Thanks Sukie! And thanks Florence for your thoughts on that as well :)

The vet at U of GA also confirmed the blood type question I had as
well, and was also informed that the younger the ferret donor the
better, and I quote from the vets response -

+++++
"Also, age plays a big part. We try to get donors under the age of
4yrs, this is about middle age and it is less likely that the ferrets
will have an illness.
+++++

So with that, I am guessing that any illness an older ferret may
have, could possibly be contracted by a ferret in need of a blood
transfusion... which makes sense, and is a possibility I had not
thought about.

The Vet also told me that any blood that is not needed, will be
'banked', stored for future emergencies. I also asked how much blood
they take/could be taken from a ferret, and here is the info for
those of you that are curious...

Quote ++++++++
"...So the general rule is we take 1% of the body weight. So for
instance, the average male size is about 1kg-1.8kg (2.2lbs-3.96lbs) so
from a 1kg animal we would take 10mls. 1.8kg we would take 18mls. There
is no max amount that can be given, that I am aware of, so we usually
give the full amount that we pulled from one ferret and bank the rest
if we had two donors. Sometimes we have given both within 24hours...."
+++++++

Sukie, thats a good question, what is wrong with the ferret? Florence,
did they happen to mention that to you when your ferrets donated?

I will be contacting the vet on friday to check the status of the
ferret to see if they may still be in need of donors after the weekend
is over. I will also inquire as to the problem the ferret is having,
if they are permitted to tell me so. I don't know how 'patient
confidentiality' works with animals, so there is another question that
has come up as a result of this situation with the ferret in GA - Are
vets bound by confidentiality for animals, like Dr's are bound to it
with 'hoomins'? :)  If I get an answer about the problem with the
ferret, I will post it this weekend.

Howard

[Posted in FML 8123]