At one time apparently there were countries which were considered unlikely
ones in which an animal may be exposed to rabies or other serious
communicable illnesses, and others where the likelihood was considered
higher and the behaviors of officials in relation to requirements,
quarantines, etc.  varied according to that listing.  I do NOT know if
such a list still exists or where Mexico places on it if it does, but I
suspect that it does from something I read about either mad cow or foot
and mouth in relation to ungulates from parts of Europe.  Heck, there
sure are such rules even for dead matter and the customs division that
goes after "bush meat" is kept very busy finding dead animals smuggled
in for eating purposes given that they can bring in some truly horrible
illnesses.
 
There may have been confusion with Black Footed Ferrets which ARE a
protected species in Mexico, in fact, Mexico is putting aside the best
and largest reserve for them and some other endangered species in the
Americas.  It's there that they have the single best future chance for
re-establishing themselves in the wild at this point.  I certainly have
read of multiple US state officials confusing the domestic ferret with
the Black Footed one through the years.  Since it is not terribly unusual
for officials here to confuse one species with another species...
 
(Oh, and before I get "corrections": taxonomy was part of what I worked in
to put myself through school and "species" is both correct as singular and
plural.)
 
IMPORTANT: Too many people spend time looking in black and white and
forgetting shades of gray.  Also, too many forget that errors can
arise from poor reading or poor listening, as well as from from poor
speaking or poor writing.
 
Like some others I have compiled data from ferret owners on and off, only
to find that more accurately it was "data".  Why?  Well, lots of reasons:
most people don't reply.  The ones most likely to reply are those who have
similar worries or gripes so the outcomes get skewed.  There are always
those who like to corrupt data bases.  There are always those who didn't
use a vet but don't want to admit to it, or attribute things to vets that
didn't come from them.  There are always those who just assume that an
assigned age is the same as a known one.  There are always those who don't
read what info you want or how the categories are defined, and answer what
they assume that one wants or what they assume the categories are.  Heck
-- going non-survey for a second -- anyone remember that before the Ferret
Health List on Yahoo we had a special list for puzzling cases to be read
by vets?  Know what killed that?  We had three people who sent in FALSE
reports with faked reports or faked diagnoses (and recognizably so, though
verification of that was sought) and wasted the time of the volunteer vets
(when they had precious little to lose).  Anyway, those are the problems i
encountered and I have gotten similar stories from multiple people who
also ran surveys.  Internet surveys are notoriously undependable due to
such sampling problems.
 
>>Marshall Farms is the ONLY farm we have heard of that ever had a
>>permanent position for a vet working on staff.
 
>Nope, not the only one.
 
Danielle, which other farm?  I have not read or heard of any others with
one actually on-staff, but instead of ones using weekly visits by a
contracted vet.
[Posted in FML issue 3625]