Hi you fellow ferret fanciers,
 
   Well, just to update you, Jazmine (the ferret), Jill (my wife), and
I are doing fine.  We had a little bout with ear mites over the
weekend.  We took Jazmine to the vet yesterday, and he cleaned her
ears out with mite-killer.  The only problem is that it cost $40,
and he wants us to come back next week for another cleaning.
 
   We're cleaning her ears in the meantime (with a Qtip) as
there's still some wax coming out, along with the odd black speck
(is that what the ear mites are?).  My question is, is there something
I can get in a pet store that is a good remedy for ear mites?
Is this something we can deal with ourselves, or should we really
go back to the vet?  I would like to avoid going back to the vet,
both from a cost point of view and also owing to the fact that
Jazmine didn't enjoy the experience very much.
 
[See my message below.  Ed.]
 
   Another thing that bothered me about the trip to the vet was that
he incidentally asked me what kind of food I was feeding her, and
I replied that I was using IAMS kitten food.  He looked at me rather
dissapointingly and basically told me if I wasn't feeding her
the ferret food they sold there, that I was risking health problems
in a couple of years.  He was quite adamant that ferrets should NOT
be fed cat food.  I tried to point out that the protein and fat
content of the two food were very close.  The food he recommended
is the Kay-Tee Forti Diet that I had Jazmine on before.  Its protein
is 35%, fat is 18%.  The IAMS is 33% protein and fat is 22%.  He
went on to argue that just because some (protein and fat) is good,
that more isn't necessarily better.  He also said that cat foods
have taurine which cats need but ferrets really don't.  I pointed out
that the Kay-Tee stuff has added L-Taurine.
 
   To make a long story short, I was a little put off.  I was under the
impression that the IAMS was pretty good stuff.  The ingredients listing
for the IAMS has lots of chicken by-products etc. at the top, whereas
the Kay-Tee stuff has a lot of ground corn and fish meal.  I'm not
sure what to think now.
 
   On another front, I'm trying to attack Jazmine's habit of defecating
outside of the litter box by buying several litter boxes and putting one
in each of her favourite latrine spots.  There's 5 litter boxes in our
apartment now! (including the one in her cage).  It seems to be working
better, as she's actually gone in the box since without our intervention.
 
   Anyways, I should wrap this up, I guess.
 
   Happy ferreting!
 
   Charlie Cook
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[Posted in FML issue 0716]