Okay, someone PLEASE send me or point me to this wonderful chicken grazy
recipe!  And what's "Timmy's tonic"?
 
I do various Duck Soups, and I'm making a batch of insulinoma soup right
now (for my probably-adrenal underweight fella, actually), but this chicken
stuff sounds wonderful.
 
>I am wondering how many folks out there have fuzzies who sleep on/in their
>bed with them.  Surely I do not have the only cuddle-muffin (I sleep
>hugging her like a tiny teddy bear) around.
 
We have two who like to sleep with us--but only one can.  One is having
litterbox problems--like rememberin they exist (he's pretty old), and he
doesn't like the other much anyway.  Gibber loves to sleep in our bed,
though.  Right in between us.
 
And now for my real reason for writing.  Lisette wrote a very long message
that I HAVE to reply to...
 
>So many of you seem eager to make this intelligent, complex, sickly,
>costly animal { that needs room to run and play-despite many keeping it in
>a bedroom forever- that needs variety, despite being given the same food
>forever and locked in a cage by many} a house hold pet : to be abused by
>millions and ultimately euthanized.  You know that no pet store is going
>to educate the public on the horrible, expensive medical problems, or on
>the ferrets need for room, fresh air, excercise,diversity, contact with
>others, fert proofing, privacy,etc....
 
Blanket generalizations like this REALLY make me mad.  I work in a pet
store that sells ferrets.  Yes, we tell people they're prone to health
problems, especially as they get older, that can be very expensive.  We
tell them that they require lots of love and attention, training, and
handling--not unlike a crazy puppy.  We tell them their life span, what
kinds of signs mean the ferret is sick, and how much work is required to
make sure their home is safe for their fuzzy.  We offer feeding suggestions
and training tips.  Almost all of us have ferrets of our own.  We can even
tell them what we think of the local veterinarians.
 
We also tell them the good stuff--that, with the proper care, these little
furballs pay back every bit of the time and attention and money a
hundredfold.  That they're never boring to watch or play with.  What, you
think we'll just tell them the bad parts?
 
We also, just as an example, never sell iguanas to people who think they're
cute green lizards, because they're not, at least not for very long.
 
So, please, watch it with the blanket statements.  We work very hard to
educate people about their pets to the best of our ability, and most of our
regular customers appreciate it.  We discourage impulse buys, and always
try to make sure people buying an animal also buy a book about the animal.
Someone who bought a pair of ferrets from our store brought one of them in
the other day to have us check him out--they wanted to know if they should
call a vet!  The little guy was fine, just lower-energy than his sister,
which is why they were worried.
 
Not all pet stores are evil.
 
As for why some of us want ferrets to be popular pets--we want people to
know that these aren't vicious animals, that they can be wonderful
companions.  We want them to have the same protections as dogs and cats,
and the same status as commensals.  We want to be able to own them legally,
or even breed them if we think we'll be good breeders.  I don't think any
of us just want everyone to have a ferret!  We want people to understand
the truth about these wonderful, cuddly, oddly fragile little beings.  The
bad with the good.
 
I, too, have an older ferret, possibly adrenal problems, too weak to open
him up to know for sure.  When we took him home, he was so dehydrated he
couldn't walk.  We almost lost him.  He's doing better now, on a steady
diet of duck soup, but he's definitely a problem case.  He's aggressive
toward anything with four legs, and has badly bitten the other fuzzies
before, so we have to be careful about allowing them to interact.  He has
completely forgotten whatever he used to know about litterboxes, and poops
whenever and wherever he is..  We've pulled plenty of all-nighters when he
seemed sick.  And we do love him, even though he was sick when we took him
in.  Even though he's a rotten cranky old fert and impossible to deal with.
I'm not writing from the perspective of someone who's never been faced with
the negative sides of ferrets.
 
Please, consider your words more wisely in the future.
 
Jen and the Crazy Business plus one ferret no longer so sick
[Posted in FML issue 2688]