Given all of the people who have been down or will possibly later go down
due to the Excite bankruptcy I figured that I'd better post this info.
 
If i have these AUTOMATIC steps down right:
 
You can get the digests (which will be usually 2 to 3 a day) by doing
these steps:
 
1. If you have not joined, yet, send a mail with nothing written within
it to: [log in to unmask]
 
2. Then send a second -- also with nothing written within it -- this time
to [log in to unmask]
 
OR
 
You can just join at
 
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Ferret-Health-list
 
Non-members can read at the webpage, but not all aspects are
available to non-members, and non-members may not post.
 
Gail wrote:
 
>Ivory soap is used on show dogs for whitening purposes.  I have no
 
We use Bright White shampoo.  Actually, Steve and I use it on our hair at
times, too.  He's got white strands in with natural chestnut and I have
white strands in with natural blonde.  We find that it brightens the white
strands remarkably well, and -- YES -- we got the idea because of the fine
job it does for our white ferrets...
 
Back when the Peta announcement about France came out I tried to get
details from officials in France only to find that they didn't have any
idea what I was talking about.  Some said nothing; one point-blank said
that he was unaware of any proposal by MF to have any type of facilities
there.  Further checking kept coming up empty-handed about any proposals,
inquiries by MF, etc.  The closest thing to a statement from a French
official turned out (when clarification was sought) to be a response to
the protesters that *IF* MF made any such inquiries they would be turned
away.  Several possible explanations which still could have MF trying for
it were mentioned by ferret folks but those didn't pan out in checking,
either.  It appears to likely have been a false rumor that got some
animal-rights people up in arms but never had anything to support it.  I
don't know who began the false rumor, but continuing it doesn't do much
for veracity.
 
MF is far from alone in selling to labs
http://guide.labanimal.com/product/category1.html .  Heck, not many years
back one of their several large competitors definitely was selling to fur
producers (may have stopped or may still be doing so since I don't know --
and i never checked some of the other farms on that score); compare
selling for fitch coats to having ferrets used for things like developing
influenza vaccines (which save thousands of lives each year), or teaching
how to intubate premies and infants (ditto for saving lives) -- processes
which are among those that afterward let the ferrets be adopted out.  We
have folks here who have retired research ferrets as pets; hopefully that
adoption trend will continue.  If the standards bar is going to be raised
it has to be raised for all of them!  Pure and simple.  There are farms
that are equal and some which are worse, and if MF is hurt more than
those then those other farms (some of which are worse in their official
inspections, also sell to labs, may be still selling for fur...) will fill
in the void and then things could be worse for ferrets.  You can see how
the entire grouping stacks up by getting the inspection reports for each
one.  How to do that is available info in the FML archives.  It is time
to stop scape-goating and instead raise the standards bar for ALL!
Scape-goating should be below us.  Could someone put up the equivalent
non-U.S.  pages for checking inspection results, lab animal sales, etc.
in some other countries?  I have lost my copy of the inspection page for
the U.S. so will have to go the FML archives like anyone else, or rely on
someone posting that info.  The last two or three MF reports that i read
aced the inspection; not all of their competitors can say that.
[Posted in FML issue 3622]