=== heat cycles
>I was not aware that temperature could affect the estrus cycle.  Have other
>breeders experienced this?
 
Yes - this is quite possible and one way mother nature helps her children
survive.  That is one reason I wait at least two weeks to make sure a jill
is in heat, in case she decides to cycle out because of poor conditions.
 
===   Show results and pedigrees.
 
>Being a persnickety person, I have been mildly to moderately to seriously
>frustrated by two large gaps that I perceive in the world of ferrets.  The
>first is the lack of readily available show results and the second is the
>lack of readily available pedigrees.
 
If you subscribe to the group's newsletter that put on the show, you will
see published show results.  As to pedigrees, there are two groups out that
I know of with pedigree records.  Breeder's Digest and a group in Michigan.
Or you just ask the breeder where you obtained the ferret for the lineage
chart.  You will not fine backgrounds on pet shop ferrets.  Many show
catalogs also list the sire and dam of showing ferrets, and I, as do many of
the breeders and showers, tend to keep these for historical purposes.  I
might just have the finest collection of old IFA show catalogs, and I do
have them sorted into albums for referral purposes.
 
Pamela Troutman Grant
STAR* Ferrets
[Posted in FML issue 1824]