>I was wondering if anyone read The great ferret race by Paul Collins, I'm >looking to see what others thought of the book. Mostly liked it for middle schoolers, and enjoyed that it rapidly got across a true cherishing of ferrets while teaching multiple points on compassion, values, and fairness, all in the midst of a rollicking good time. The ending was PERFECT, but no one should skip ahead; it really belongs exactly where it is in the book. >Marshall Farms was broke into yesterday by and animal rights group. They >stole both ferrets and beagles to protest their sale for research. As I >live very close to there, it made our local news. > >Lisa Olscamp I hope that is not true. The last time I heard of something like that it resulted in most of the animals dying and the "animal rights" people saying that was fine because it made a point! What point? That people can commit genocide of certain domestic animals if they have a good-sounding name which makes it sound like they are on the side of the animals they are killing? >I think that, just as a baseline, some of us are just looking for a little >honesty, you know? If MF would just say something like, "Yes, we're >shipping them at 4 weeks, due to high demand and crowding issues," that >would at least be an honest answer, and with the demand issue that is at >least a defense from a corporate point of view. ??????????????? That sounds like what you are saying is that they are being honest only if they agree with your age assumption. I do recall one time when a shipping person shipped out too early due to holiday demand. I ALSO remember that person found that doing so was not the way to retain a job. MF was very responsive because it could be shown that shipment went out too young. Over the years what has been far more common has been people incorrectly aging kits from their personal observations. MF is not particularly different from other farms. Nor is the health different from most Steve and I have encountered from private breeders in 19 and 1/2 years. Every farm has its problems. MFs get a lot of "air-time" with them being the scape-goat for all farms. You barely hear about ANOTHER farm which has had multiple folks have ferrets arrive or be taken directly from their farm and bring in ECE, or YET ANOTHER one that was still selling some of their ferrets for fitch fur, or... It seems to me that there are a few folks here who only want to hear confirmation for what they assume, or who only look for documents supporting one position and ignore the ones supporting the others. Having read a PILE of things on both sides, and having sought confirmation about a number of things said, I came away with what a number of other people who have been following this for very, very many years have: 1. there are things at every farm that need changing 2. some of those are affordable 3. some are affordable only if all the farms have standards imposed upon them, such as later shipping ages, or having BOTH full-time on-site vet and all neuterings done by vets (rather than either/or, as now exists) 4. almost all of the negative things said about MF are no more than rumors, and that's not condoning what could be corrected but instead is saying that what needs to be tackled are real problems at all farms rather than assumed problems at one. [Posted in FML issue 3626]