An Eye and I,

*To* those who may be having eye trouble or other health problems, We
offer our heartfelt, sincere thoughts for those suffering and that the
immediate future will hold the maximum and greatest relief possible.
Here's to you both, steins held high . . . Clink! and the best of luck.

Hopefully no one will take offense from my remark following, that the
new, news to me about eye problems, has allowed a new stirring, a new
surfacing, of my thoughts that I've long held concerning eyes, not
only of Church and Crandal, but the eye of the ferret.

We pretty well know the physical differences between our eye and the
ferret eye. Of these differences at least two stand out in my mind.

The first difference is the coating/substance internal of the eye that
directs received light to bounce back and forth inside the eye and not
be completely absorbed immediately on the sensitive surface termed the
retina, as occurs in our eye. The oscillating coursing of light packets
and light waves internal of the ferret eye give that eye a unique
property of enhancing dim and dimmer light to be sensed by the back
end of the ferret brain. As some say, this capability gives the ferret
night sightedness.

You know the ferret's normal environment is dark, since daylight abode
for the wild ferret is subterranean and the night is terranean, as
hunting for food occurs following emergence from the burrow, possibly
after several days of imposed fasting when prey is less plentiful. For
the wild ferret, its feast or famine, gorging or fasting.

NOTE: Speculation has it that light energy sensed by the ferret during
inappropriate times may very well play a contributory role in the
development of adrenal cancer and/or disease of other organs of the
endocrine system. The ferret owner should provide the caged or free
running ferret a goodly patch of opaque medium to heavy weight
material. If available to the ferret, you will see that the ferret
takes considerable care to burrow under the material patch and hide his
head (eyes)from incident light, especially during darkness. I recommend
that cage hammocks be not used, get rid of them, since the ferret
cannot shield his eyes unless the owner has enough sense to add a dark,
heavy patch cover to the hammock, so light is blocked. Open hammocks
may very will contribute to the rampant incidence of disease and I will
never use one unless it is a double, heavy duty hammock that permits
the ferret to burrow in between its two parts.

Second, finding a wandering ferret in the dark is quite easy. The eyes
will glow in the dark for some extraordinary distance away from a
person who takes his time in searching with a strong flashlight. When
the flashlight is directed about 25 degrees or so above horizontal the
ferret eye picks up the peripheral light rays and as they bounce around
inside the ferret eye, there appears to be a magnification of the
light, some additional spectra are additive, and the eye appears to
shine even more brightly than the light of the flashlight itself. A
greenish tint is visible. Viewing the eyes luminosity of a rambunctious
ferret is very funny. It reminds me of the days long ago when in the
theaters the viewers would sing the song lyrics projected on the screen
and be guided by the bouncing ball moving along the score. Now that I
think back on this I will be forever reminded of the night time ferret,
bobbing and weaving, while scenting the cool night air.

From what I've read, this eye glow is the one method used by USDA
biologists conducting censuses of the Plains BFF ferrets.

This phenomenon is seen quite vividly by raccoon hunters and also in
the eyes of night time predators, who come to you when you are sounding
the scream of a rabbit or other small game that is being torn to pieces
by another predator, or so it seems from the incoming predator's POV.
As a predator caller/hunter myself it is necessary to sit back-to-back
with a second caller and his flashlight. Otherwise the incoming
predators behind your back, such as a cougar or coyote, can take a
nasty chunk out of your head or back, apparently thinking you are the
screaming rabbit.

Now the interesting part. As a pet, the ferret is a "Johnny Come
Lately". It's normal mode is nocturnal, but we upset that mode when
we keep the ferret as a pet. Perhaps you can, but I can't think of
any other *eyeglow* critter whose living habits are the same as
the ferret's. Here we have a unique opportunity to delve into the
biological history of the ferret and study its genome, especially the
developmental evolvement of the eye from the Oligocene/Eocene period
about 40 million years ago, until today.

Is there any one or a number of perceptible changes to the eye over
these millions of years that can be detected in the modern day colonies
of commercially bred ferrets? As some have claimed, the complexity of
the eye, possibly the most complex organ of an animal, cannot be a
fluke of nature. There is, without a doubt, genetic instructions in the
building and growth of the eye. The genes provide the plan. a plan that
is modifiable by biological and environmental pressures. Is the eye
today the same as it was some 40 million years ago? Will the pet status
of thousands of recently bred ferrets be of sufficient force to change
even just one amino acid link in the ribo nucleic acid RNA and/or the
deoxy ribo nucleic acid DNA within the double helix strand? I think
such a minor change in the genome is entirely possible . . . and
likely.

The eye, particularly the ferret eye, offers a magnificent opportunity
as the subject of a doctoral thesis, which would describe genetic
changes that are happening, even as you read this. The wondrous marker
here is the possibility that the luminosity of the ferret eye can be
accurately measured. Hence dimming in eye retina reflectivity, however
small, would serve as an external marker indicating genetic change has
probably happened. Were the genome of the ferret eye mapped, as the
human genome has been mapped, the geneticist would think he's in
heaven. The study of the ferret eye from a paleozoological view could
offer great benefits.

Ancien regime (French: Ancient order of things)
Edward Lipinski

[Posted in FML 6214]