Dear FML,
 
I never thought that I would be writing this post to the FML.  We have to
close our shelter.  After 8 years of heartbraking and bankbreaking work,
we must close our doors as a ferret shelter.
 
We have recieved to much flack from ferret breeders and other short sighted
people who don't believe that ferrets should be desexed and vaccinated that
it is becoming a struggle to answer enquiries anymore as they are quite
often abusive.
 
We have also run out of funds and both have had to increase our work to
cover the shelter expenses.  This cannot go on forever as we are now faced
with the dilemma that we cannot spend enough time rehabilitating ferrets as
we both come home exhausted at 9pm every night from work.  We have made the
decision to close the shelter for our sanity and the sake of the ferrets.
 
It worries me that there are NO other responsible ferret shelters in
Victoria, Australia (where we are) and when we close there may be no other
avenue for stray and unwanted ferrets to go down.  We will be appealing for
the animal welfare shelters to give ferrets owners a chance to reclaim them
before we close.
 
We are appealing for anyone in the Melbourne area who would like to adopt a
stray ferret.  We still have 16 strays desexed, vaccinated and ready to go.
We are charging $60 for females and $50 for males to help recover some
money to pay our debts (desexing costs us $70 for females and $60 for
males not including vaccination...) We also need homes for a number of
**Special** ferrets, these guys have been badly treated or have recovered
recently from long ilnesses and have become "Mascots" for the shelter as
they were deemed unrehomable.  This group of misfits are all desexed and
vaccinated too but we are not asking for any fee for adopting them.  We
will adopt them to experienced ferret owners only, they are all friendly
but each needs some extra care!!
 
I feel realy bad about this but we have no choice.  If anyone ever wants
to start up a shelter in Victoria please let us know we would be more than
pleased to help them get going.
 
Please Email me or give us a call if you can help us out.
 
Please remember that we are in Victoria, Australia!
 
Phone (03) 9436 1893 (+61-3-9436-1893) or Email me at
mailto:[log in to unmask] (work) or mailto:[log in to unmask] (home).
 
Thanks again.
 
Michael and Rachael Curry
[Posted in FML issue 2685]