Hi,
    Three months ago, I adopted two ferrets, Monzy and Slinky.  Monzy is a
2.5 year old male and Slinky is a 1.5 year old female ferret.  They were
sold to me as a breeding pair and had been bred once before.  Shortly after
adopting them, I had them both fixed.  Up until around a week ago, they
seemed very chummy and happy to hang out with each other.
    However, over the last week, Slinky (the female) has started to attack
Monzy (the male).  She starts jumping on him and trying to get her teeth
into his neck or body and then tries to pull back and forth as a dog would
when trying to break the neck of a smaller animal.  There is still a fair
amount of dooking with a few cries and screams.  Monzy is twice the size of
Slinky but is not aggressive enough to really deter her.  Monzy tries to
run away but Slinky just chases him and continues to attack.  This
behaviour can last up to 10 minutes and seems to happen once a day.
    They still hang out with each other when they play and sleep together
at night.  Slinky has always been the dominant ferret but has never
exhibited this type of behaviour before.  I'm not sure if this is just
natural play for them or if I should be concerned and seperate them when
Slinky gets aggressive.  A friend suggested that perhaps Slinky is jealous
of the attention that I pay to Monzy but I pay an equal amount of attention
to both ferrets.  The same friend said that this could possibly be the
result of a adrenal tumour(?) in Slinky but considered this to be
improbable since she is so young.  I think it is also unlikely since Slinky
acts agressively neither towards myself nor my girlfriend.
    Anyway, I would appreciate any advice anyone has to give.
 
                     Sean Affleck
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PS To the anonymous person with the urine drinking ferret ... I've caught
Monzy doing it once as well.
[Posted in FML issue 1220]