Some time ago, maybe a month or more, someone (Alexandra??) mentioned
macaroni in a plastic tub to amuse ferrets.  I have eight fuzzbutts who
range in age from 4 months to three years, and although they have a room
to themselves during the day, they still get bored.  It was time to spice
up their lives.
 
I went to WalMart and bought a large plastic bin, about 18" high, 3' long
and 18" deep, with a snap down lid.  It was cheap, only about $5.00.
Then we bought 14 pounds of elbow macaroni and dumped it all in.  Viola,
a ferret circus!
 
Shelby our 3 year old Alpha ferret sniffed, looked at me as if to say
'yeah, so what'?  and promptly hopped out, but the others thought this
was the hottest thing since Cheweasels!  It was a fight to see how many
could fit in the tub, who could fling the pasta the furthest, who could
dig the deepest and who could act crazier.
 
We have 4 month old brother and sister who are both deaf, and they seem
to enjoy the physical stimulation more than anyone.  The reverse skunk
sister Ruby timidly approaches the tub, stands up to peer over the side
and sees her brother Patches thrashing from side to side with wild
abandon and decides to jump in.  New textures!  New smells!  She pounces,
she dives, she body slams her brother then does a high jump and scales
the tub wall in a single bound!  She's so excited that she does an
extremely exaggerated weasel war dance so vigorously that my son says
she's going to give herself shaken baby syndrome!
 
Saide, our 2 year old minature girl, Sparky our 1.5 year old HUGE male,
Nibbles the 8 month old boy, (whose no slouch in the size department)
and Little One our 7 month old albino girl take turns war dancing on
this shifting ground, pouncing on eachother, alligator rolling eachother
and tunneling deep to pop up and surprise attack the others.  They get
themselves so excited that they fling themselves out of the box to bounce
across the room to the nearest dumping station, a quick butt slide and a
running jump back into the melee!
 
Rocky our 1.5 year old rescue is sooooo timid, he looks with yearning at
everyones antics and you can see the fascination in his eyes.  But being
the shy thing that he is, (never was allowed to play before and isn't
always sure how to) looks at me, looks at the box, looks back to me.
Rocky, do you want to play?  Everyone else gets scooped out and we try
to hold them at bay while I put Rocky in by himself to test the waters.
He sniffs, he looks at me, he sniffs some more and then burys his head
up past his ears in the macaroni....and stays that way.  Does he have
an ostriche in his past??  Suddenly the head pops back up and he digs,
tunneling his rather large belly-dragging frame deep into the pasta, then
pops up with an absolute look of amazement and joy on his face.  Suddenly
he's war dancing and bouncing off the walls, flinging macaroni and diving
back in.  Being such a gentle giant, Rocky prefers the easier wrestle of
the little girls and one by one they hop in to play with him.  He's found
nirvana and it's name is elbow macaroni!
 
Our new objective now is to add scents to their old toys, add more
macaroni and bury the 'new' toys deep in the bottom to keep the
wonderment new to these kids.  For less than $20.00 we've added
enrichment and joy to our babies lives, which in turn gives us endless
pleasure :-)
 
Leslie
[Posted in FML issue 4855]