Hi everyone.

This is my appeal for help. This will be long and I am sorry but you
will need to read it all to understand. Rhea one of my Ohio girls is
in need of help. She has been attacking humans. I say humans because I
want you all to know that it is not just me she has attacked, she has
also attacked a member of our rescue. When I say attacked I mean just
that!! This is a very serious situation.

First let me say that this has started within the last month. I am
going to show you all the emails I sent out to my rescue appealing
for help and giving updates.

The 1st

"It is so hard to write this as I am crying an shaking so hard I cant
really type. Rhea ATTACKED me! I mean she bit me and when I tried to
stop her she went crazy. Really crazy!! I tried to scruff her and she
started screaming. Screaming! I let go of her quick and she ran after
me biting my legs and feet. HARD!! I am bleeding all over. I am
doing something wrong!! But I don't know what. I am so upset. I am
hysterical. I tried to get away from her but couldn't and she got me
bad. I even climbed up onto the couch, which is funny now I as I know
she can get up there, to get away. She would not stop. I grabbed her
and got her scruffed, she was screaming all the way, and drawing lots
of blood I got her in her cage. She hurt me physically but I am mostly
hurt emotionally because she did that. And I am scared of her now!

I am messing the sisters up. Help me. I am so sorry to ask as I fought
for them but I have no choice. I cannot keep her like this. I am doing
something wrong and refuse to keep hurting the baby. She has NEVER done
that before. She is the one who kisses me all the time. She is not
showing any signs of illness so I don't think that's it."

Needless to say the members quickly responded to my cry for help.
However I do believe they thought I was exaggerating. I tend to when I
think one is sick. But this was something that I have never read about
or heard about. It was bad. I though after a while that something just
spooked her. I was wrong.

The 2nd

"She did it again. This time I was in the bathroom with the bathtub
water running, all the ferrets jump in and play and drink water, and I
sat on the toilet. I started to play with Griffin and Kiki as they were
asking me to and Rhea started to jump around with them. I backed off a
bit and Kiki and Griffin ran off but Rhea attacked my foot. I lifted my
leg and she jumped up and got a hold of my skin under my thigh and hung
there. OUCH OUCH OUCH..... Bleeding all over you should have seen me
sitting on the commode with my legs up in the air praying she did not
jump to get me again. She tried to find a way to get to me. UNREAL She
started to climb onto the side of the tub; I have a towel there for
access in and out when the babies go in to play, so I yanked the towel
out and away. She looked at me right in my eyes and prowled YES prowled
around me. Then she walked away. I carefully walked out of the bathroom
and got shoes on and gloves. Went back to where she was and picked her
up and placed her back in her cage.

Something is wrong with her. The thought came to me that she hates me.
HATES..... Just how she acted in the bathroom. This is not normal. I
will be calling Dr. Case tomorrow. I will have him examine her to make
sure nothing is wrong. When that is done and if she is fine I wonder
if I can find someone who will try to work with her a bit more. I can
no longer let her do this to me. She has me jumpy with all the other
ferrets."

Once again I was given support from the members of my rescue. I did
call Dr. Case that Monday and he got me right in that night. I spoke to
him of the phone a bit and explained the situation. He explained that
she might be adrenal. So that eve I brought her to him. Dr. Case did
a through exam and found nothing physically wrong with her. The only
symptom of adrenal would have been her behavior. So he decided to give
her a melatonin implant. He assured me that even if she weren't adrenal
this injection would not harm her. Armed with the info from Dr. Case
to keep her separated from the other ferrets and keep only a very
limited play area we went home. I will say during the visit she seems
petrified. Now let me say Dr. Case has seen her before and done her
surgery and she never acted like this. Wide-eyed maybe and nerves
before but never petrified looking. I updated everyone in the rescue
that morning and was told to bring to the rescues meeting that Tuesday
night. So we went to the r escue. I arrived early knowing I would be
able to have seasoned members look at her. Jane, who is very seasoned
and keeps our sanctuary, was there. She told me to let her out of the
carrier to play with the others out while she cleaned. I WARNED HER!!!
But I did as she asked.

The 3rd

Rhea stayed in her cage until Tuesday when I brought her to the meeting
to be looked at my seasoned members of the rescue. When I arrived at
the rescue Chris and Jane were already they're cleaning. I updated them
on Rhea. Jane, bless her, wanted me to let Rhea out to play with the
other ferrets out playing. Warning her I did just that. Rhea went off
and started to play with the other babies. I walked out of the room for
all of 10 minutes and then heard Jane say, "She got me." Horrified I
ran over to see just how bad it was. It was bad. Poor Jane I felt so
bad. Rhea had gotten her Achilles tenant and both her hands. BAD! Jane
had said then that she squeaked a toy and that was her reaction. I am
unsure, as she has attacked without that sound.

My heart sank as the thought came into my head that she would have to
be put down. I say this because she is not right. You can tell. Jane
said she had seen nothing like it. When I say she attacks that is what
she is doing attacking.

The thoughts of the members are that she looks "not right."

So she spent the day out in her pen. I have noticed not that she
attacks the tube in the pen. So I put in stuffed animals. She plays
with them hard shaking them and such. This is all however.


I was at a loss. Well maybe I need to spend more time with her I
thought. So I did! This weekend I spent all the time I would with her.

The 4th

Well we had a good weekend. I worked with her a lot. I held her all
the time. When I could. I would give her olive oil on my hands and just
loved on her. I let her out in the living room to play with the others
and it was fine. She wanted to play hard with the others and I let her
do her thing. I had on boots and pants though. I never attempted to
play with her or the others while she was out. There were a few times
when she tried to climb on me but I replaced her onto the floor.

Tonight however I had only her in the pen. I was cleaning up and found
a new hidey hold. This is most likely Kippys because she LOVES squeaky
toys and they were all in there. I stepped on a toy and it made noise.
I took my foot off and it squeaked. I noticed Rhea get upset so I went
to pick her up and she jumped up to my hand and latched on!!! Lord its
bad. My hand is swollen. BAD! She got all four teeth in and kept going.
I had olive oil close and poured it all over her nose. She let go after
she was covered. It was all I could do. I got her by the neck and put
her in the cage. After a weekend of kisses and hard play time. :(

SOO it's the noise. This set her off this time. But she will do it
when there is no noise. Jane called it. She was right. She had made
that noise in the rescue when she attacked her. So this solves one
question......She is not hurting or sick.

So that about brings you all up to date. I did not want to address this
situation nationally until I had exhausted all possibilities. I have
become very jumpy with all the other ferrets. I can no longer stand
to be attacked like this because it is very painful. I have bit marks
everywhere. I will say that this is not how she acted when I got her.
She was never this bad. She is now about 9 or 10 months old. I will let
Rhea go to someone who knows how to handle problem ferrets for help.

I am asking for help. I have set up an email account only for this as I
am unable to check my others with very little time. I need to be able
to get only this info. I am so very sorry right now I just have no time
to respond to emails other than those that pertain with Rhea. The email
is [log in to unmask]

When you replay please send it to this address.

I want to thank you for reading my very long email and for your help
with this situation.

--
Misty Hosier
Broward Ferret Rescue and Referral
[log in to unmask]
http://www.missionfish.org/NPMMF/nphomepage.jsp?NP_ID=20871
http://www.myspace.com/ferretplayground
954-921-0843

[Posted in FML 5860]