I'm baccckkk!  With a very few exceptions, I've been offline for the last
week and a half while I've been sleeping at the hospital to stay with
Elizabeth.  She came home today, and although she will miss school the rest
of the week, she is doing much better.  Thanks from both of us for all the
cards and calls; we both appreciate them!  There are about 250 posts in my
mail box that I will sort through in the next few days and get back to
everyone as soon as possible.  If I missed yours, write again!
 
On another note, I would like to start a thread by posing a question for all
of you regarding your attitudes concerning geriatric ferrets that have
become ill.  Specifically, assume you have an elderly ferret that has come
down with a life threatening disease, but the treatment reduces the quality
of life while at the same time does not offer much more of a long term life
span.  Some of you might think I am addressing Buddy's adrenal problems, and
in a round-about way I am, but this question is not limited to the
circumstances Buddy and I face.  (Besides, I have already answered that
question) This is more of a question regarding the ethics of the pet/owner
relationship, and is related more to the concept of living wills.  So, here
is the question:
 
When is enough enough?  When do you put down the surgical equipment, the
medicines, the intervention, and allow nature to take it's course?
 
I am looking forward to your responses. I will post my opinion later this
week.
 
Q: (From the FML): Can you use styptic pencils to stop bleeding nails?
 
A: Wouldn't an exorcist work better? Must make the walls look gory.
 
Actually, they work fine, but have you ever used one?  They are a great way
of training a ferret to hate nail-clipping.  First you hurt it when you nick
the quick, then you sting the hell out of them with the styptic pencil.
Styptic pencils are a chemical way of stopping bleeding, but mechanical ways
are just as good.  When I was actively studying mink, we would sometimes
clip the nails to the quick in order to obtain blood for study.  We used
beeswax to stop the bleeding.  Just rub it into the nail, and it works like
a charm!  Natural, antiseptic, and, best of all, no sting!  A purified and
sterilized form of beeswax is often used by surgeons to stop cut bones from
bleeding, which might be hard to get, but food-quality grade is just fine.
It is usually found in the canning section at supermarkets.  When I cut
nails to the quick (and we all do one time or another; well, maybe not
TLE...) I just jab the nail into the beeswax, then rub it into the nick with
my finger.  If you like, you can clean and sterilize a metal lip-balm
container, then melt beeswax into it.  Keeps it clean and handy for use.
 
Q: (e-mail; old) There are a lot of new books about ferrets coming out
lately.  Do you have a favorite book?
 
A: Yes, the "Kama Sutra." 2nd choice is "1001 Ways to Make a Fish and
Gestapo Agent Look Really Stupid (Without Really Trying At All)."
 
I am the wrong guy to ask, because I have such high standards (and strong
opinions).  I tend to be quite critical when I read nature books, and have
been trained that way by editors that would just as soon cut body parts as
paragraphs.  So you will have to make up your own mind, but I will give you
a few clues to separate the chaff from the grain.
 
1) Books without references are basically worthless.  You don't need a
science-type reference, just a statement regarding where the information
came from.  Case in point is the myth about ferrets being domesticated in
Egypt.  Maybe so, maybe not, but there is absolutely NO EVIDENCE!  Yet, to
read some ferret books, it is an established fact.  Never trust a book that
doesn't tell you where they got their information.
 
2) Never trust a book that doesn't offer alternative choices.  If a book
says, "While some do A, most feel B is the better choice," it is more
trustworthy than one that says, "B is the only choice." The second author
clearly doesn't respect other opinions than their own, or never did the
research required on the subject.  Case in point are books that suggest
feeding bones/chocolate/whatever to ferrets is terrible, stupid, evil.
Well, maybe.  Where is the evidence?  Books that don't allow the reader to
make well-informed choices on their own are not worth owning.
 
3) Books made of recyled stuff are generally thrown together to take
advantage of the market, and books written by experts in the field generally
reflect the knowledge of the author.  I have six ferret books with almost
identical pictures and/or contents.  Very little is different.  If I read a
paper from a student who copied a source as close as some books follow each
other, I would flunk them for plagerism.
 
4) Watch out for dogmatic language.  If a book says, "No one knows where the
ferret originated, but some suggest Egypt..." or "While no evidence exists
that demonstrates chocolate is bad for ferrets, it is suggested that..." is
much better than a book that says "Ferrets, domesticated in Egypt before the
cat..." or "Chocolate will poison your ferret and should never..." These are
opinions disguised as facts, and demonstrate an unreliability of the book
and author.  A well-written (and trustworthy) book will use qualifiers, such
as "apparent" or "evidence suggests" to inform the reader that the facts are
unclear or unproven.
 
If you judge your ferret books by these criteria, the good ones will become
quite few in number.  I'll let you post which ones are good.
 
Bob C and the Mo' 18.
[Posted in FML issue 1830]