In answer to"won't they learn to hate the carrier"........ferrets don't
like carriers regardless if they are put in it for time out OR to go to
the vet......but some of the difference is going to the vet they can
have blankeys and toys and "stuff" so that is different. Their minds at
time-out is not "Oh I'm in a carrier, I hate carriers" but rather "I
only bite that lady a little bit, I want back out there, I gotta get
back out there, I was having fun, this ain't fair, I want back out
there, I gotta gotta gotta" By the 2nd time you do that over a certain
behavior, it does cross their mind "OH if I do this, I'll be locked
away from it" The difference is NOTHING in the carrier vs putting them
back into the cage - they don't hate the cage but the cage does give
them other things to occupy their minds with so not a good place for a
time-out (sorta like sending your kids to their room for an hour where
they have phones, computers, tvs, I-Pods and whatever is the craze
now.) The carrier Works but trying to thump them on the nose for
bitting or saying No No you mustn't do that does not work, as we all
know..

Retraining ferrets to potty boxes. What I tell people who call/write
with the problem is to cut down cage space, give them ONE shelf to live
on, potty box on one side, food water on the other, a nice hammock
hanging in the middle, and a blankey wadded up in front of the potty
box. They get the idea in a hurry its not nice to potty on that
blankey, its better in the box. Then start giving more space and make
sure they go back into their potty box. After that, the world is the
limit, their world that is.

Millie and her ferrets and Danes
www.txferretrescue.org 

[Posted in FML 6811]