of
em.  You can build a really wild design making turns and back tracking,
going straight up and crisey cross and all over THere are the 3 T's elbows
I like because it gives an exit too, you add the pipes to two of the holes
and the 3rd is free and/or can go to a pipe going another direction.  It's
even fun to build, like playing tinker toys.  Plus you can build it around
below and behind the cages, they can be disassembled for different designs
or to get to someone who had an impass or whatever and the tubes are easy
to cut with jigsaw or whatever.  There is hours of fun right there they
don't tire from.
 
I just lost Cascade Sunday, a week ago she was tooling around minding
everyone's business and by that evening was dehydrated and bad off, Monday
we were at the vets, she stayed 2 days to have the blood test and get more
fluids in her.  Lymphoma, she was only 2, to be 3 in Nov., I could not
believe she could go down hill so fast, She was better when I picked her
up but was so weak had to hold her up to let her go potty, She continued
to eat wonderfully as long as it was Church's chicken gravy warmed and in a
spoon but a couple days later she was too weak and then shut down to where
she would not swallow.  It was a hard way to go on the end, her heart
beating so hard and her horrible breathing, if she had made it through the
night we would have assisted her by morning.  I at least can say she had a
good 2 years - she was turned into a shelter at 9 months of age by a gal
whose boyfriend had bought her, she had free roam (the ferret, not the
girlfriend) till the guy moved off and left her with her, she was at the
shelter 1 day when I got her and she had free roam here.  At least she did
not go through dirty cages and horrible heat and some of the other things I
have seen and read about.  But 2 yrs old..............
 
Just had a ferret room added to the house (3200 sq. ft house just me and
the granddaughter and I have to have a ferret room added).  this room has
the a/c and heat pumped in, windows upside down where they drop from the
top for air (for the few hours we have the right temperature in Texas) and
the windows go to the floor where the little tykes can see out.  It has a
sink to wash potties, 3 tubes through the walls to the outside where
eventually there will be 3 separate cages, 2 feet down into the ground,
filled inside with dirt, and 2 feet up for swings and hammocks.  IN this
manner they can go outside when they want, when it gets too hot they come
in.  If I do have some who have to be kept separate from the others, will
have flexible tubing to go from the cage inside to the openings outside
where they can come and go.  The door to their room has a doggie door where
they can come and go to the den or it can be blocked off.  Had the wall
removed to have windows between the rooms, can see in and still be shut off
open again from the top where the ceiling fan will circulate the air.  I
was laughed at when I was telling a friend about it and advised in tubing
going outside I had taken the old timey flat rubber stoppers, drilled holes
into them and the tubes, took bailing wire and wired it in where it was a
flap so when they come and go it will close up the a/c and heat escape
route.  I also have stoppers to shut off their going out.  I am really
proud of it even if I don't have the outside cages done yet.
 
My love goes to those who have lost their ferrets and bless them for loving
these little guys to such a depth they leave an effect behind.
 
Millie and her Exploding (for Bottle Rocket) Noble (for Dizzy alias
Benjamin Disraeli, JR.) Drinking it up (Salty Dog) CLeaningcrew (Easy
Off, Ammonia, Cascade, Ajax, Joy, Prell, Febreze, Cheer, and Bounce,
and the dogs Drano, Brillo, Comet, and Downy)
[Posted in FML issue 3021]