I've got a new, strange thing my ferrets are doing.  Every night, about 2am,
they decide it's time to "wrestle".  One of them always ends up _screaming_.
 
Background - they're both 1.5 years old, and have been together since they
were kits.  I've had them since December.  They have the run of a bedroom
during the day, when I get home they have the run of the whole apartment
('cept the kitchen).  At night they go in their cage.  They're both eating,
drinking, pooping fine.  They run around and wrestle when I'm home without
screaming.  They don't yell when they play with my boyfriend (who plays a
lot more roughly with them then I do).  In fact, the only time they scream
like this is at night, in their cage.  I don't see any broken skin, scabs,
irritation, missing fur, etc.  Oh, and my male (the one I think is doing the
screaming) isn't descented, and while he's only ever "poofed" at the vets,
he's not "poofing" (which I assume is a usual reaction to pain?  He does it
when he gets shots, or his temp.  taken).
 
If I turn on the light, they just look at me like, "What's going on?".  I
think they are fighting over space in the favorite hammock.  Most of the
time I'll flip on a light, tell them to go to sleep, and then repeat for a
half hour or so.  If I'm really, really tired, I'll get up, top off the food
bowl (which never gets less then half-empty), and that will distract them
enough that they do something less disturbing, like dig in the litter box.
 
But they really, really sound like they are killing each other when they do
this.  I hate to seperate them at night - beside the half-hour of yelling,
they spend the rest of the time curled up together.  But I really think one
of them (and I'm pretty sure it's my male screaming when my female attacks)
is getting hurt.  And I'm not sure exactly how to get them to stop.  I don't
think there's something wrong that is making them hurt - if there was,
they'd be yelling everytime something/someone was too rough, right?
 
Anyway, I'm at a loss.  Any suggestions?
 
Tina Marie
Slinky ("But I want _all_ of the red hammock! You go sleep in the
                 other one!")
Toggles("Ouch!  I was here first!  Human, come rescue me!")
[Posted in FML issue 1878]