I just fired off the following letter, and an exact copy/paste of the item,
and the article about cedar chips from Dr. Williams from
http://www.ferretcentral.org   with all due credit of course...
 
Dear Sirs,
 
Please evaluate the item as listed below for contents.  I have been warned
in a variety of forms from Internet newsgroups to commercial ferret care
books to not use cedar chips as a bedding material.  Ferrets are
litter-trainable and wood pellet or compressed newspaper litter in a litter
pan is about all the litter you need.  Otherwise my ferret seems happy with
old towels, a hammock, and a sleep sack.  Beyond that her floors are bare,
and she looks pretty happy after almost a year... and it's very sanitary
and this is one healthy ferret!  A small litter pan and a bag of compressed
newspaper litter would be more in keeping with modern ferret care and
training theory.  This cage is also a bit small for an active young ferret
... though I realize some people can't afford the big Midwest condo I
bought, a 25 inch cage is barely twice the length of a ferret and offers
little room for exercise.  This will lead to a very cooped up thus hyper
ferret and hyper ferrets can be nippy ferrets, and nippy ferrets end up in
shelters.  Proper education of ferret owners is the key, along with the
right products to support this unique animal.  Thank you for an informative
and well laid out site, and I will keep you in mind for future purchases.
 
Sincerely,
 
Todd J Collins
*Address Expunged for Newsgroup
*Phone Number Expunged for Newsgroup
[log in to unmask]
 
On a related note, I want to praise The Ferret Store www.ferretstore.com
for a great job with customer service.  One of two "double ferret" coffee
mugs came with a big chip on the rim.  I E-mailed them for instructions on
how to return this item, and received a reply that day to not bother
returning it, just pitch the damaged item and a new one is on the way.  A
day or two later I had the replacement mug, no charge.  I am an Information
Technology graduate student and I am employed by a large Telecommunciations
company that does E-commerce, and the number one reason Internet stores
fail is bad customer service.  It is a leap of faith to send your credit
card information to strangers over the 'net, and it always seems like a
miracle that some product actually comes back!  With The Ferret Store I
feel like I am dealing with humans now, and I will continue to do business
with them comfortable in the knowledge that if an order goes bad they will
deal with it!  End of endorsement.
 
Welcome to the wild world of E-commerce and the Internet!  Now if I can
just figure out why Mattie keeps dragging network cards under the sofa and
what she's building under there...
 
Be safe!
Todd
and Mattie "I want my own E-mail server" Ferret
[Posted in FML issue 2871]