Howdy, Y'all,
 
        Well, after surviving winter break with a friend's ferret just
fine (aparently they got along famously), Ceili nearly killed herself
last night- and scared me to the same point.
        I got home after school, and when I walked in the door and
turned on the light, there was Ceili, kindof sitting/hanging just under
the couch by the door.  Normaly if I walked in, she'd scamper away right
off, scared by the door opening.  But she didn't move at all, nor squeek
or anything.  Needless to say I realized something was wrong and just
dropped my stuff and investigated- I was starting to cry already.
        What had happened was that she had gotten into some fishing wire
that was in a box she'd never gotten into before but somehow managed to
get into finally.  She had played with the wire and gotten herself
tangled up in it rather badly- it was wrapped around her 4 or 5 times,
just behind her front legs, fairly tightly- she was gasping for air a
bit.  Worse, she had aparrently runaround this was for a bit, and the
other end of the fising wire had become caught on the sofa- her back was
on the ground, but her front was hanging off the ground just a little.
She had obvoisly not been able to eat or drink for some space of time.
        So I ran to find the nearist cutting device (nail clippers) and
freed her from the sofa.  This did not loosen the wire wrapped around
her body any, but i figured first things first- she was really weak and
completely flaccid- I took her over to her water and helped her drink-
she couldent use her back legs at all, but she could support herself in
front enough to reach the water bottle.  Once she started drinking, she
drank for a long while, and once I saw she could do it herself, I went
for the scissors, and quickly returned to snip off the rerst of the
wire.  She was still drinking- I figure that she may have been stuck
that way for three hours or so.
        Well, the long and short of it was that after an hour or so, she
was mostly her old self again- she ate some food and seemed to feel a
bit better, although she wasn't quite as frisky as normal for a while.
As of today, more than 24 hours after the event, she is perfectly
herself again, so all's well.  It gave me quite a turn, though.  Just
when you tthink you got everything out of harms way...
        Normaly thins sort of trouble probably woulden't happen, becuae
my roomate and I are in and out a lot durring the day, but my roomate
isn't back yet because his school doesnt start for another few days.  I
think for the remander of that time, I will put her in her cage when I'm
not going to be in for a while- although I feel bad about locking her up
(she's used to complete freedom), it's safer than having anything of
this sort again.
        I also have a question for y'all- how much does your ferret
sleep?  In the Barron's book it says "up to 14 hours a day", but Ceili
seems to think 14 hours is a minimum- she can and does sleep up to 20
hous a day.  This was not always the case, either- when I first got her,
she defenatly did not sleep that long.  I sort of think it may have to
do with the winter light, but I'm still a little worried.  She's pretty
active when she *is* up, though.
        Lastly, Inez mentioned Dr. Bernie's Pet Connection a few issues
back (I only caught up tonight).  I've seen this show a number of times-
I used to watch it every saturday, waiting for an article on ferrets.
when they finally did, it was a bit of a let-down, as all they did was
give a basic introduction to ferrets.  they did, however, show them in
a very good light- they had a little girl on with her 3 ferrets, and
explained that ferrets did not deserve the reputation they sometimes
have.  The show is basicly about cats and dogs, however.  It's Canadian
(Dr. Bernie is from Toronto), and at least in Boston it's on the
Discovery Channel on Sat. late mornings (11:30 or 12:00 I think)
 
ethan and ceili (who is sleeping in my bed, as usual)
 
[Posted in FML issue 0694]