Dear Ferret Folks- I have never. Ever. Seen such an epic tantrum as I did this evening. Little Switch the Kit is obviously not a sweet child anymore, she has become a teenager. If she could have yelled "I hate you!" and slammed her door she would have. Tonight my husband decided to build a set of shelves in the room where we keep the ferret cage. He brought in lengths of wonderful smelling pine wood and a handfull of shiny metal nails, none of which Switch could swarm over, lick, or drag under the furniture. She could see the intriguing new things brought into her territory, but only from a distance. A hammer. Little bags of bright, sharp screws. So near, yet so far. The aromatic sawdust flew. And Swich lost her tiny mind. She decided that no cage could hold her. She tried with all her might to jam her pointy little head through her cage bars. She pushed and pushed until her lips were streched so far back that I could see her fangs. No go. Her skull would simply not cooperate. That just made her MAD at the cage. So she bit it. She chewed the bars savagely. Nope. She was still a prisoner. She grabbed the bars in her little white mitts and shook them. No good. She stood in the food bowl and shook the bars there. Nope. she ran to the first floor litterbox, stood in that, and shook the bars there. Nope. She ran to the second floor, shook the bars there. Still no go. She became very quiet, then. She simply stood still on all fours and glowered, her little forhead furrowed in consternation. Then she jumped up and down in place about ten times, and flew to the top of the cage. I'm not really sure how she did it, maybe it's related to the way cats always manage to fall feet first. She fell UP feet first, grabbed a bar in each of four paws and, upsidedown, shook the bars furiously. Still finding no satisfaction, she bit the bars while continuing to shake them with all four paws. Finally, she relaxed all of her paws and hung from the bars by her teeth ,whiskers quivering in impotent fury. She hung there, swinging, for a full five seconds before dropping to the floor in defeat. Having no other recourse, she elected to make one last statement of protest, just in case we hadn't gotten the picture yet. Having no door to slam, she pooped smack in the middle of the floor and threw herself face first into her hammock, where she spent the rest of the evening stewing. She'll forgive us in a few years. Maybe. Alexandra in Massachusetts P.S. The shelves look great. [Posted in FML issue 3661]