Dear Ferret Folks-
 
Ever since our recent move, Puma has been...well....acting like a puma!
A big, tawny, fanged predator!
 
It used to be a source of amusement that from time to time at the old
house she would run past my bare feet, and give me a chomp on the way.
(ME, never Dann.  She is Daddy's little girl!) Well, since the move she
has started biting my feet much more frequently, and harder, too.  Now
it's not just my feet....she comes up behind me and LEAPS through the
air as high as my knee, wraps her front legs around my shin and digs in
with her fangs.  *Hard.* Imagine bad Hong Kong martial arts movie leaps.
Her "Aieeee!" would not quite match up with the movement of her lips.
She goes for my hands when she can, too.  As per her usual habit, she
reserves these attacks for me, and not my husband.
 
The other day she even gave my three year old nephew a good chomp on the
back of his calf.  He was a *very* good boy.  I have always taught him
that it is bad to kick ferrets, they could be terribly hurt, they might
even die.  Obediently, he simply shook her off of his leg, and did not
kick her to kingdom come, which I am sure was his first (and reasonable)
instinct.  He got a popsicle for bravery on and beyond the mandate of
a three year old.  Puma got a time out in the cage.  I am very glad my
little sister (the mother of my nephew) was not there to witness this,
she probably would have tied Puma in a knot, or maybe me.  Maybe both
of us.
 
Now, Ping and Puma used to have their own room, but here at the new house
they have a pretty darn nice four foot tall cage on wheels.  The cage is
attached to about twenty feet of four inch black PVC drainage pipe, the
stuff that looks like bendy straw along its length.They can run in that
while confined to the cage.  Not a bad set-up for a ferret, but not what
they are accustomed to.  I give them lots of run time outside of the
cage, but the cage is going to be a fact of life until we can build a
new room onto our very small house.
 
I guess I could understand some initial freaking out over the change in
living arrangements, but *Ping* has certainly adjusted well.  He is the
same old Dude.  Once he was able to establish that his *food* followed
him here from the old house, he was just fine.  Puma, however, has become
a sabertoothed ferret.  If *I* could adjust to the new Puma simply by
wearing shoes when she is out running, I would....but these flying leaps
are HORRID, and I have to deal with them the several times a day that I
let her out.
 
Times out back in the cage?  HAH!  No effect.  A scruff and being told
firmly "No bite!" Hah!  Ditto, no effect.  Extra loving... ferretone...
treats.... no effect.
 
What do I doooooo?  Help!  My shins are starting to look like Flanders
in 1918.
 
Alexandra in MA
[Posted in FML issue 5341]