To all of you with new ferrets who are worried about your ferrets not
getting along:
 
Currently we have 7.  The first two were littermates - sisters, so of
course Massey and Eris got along!
 
The second two were close in age, from the same breeder, but not
littermates.  I got them as kits also.  Massey and Eris paid no mind to
Little Iodine, the girl, but Massey took Sluggo, the new boy under the TV
set and beat the tar out of him.  She spent that first day dragging around
a crying kit.  Io and Sluggo had no problems getting along, and I never saw
Massey or Eris react to establish any dominance after that again.
 
Then our shelter ferret, Sophie joined us.  And Sophie had a time of it.
Eris and Massey would charge her agressivly, spray (Sophie is the only
descented one) chew the back of her neck until she was raw, not let her eat
if they were awake, and Massey even tried to bite my hands once because I
had been holding Sophie - she ran straight up my leg!  The screaming and
spraying went on for the better part of a month.  We really began to despair
from keeping Sophie.  Even Iodine, normally rather jovial about everything,
hassled Sophie, who would run screaming every time.  It took a long time,
but Sophie seemed to be less concerned about the other ferrets and they
stopped bugging her.
 
When Helga arrived there was not a single episode of agression or dominance.
She slept with them from day one.  Somehow that took some of the pressure
off of Sophie and she really became part of the crew, playing, grooming and
sleeping together.
 
When Nicky came - no one noticed!
 
So I think that most new ferrets eventually do settle in to a group of
existing ferrets.  At one point I even wrote Bob Church, master of ferret
integration.  He suggested that I stop caging Sophie seperately and just let
her run with the gang.  It hurt to do it - you could hear ferret screaming
everywhere in the house, but it did work.
 
This may not apply for all small kits, and I know I'd be careful if there
was a concern of real injury taking place.  I'd also not confine a new
ferret to a cage with the existing ferrets - choosing to integrate in a
ferret room or during play time, but I agree with Bob - they do work things
out.  I also think single adult ferrets, who think they are the only ferret
have more problems accepting new ferrets - perhaps more caution here?
 
Ann
--
forces of evil in a bozo nightmare
bent all the music with a phony gas chamber
cuz one's got a weasel and the other's got a flag
one's on the pole, shove the other in a bag
 
Beck - Loser
[Posted in FML issue 2292]