Epizootic catarrhal enteritis aka.  green slime, ECE, Irish diarrhea, and
perhaps with other descriptive names, has to date not manifested itself in
the ferret colonies at Ferrets NorthWest FNW, near Seattle, Washington.
 
Yet the symptoms of ECE are present in individual ferrets from time to time
throughout the Puget Sound region.
 
FNW boards ferrets, takes in strays, receives owner forsakens, and
intimately associates the FNW ferrets with privately owned ferrets that are
brought to FNW for partnership matching, so that the owned ferret may have a
ferret companion, due to the owner's heartfelt pangs of anguish that the
domiciled ferret may be lonely.  FNW ferrets are fettered in a manner that
permits them to dig in fresh soil for up 10 hours some days, such that they
are exposed to the mother of all bacteria, viruses, prions, and other
biological agents yet unknown, and that is Mother Earth.
 
In short, FNW ferrets are in no way isolated from the greater ferret
community of the Puget Sound region.  Hence, why should FNW ferrets be so
"lucky?" Or, rather, does "luck" have little if anything to do with our
apparent immunity?
 
ECE, I'm given to understand, affects the lining of the intestines and
seriously depletes the cellular water throughout the entirety of the
ferret's bodily tissues.  Thus, starvation and dehydration are symptomatic.
 
The causitive agent(s) is unknown, although a viral agent is theorized by
the erudites.  Yet there is one unerudite who says to you, Hmmm, I wonder,
as perhaps some of you do too.
 
In hmmm-ing and wondering, there is one practice here at FNW that is perhaps
radical and not really based on any one scientific fact.  Nor, to my
knowledge is this practice practised anywhere else in the world.  That
practice is the habitual feeding of FNW ferrets of a simple home-made, low
cost ($, not time) porridge soup (LUMPS) that complements an extensively
wide array of dried pet foods, and not necessarily just ferret food.
 
Perhaps one of the most vital ingredients in the home-made porridge soup is
yoghurt, a naturally occuring consequence of bacterial/enzymatic action on
milk.  Although anything is possible,'tis said, is there the possibility
that the ingestion by the ferret of the multitudinous bacteria endymic to
natural yoghurt renders, in effect, the ferret's GI tract "immune" to the
agent(s) associated with ECE?
 
I should like to appeal to the bacteriologist/nutritionist/biochemist who
may have an interest in this trail to eruditeness to explain the mode of
action of the diverse bacteria in the gut of a living mammal to the extent
that these microbes enhance the processes of life.  After extensive
research, let me list the particular microbes that are involved:
 
Lactobacilus acidophilis, L. plantarum, L. bulgaricus, L. casei, Streptococci
thermophilus, Bifidobacterium bifidum, Streptococci faecium, and
Bifidobacterium infantis.  Of the complementing enzymes I'm absolutely
unerudite.
 
What is it that each one of these 8 bacteria do to me and to my ferret?
Just as matter of interest, the ferrets at FNW receive 14 billion (that's
with the letter "b.") bacteria every two days in their LUMPS.
 
Omni ignotum pro magnifico [L.] Everything unknown is magnificent.
 
Edward Frettchenvergnuegen Lipinski,  Der Frettchenlustbarkeitsfuehrer !
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[Posted in FML issue 2118]