[2 part post combined into one.  BIG]
 
It is very difficult for ferrets to go feral.  After looking the long list
of locations where ferrets have been (or are) feral, and you still don't
see it, don't feel bad.  You are no different than those Sultans of
Stupidity, the CaCaLand Fishing Gestapo and Inbreeding Society.  All you
need is a moderate understanding of published literature, mediocre
understanding of ferret physiology (olfactory imprinting, reproduction), a
poor to middling understanding of 3 areas of ecology (predator avoidance,
prey location, predation skills) and a very slight understanding of New
Zealand ecology.  Get these under your belt, and you will be able to shred
ANY feral ferret argument that comes your way, leaving the hapless victim
drowning in their own drool over your extensive knowledge and expert use
of the facts.  In other words, if you are just twice as smart as a boiled
potato, you will be more than a match for those butt nuggets at the
CaCaLand Fishing Gestapo and Phart Farm.
 
The vast majority of "feral ferret" reports are either untracable gray
literature (unpublished reports) or personal communications.  What this
means is, while a sighting of a ferret might have been made, no study was
done so there is no way of knowing if the ferret was actually feral or
lost, but it still ends up being cited as "feral." Often, someone will not
be able to trace the information, so instead will cite the author who cited
the untracable data.  This is BAD science, yet the majority of "feral
ferret" sightings are of this type.  For example, the CaCaLand Fishing
Gestapo and Mental Masterbationeers often cite Hoffmeister's book "The
Mammals of Arizona," to claim feral ferrets live in that state.  However,
when reading the book, you discover NO feral ferrets were actually found,
just two SIGHTINGS were made.  Where they feral?  Where they lost?  Where
they even ferrets?  (Arizona longtailed weasels are frequently brindled;
that is, they sport a ferret-like mask).  Without a peer-reviewed field
study, the claim that a ferret is "feral" cannot be made.  It is the
scientific equivilent of saying a particular gun is a murder weapon without
testing the ballistics and prints.  The ONLY way you can determine if a
ferret is feral is by field work.  Ever wonder why the CaCaLand Fishing
Gestapo and Butt Pucker Society has refused to do a field study?
 
There are two important aspects of ferret physiology which make it
extremely difficult for them to go feral; reproduction and olfactory
imprinting.  Ferrets do not clump in the wild; they are solitary carnivores
and exclude other ferrets of the same sex.  In order for ferrets to form
feral colonies, they have to be able to reproduce.  This can only take
place if 1) you are not neutered, and 2) there are enough fertile ferrets
around to bite and grunt with each other.  Neutered or solitary ferrets
CANNOT form a feral population.  Even if there was a individual feral
ferret, because the lifespan is limited in the wild, the ferret has an
insignificant impact on the environment.
 
Reproduction assumes the ferret can overcome a major hurdle; olfactory
imprinting.  Ferrets hunt with their nose; even when prey animals are
abundant, they usually only take those they find by smell, not sight.
Olfactory imprinting takes place during a specific period of the ferret's
life; the period of time that spans from weaning to juvenile independence.
By the time a ferret is making its own living, it has already been
programed to accept only certain smells as food related.  A major-reason
ferrets do not easily form feral colonys is because they don't recognize
the new prey odors as "food."  Most die of starvation-related disease prior
to overcoming their imprinting.
 
Now, just suppose your ferret can reproduce and find things to eat.  Now
can they go feral?  Well, just knowing what food smells like doesn't mean
you know how to catch it.  Studies with the black-footed ferret and the
steppe polecat (often called the Siberian polecat) clearly prove polecats
(ferrets included) have to LEARN how to hunt.  Learning to hunt makes all
the difference in the world; the difference between starvation and just
making it.  While instincts can tell you what to do once you find the prey,
it is hunting skills that gets you to the prey to begin with.  Besides,
you have to know WHERE to hunt (also taught during the polecat predation
training program).  So, for ferrets to go feral, they have to be able to
recognize the smell of prey, locate it, and hunt it successfully.  A pet
ferret, with their olfactory imprinting and lack of predation skills,
simply lacks these abilities.  Sure, toss a mouse in a room full of
ferrets, and some of them will take it down, kill it, carry it around and
finally eat it, but that is a far cry from surviving in the wild.
 
Last in this very short list of reasons why it is difficult for the ferret
to go feral, is New Zealand; about the only place on earth where ferrets
have naturalized as a true feral population.  It is the place where
everyone points to and shouts, "GAWD!!  They're WILD!" New Zealand is The
CaCaLand Fishing Gestapo and Intellectually Challenged Club's silver bullet
in the ferret legalization issue.  Except they are firing blanks.  While
some aspects of New Zealand are very much like CaCaLand, there is one major
difference; except for sea mammals and a couple of bats, ALL mammals on the
island have been introduced by humans.  Rabbits were introduced first, and
when they increased their population so much that sheep grazing land was
threatened, in came the weasels, stoats, ferrets, and some polecats by the
thousands.  The death rate for the ferrets must have been unbelievable; I
estimate most of them died of predation or starvation within a few weeks.
But, because of the enormous food supply in the form of rabbits, rats,
mice, and local fauna, enough survived to form the "seed" for today's
population (Yes, I have almost unrefutable evidence for this die-off, which
is why I am going to New Zealand next Feb.  to gather just a little more
evidence to prove it.  (Cash donations welcome, I do not accept checks
unless they are large and certified).
 
There were several factors on the ferret's side which do not exist in
CaCaLand, or much of any other place except small islands (OooOOoOOo, see
a trend in the British feral populations?).
 
1) No competition.  No mink, fox, longtailed weasels, coyotes, bobcats,
   etc., as found in CaCaLand.
2) Unnaturally large food supply just waiting for them.  In CaCaLand, prey
   species are kept at natural levels by existing predators.
3) Thousands of breeding-capable individuals released at one time.  Even if
   ferrets are lost or strayed in CaCaLand, they are individuals, not
   groups.  The chances of two breeding ferrets finding each other to make
   woopie are worse than proving OJ did it.
4) The ferrets released in New Zealand were olfactory imprinted on prey
   species, specifically rabbits.  Pet ferrets are not; there is no kibble
   in the wild.
5) At the time of the ferret release, there were very few predators that
   would kill and eat the ferrets.  Try that in CaCaLand, where coyotes,
   fox, bobcat and cougar come into back yards for Fido.
6) In New Zealand, the ferrets were directly released into the countryside.
   In CaCaLand, ferrets are most abundant in urban areas, places where cats
   and rats already own the neighborhood.
7) When ferrets were released in New Zealand, about the worst traffic
   hazard was a slow moving horse.  In CaCaLand, more animals are killed
   by cars than by hunters.  One of the ways they study polecats in Europe
   is to drive around and pick up the flattened polecat fauna.  I'd LOVE
   to see a ferret make its way from El Monte to suitable habitat.  Humans
   can't even do it.
 
So, while ferrets can certainly go feral, and places exist where ferrets
ARE feral, in a comparison to ALL OTHER domesticated animals, they are very
bad at it.  Cats and dogs are feral anywhere humans live.  Goats, sheep,
pigs, cows, and horses are feral in almost as many places.  Ferrets aren't
even as successful as introduced wild animals, such as weasels, stoats,
fox, deer, a long list of birds, rats, mice and even some really disgusting
insects.  The next time you hear those pus-filled crania at the CaCaLand
Fishing Gestapo and Oral Flatulence Society start farting out their
"facts," you pull out your debate hammer and smear their ass all over the
debate table.  Which might be messy because they are all ass, so stand
back.  Can you tell this ticks me off?  It's bad enough that they do
piss-poor science at Gestapo Headquarters (known as the Purulent Police
Palace), but when they use it to force their undemocratic will against
taxpayers, it just lights my rocket.  These guys have the intellectual
equivent of Tourette's syndrome; all they spout forth is scientific
garbage.  I would just LOVE to have an unedited, televised debate with
every one of those saprovoric microbrains.  Sometimes you just have to put
on the cowboy boots to get to the cockroaches in the corners.
 
Bob C and 16 Mo' Cockroach Killers [and]
Bob C and 16 Mo' Cucaracha Crunchers
[Posted in FML issue 2730]