One thing to always remember with Lysodren is that exposure to water or
saliva WILL destroy its effectiveness.  Give it with fats/oils, or fat-based
nutritional gels (NOT laxatives).  Examples of effective media are Linatone
and Nutrical.
 
Follow the rule above with Enacard as well for the same reason.
 
A question came up where the moneys channeled through the Morris Animal
Foundation for the series of rabies shedding studies is coming from.  Part
of it is from direct donation to that fund made to the foundation, and part
is from their General Fund, a fund which is applied to studies deemed by
their consultant vets to be essential but which may not receive quite as
many donations as they would like.  For whatever reasons -- perhaps because
many ferret owners are young so their incomes are still low -- ferret health
studies in various locations around the country still are very
proportionately underfunded per capita pet (just as ferret shelters are)
compared to these services to help cats and dogs.
 
A distressed poster complained about the number of ill and dying posts.
Yes, there have been quite a lot recently and I sent a large number of them.
Ferrets live rather short lives, about like golden retrievers, so with so
very many folks here there will always be some of us going through a rough
stretch.  Hopefully, you will NOT know what this is like for a very, very,
very long time, but at some point you will and then we will be here to help
you.  During the illnesses the posts help us all learn to recognize
illnesses faster so that our own ferrets have a better chance of surviving
and being happy.  Over the years the FML has taught about getting ferrets to
eat with psychological tricks (such as competition for food from another
held ferret, and just plain old praise with long, long cuddles -- still the
best), noting infantile behavior or symptoms to spot any illness early,
chemo, ligating vena cavae, partial bilateral adrenalectomies, ECE treatment
and support care, canine distemper, vaccine reactions, flu, supplementing
with florinef and the like for complete bilaterals, the Tennessee panel,
surviving strokes and ventricular bigemini, and so many more things that is
impossible to mention them all.  When it began no one had even TRIED chemo
for a ferret!!!!  (We know because around 9 years ago Helix was in the AMC,
one of the world's premier veterinary research hospitals, as the first;
unfortunately, it was JL and no one even knew the differences between any of
the lymphos back then.) Read the early FMLs and you will see that our
ferrets usually died with weeks or at most a couple of months of the onset
of a serious illness.  Sometimes the illness just was not spotted at all
because no one (even the vets) knew what to look for.  Too many are still
clueless.  Now there are cancer survivors, and those with long-term (a year
or more) management of things like lympho or cardiomyopathy.  After the
critters are gone sympathy letters help a person begin thinking about the
ferret's life more than the loss.  I can't verbalize how thoroughly the
letters we have received have helped us, and how people's kindnesses have
helped us heal.  For the most part people here stick together and help each
other, and that has always been the case.  It's a good crowd.  It you can't
deal with tears one day then just pass the sad posts.  Most will understand;
understanding each other is part of what we try to do each day for each
other.  -- Sukie
[Posted in FML issue 1896]