I guess I'll chime in on this one! I bought my first ferret in 1977,
at the pet store where I worked. She was not spayed/ decented and came
from 'Colorado Ferrets' (confirmed by Bob Church, he told me they were
one of the first pet store breeders. Others also came from area 'back
yard' breeders. She died at two of Aplastic anemia. Spayed too late. I
did try breeding her a few times. Which brought her out of season.

Louise and seven ferrets after that were fed Meow Mix/ Kitten Chow. I
do believe I fed Iams kitten chow when it first came out , too. I still
have those 20+ year old books that told you to hold them with gloves
and feed them bread and milk...really!! They were kept in a 55 gallon
fish tank with cedar chips and cardboard boxes for a house. A big glass
puppy water bottle for water. No litter box. They did have run of my
parents house quite alot also.

Sounds awful now....compared to my kids presently, who have their own
free roam room, plus run of the house. All had to be spayed, and my
Vet didn't decent them. I highly doubt they had any shots at all.
MAYBE once, plus a rabies one time.

This is a list of my first group, at my parents house. (had 12 at my
BF's house, all gone now, and currently have 5, picking up #6 at the
Buckeye Bash!)

Louise-'77-80-Aplastic Anemia/ black roan mitt, as they are called now

Rigby-'80-81-accident/ sable

Sadie-'80-91-old age, plus insulinoma...had the 'screaming'kind/sable

Samantha-'80-? my Siberian got ahold of her. :( /silver/ roan

Sally-'83-'87-tumor in her abdomen/ silver/roan

Ceclia-'83-? got outside, killed by a dog/ sable

Gizmo-'84-94-Adrenal, as we call it now, the Vet then called it a
'hormone' problem. Was never treated for it. Put to sleep at 10 years
old...mostly 'naked' :(/ sable

Sushi- ?-?- '80's-came from our local Zoo. Had a huge tumor on her side./ 
Light chocolate

Guess my point to writing this is...it looks like those 'problems'
showed up back then too!

P.S. to Sukie...who was that breeder who had the orange ferrets? Wasn't
she from MI???

           Joan and the 5 Fuzzies

[Posted in FML 5708]