Out of curiosity, I checked around some dog breeding and wefare sites.
They seem to use 'hobby' breeder to mean show breeder, breeder at home
with one or two animals or small kennel, and backyard breeder to mean
irresponsable breeder, usually breeding the family pet to get cute puppies
with little regard to pedigree.
 
Backyard breeder is used by dog fanciers quite a bit, especially rescues,
since can mean any sort of irresposable breeder, not just a large 'factory
style' breeder.
 
Here's a good set of differences
http://www.lhasa-apso.org/articles/pmill.htm
 
I suspect these differences would work just as well for 'hobby ferret
breeder', 'ferret mill' and 'backyard ferret breeder'.
 
I think the easiest way to sum up this page is that a backyard breeder
usually breeds a few private pet animals to either make money or to have
cute kits, with little regard to genetics, neuter/spaying, the health of
the jills or the number of homes already available to place kits into.
A hobby breeder may also only breed a few private animals, but they are
breed with regards to genetics (usually by studding them with another hobby
breeder's animal if there is only a few animals being kept), are pedigreed
by at least three generations not only for showing but for health, are bred
wih regards to their health, are sold with a neutering/spaying agreement,
and are littered after the prospective owners are found.
 
Remember, many of our terms come from the dog and cat showing world, so we
might as well take advantage of that in cases like these to fall back on
authority ;)
 
Probably the least troublesome term to end sematics wars with such flamey
members as this new 'Dee' is 'fancy', a good general word.  Or will this
lead to accusations that one must not fancy ones ferrets?
 
Mel (evil of a.p.f)
[Posted in FML issue 3203]