>From:    K Warniment <[log in to unmask]>
>Subject: Small local breeders
>Can anyone recommend a good way to make sure you find a good local breeder,
>and not one who is just in it for the money?
 
This will be rather hard.  Check for things like age of placement.  The
younger the less interested in the ferrets and the more interested in the
money.  We prefer 12 weeks or older.  We are never in a hurry to place any
kit.  It can stay with us forever.  It often is a matter of perspective on
what you want and what they have.  Good ferrets can come from bad places.
And unfortunately bad ferrets can come from good places.
 
>Is there any way to tell besides actually visiting the sites and checking
>out the fuzzies?
 
Recommendations of others you trust.  Looks for clues in phone
converstations.  If they say things that resemble hard sell sales tactics
than we'd be hesitant.  Things like "we have a waiting list but I can let
you have one of you say so right now".
 
>Are small breeders reluctant to show the parents of the kits?
 
Hopefully not.  We love showing ours off.  Are they ashamed of something?
 
>I recall seeing something like that a few days ago saying that is was hard
>to get a look at the parents.  Why is this?
 
Sometimes the sire (father) is from another breeder maybe even several
states (provinces whatever) away.  The mother should be right there.
Sometimes a jill will have problems and even die but the kits could be
raised by a surrogate.  Try to look at other relatives in cases like that.
 
>From:    Molly Coffey <[log in to unmask]>
>Subject: Um...hi.
>I'm doing a project for a MOO and I need the info.
 
A MOO?  Are those ferrets attacking cows in California again?  You'd have to
have been here a while to understand that.  Talk to Pam Greene about her
Ferret FAQ.  You can read the top of every digest for how to get it.
 
>From:    Maria <[log in to unmask]>
>Subject: Breeding, descenting, spaying/neutering in Sweden - and skunk
>         vaccine
>I live in Sweden where we only have one (as far as I know) large
>breeder.  I think he has about 1500 ferrets and he sells around 900 kits
>to pet stores in Sweden every year.  The ferret clubs inform us not to buy
>from a pet store because there are risk of those ferrets being inbred.  We
>always try to get people to buy from smaller breeders that control their
>breeding all the time.
 
We know about that large breeder in Sweden.  We also have talked with STIF.
We think the breeder is getting the same treatmeant as the ranches here.
Some valid points.  Some unfair.  We believe quite a few of the ferrets from
the smaller breeders came from the one larger breeder.  So you get about the
same genetics.  We do not have a problem with STIF.  We have ferrets from
Sweden.  Some from the large breeder.  Some from smaller ones.  Not much
difference.
 
>According to all the experts I've spoken to there can not be any other
>reason for this other than inbreeding.
 
Doesn't make sense to me.  If there are bad recessive genes in the ferret
population then they can be paired wither from relatives or from
non-relatives.  Same with good recessive genes.  Red hair in humans is
recessive.  That doesn't mean all red haired people are in-bred.  Works the
same in ferrets.  But in Sweden as we understand it this large ranch has
more ferrets than other breeders.  With more ferrets he has a wider gene
pool and thus can have less in-breeding as he has more to choose from.
 
>And thirdly: In Sweden we never spay or neuter our ferrets until they are in
>heat (i.e. at about one year of age).
 
This is a good thing.  We wish that it could work here in the US as well.
The Swedish ferrets that came in to the US are solid healthy animals.  One
took a best in show kit at the AFA show here in Maryland.  Wasn't one we
still had but one we'd picked out for Sally Heber - guess we should have
kept THAT one.
 
>PS. Does anyone know what distemper-vaccine to use on a skunk?
 
Not a ferret but it is a mustelid.  from both of these web pages:
 
   http://www.critterschoice.com/skunk/shealth.htm
   http://elvis.neep.wisc.edu/~firmiss/mephitis-didelphis/skunks_as_pets.txt
 
  The currently recommended vaccines are: GALAXY DA2PPvL+Cv and Eclipse 4,
  given as a baby and then once a year boosters.  This information came from
  the San Diego ZOO after several skunks died from Canine Distemper because
  of the wrong vaccine.
 
These mustelids are very picky about which vaccine to use.  Black Footed
Ferrets and domestic ferrets can get distemper from the wrong vaccines or
even the wrong dosages as well.
 
bill and diane killian
zen and the art of ferrets
http://www.zenferret.com/
mailto:[log in to unmask]
[Posted in FML issue 1766]