Around here most succumb to a disease IN old age.  We've only had one die
in her sleep on night maybe 14 years ago and she had severe and advanced
Sjogren's (sp?) -- the only ferret we've ever heard of with that and it
wasn't diagnosed till we made a many hour trip to a veterinary
optholmologist (again sp?) when other specialists were stumped.  We were
told that the mucus membrane damage from the disease was what took her.
Most people who die also die in old age of a known disease.  Just think in
terms of your own human family: in old age circulatory disease rates go way
up, cancer rates go way up, there has been time for assorted damage to
accumulate, etc.  (Old age typically still beats the alternative!) Well,
the same thing happens in ferrets.  There are some individuals who get sick
and die young, a rate which can be reduced as more vets learn how to treat
certain illnesses and better procedures continue to be developed.  I know
that folks who are new get very frustrated that some of the common but
harder puzzles haven't had much in the way of huge advances but there are
reasons for that.  There was just shocking progress over the last 15 years
in the areas which could be easily enough improved with lower levels of
donations once enough vets learned ferrets.  Now, though, what are left are
larger conundrums which will likely take more complex and longer efforts
and hence require larger contributions from the ferret community to
veterinary universities which study ferrets, to places which fund such work
like the Morris Animal Foundation, or to huge clinics which are also
devoted to improving veterinary medicine like the AMC -- just like the
problems currently faced by the dog, cat and horse people.
 
So, yes, most die IN old age, but with proper vet care the causes are known
ones so they also die of a known disease or disorder.
 
I have to say here that I've recently been shocked, dismayed, and appalled
by a few (fortunately only a few) who have not been utilizing vet care.
THIS LIST IS NOT A SUBSTITUTE FOR VET CARE!!!!!!!  (NOTHING is!) Nor is
this list a substitute for learning about ferrets' medical problems to the
best of our own individual abilities and passing the information written by
vets for assorted websites on to vets.  When a critter is sick there never
has been and never will be as useful a person as an informed vet, and
sharing one's life with a critter means taking on the responsibility for
providing veterinary care; that's part of the symbiosis, and it most
definitely is part of the love.
 
Sorry that I got so heavy, but this lack of care recently in a few posts
has really bothered me a lot.  I recall when we first began to learn what
very little there was out there that we called a woman who advertised
ferrets.  She said that she had 80 (!!!!!!!) running around her home, that
they were funny as all get-out, that their lifespans normally were one or
two years -- sometimes three.  She didn't provide any vet care, you see,
had the matings happen willy-nilly, etc.  Even then we knew that she should
have little ones living normally to around six or older, so we let the
authorities know for the sake of the furballs.  Can you imagine?  That
would be like people before medicine and decent hygiene (not talking
garishly clean here but talking about the basic sorts of hygiene lessons we
all hopefully know or will learn now-a-days).
 
I agree with Ed that when ferrets are moved around they need a vet check
FIRST and whenever possible their history should be known.  His comments
that mink don't have the same protection if a bite or scratching incident
takes place and that difficulties could arise as a result is a good
heads-up.  Just remember Michigan -- what was it 4?  or 5?  years ago --
when an elderly man with very thin and fragile skin and trembling hands
caught himself on something and got a scratch.  It couldn't be proven WHERE
or how he'd had the skin broken so since he'd held a ferret and MIGHT have
caught his hand on a tooth the authorities forced that the ferret be
destroyed.  The man wanted to do the shot series instead; he really liked
the ferret a great deal.  The first decision was to not kill, but the state
put through an appeal and won by a slim margin.  Kodo died -- and was found
to be free of disease.  Now we have the Compendium on our side for ferrets,
though a few localities don't follow it (so know your local laws and rules
and regs), but a mink wouldn't have that protection meaning that extra
precautions are certainly needed in that regard as well as in relation to
shared illnesses.
 
BTW, just a reminder: there is NOTHING as good as using vet checks, careful
quarantines, and then if a mysterious illness or death from unknown cause
arises also using pathologies (on living and dead) and necropsies to avoid
the risk of causing an epizooic (an epidemic among animals).
 
I'd also like to see an increase in the numbers of posts from people in
other countries!!!!!!!  Of course, sometimes a person doesn't know where a
post comes from since some addresses don't reflect that so some non-States
posts may be incorrectly assumed by some to come from here, too.
[Posted in FML issue 2926]