>From:    Leonard Bottleman <[log in to unmask]>
>Subject: Re: zen's responses (shelters/breeding)
>You are familiar with the incident that became the "final straw that broke
>the camel's back", but it was not just this separation of activities that
>caused a falling out.  My above list of issues were more important factors,
>as well as other legal issues.
 
In that list you gave, the first two shouldn't be limited to shelters where
the operator is also a breeder.
 
The next few involve not separating the two functions.  We strongly and
without equivocation do not condone shelter/breeder commingling of funds
so to say by using any donated shelter funds, materials or time on the
ferretry or breeding ferrets.  Breeding ferrets is not a way to raise
money for a shelter.
 
We didn't mention that reported conditions as we were not talking about
that particular aspect of running a shelter.  Though perhaps we should
point out that if someone is choosing to be a breeder and then fulfilling
their obligations back to ferrets by helping with shelter work, they need
to keep themselves from becoming overloaded with either breeding ferrets
or shelter ferrets to the point that any of the ferrets are suffering.
 
We do not have first hand knowledge of what happened in that particular
case.  We hate to sound like we are walking the fence but we are also
pretty adamant about being very precise.  We have heard from people we
respect on both sides unfortunately so we only feel right in speaking in
these general terms.
 
bill and diane killian
zen and the art of ferrets
 
>From:    Jennifer H <[log in to unmask]>
>Subject: Descent or Not??  Help!!
>The bad news comes from my sweetie, who is not very fond of ferret perfume
>and has politely asked me to seriously reconsider descenting Teresa and
>the baby.  My vet does not promote descenting, but I wanted to get some
>opinions from anyone who has been through this - good and bad.
 
Would he consider your setting a firm date about 6 weeks out?  If she is
still having this problem then, you will get it fixed?
 
We do not advocate the mass descenting of ferrets.  But if there is a
medical reason (impaction) or a behavioral reason (such as this case)
where the ferret is better of descented then well.  The ferret is better
off descented.
 
If Teresa becomes unwanted because she poofs, then she is better off
descented so she doesn't poof.  Most ferrets do not poof often enough
that they really would be come unwanted over it.  Where that line is
crossed is different for different people.  Descenting is a relatively
simple procedure with rather high success rates.  Vet techs have told us
though that if the sac is punctured during the surgery it can be enough
to clear everyone out of the building.
 
>From:    Patrick Faas <[log in to unmask]>
>Subject: mice
 
Thanks for the chuckles.
[Posted in FML issue 3217]