I will start off by saying that any opinions expressed in this post are
mine, and do not necessarily reflect the views of any organizations I
am affiliated with.

I will also say that I am likely to receive some hate mail as a result
of what I am going to say, but I do hope that anyone who reads this
post carefully, and does not just skim through it, will feel that even
if they disagree with me, a civil discussion on an open forum like the
FML is a better choice than sending hate mail.

Recently, there has been a lot of discussion about a possible large
scale rescue of the ferrets at Triple F Farm. Personally, I do not
believe this will happen. It is not that I wouldn't love to see Triple
F closed down permanently - because I definitely would. But, it is for
reasons I will outline below.

Some people have compared the situation at Triple F to the situation
at Rainbow Exotics, and while the care the ferrets are receiving may
be similar, there are many differences. Rainbow exotics was more of
an animal distributor, although they did breed some animals including
ferrets. But, ferrets were just one of the many species they dealt in,
and the number of ferrets involved was only about 5% of what Triple F
has. Rainbow exotics sold only to pet stores, while Triple F also sells
to labs. Labs are not going to care how the ferrets are treated in the
breeding facility, as long as what they receive are healthy animals
free of disease. Often a farm that sells both to labs and to pet stores
(or animal distributors) will house the population intended for labs
separately. Often labs want only sable ferrets, or sables and albinos,
because those are the natural colors of ferrets. Moreover, labs often
want intact ferrets.

When Rainbow Exotics turned over the ferrets in their facility, it
was not because they were closing down, but more because of loss of
customers due to the bad publicity caused by PETA. The large chain pet
store that was their main customer for ferrets did not want to continue
the association with them. Rainbow Exotics actually continued business
for at least another year, handling other animals, before they were
forced to close.

The wheels of government turn slowly in matters like this. Triple F has
been given a period of time (though short) to improve conditions. Once
that period is over, they will again be inspected, and there can be
more appeals and more court action before anything really happens in
regards to moving the ferrets.

Now, if it should come to pass that Triple F actually does get closed
down, I doubt they are going to just turn the ferrets over to any group
or organization. They have a lot of money invested in these ferrets,
and to them, the ferrets are business assets. There are several things
that I can think of that they could try in order to recoup some of
their investment. They could create a spinoff company and transfer
the ferrets to that new company. If nothing else, this would buy them
more time. They could sell off the ferrets to other farms. Or, they
could move their operations to another country. Remember when Soren
Thinggaard was closed down? Although he initially claimed he would gas
all the ferrets, in reality, when he had to get rid of them, he sold a
few to US breeders, and took the majority of them to China, where there
are few if any restrictions on how animals are handled and raised. In
any event, it is highly unlikely Triple F would just turn over 6,000
ferrets free of charge.

Now, I have no problem with shelter personnel planning for how a large
scale rescue could be handled, or networking with each other and with
other animal rescue groups. Planning and networking is always a good
thing. And, as I am not a psychic, I could be totally wrong about this.
But, it does not make sense to me that any business would just give
away their business assets free of charge if there was any chance of
them getting some monetary return for their investment.

So, I would suggest that the ferret community focus on a different way
to enhance the lives of ferrets that come from ferret farms. And, that
focus is getting the USDA to enact ferret specific regulations
regarding the care of the ferrets provided by these farms.

Now, yes, we tried to do this once before without real success. But,
often it takes more than one go at something to get it accepted. Plus,
it is a different administration, and so there are different players
in the key spots, which might mean the underlings have been given
different marching orders.

The people who were key in organizing this before are still around,
and while they may not now have the time to be the leaders again, I
am certain they would be happy to lend advice and direction to any
individuals or groups who wanted to pursue this avenue. This might be
a more productive route to take in the long run, and might help to
prevent this kind of situation happening in the future.

Anyway, just my 2 cents on this topic. I hope it will start some
dialogue about the possibility of taking some action to help prevent
situations like Triple F from occurring in the future.

Danee DeVore

ADV - If your ferret hasn't been tested, you don't know!
For more information visit:
<http://www.ferretadv.com> 
ADV - Find out how you can help:
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[Posted in FML 7188]