Thanks, Mary! Also learned from Pub Med that there is a study in which it lowered blood sugar, so that is a concern with ferrets. Turns out that in another study it worsened the depositing of fatty material in arteries when a high cholesterol and fatty diet was present, and it also lowered the naturally occurring forms of co-enzyme Q (chemical aspects vary in species with some species utilizing Q-10, others Q-9, etc.). Ferrets do have high fat and high cholesterol diets (and the mammalian body makes cholesterol from fat which accounts for most bodily cholesterol) and ferrets are not prone to arterial disease except for occasional genetic ones I recall who didn't have good bilateral coloration of the head which turned out to be due to an Aortic Arch Defect so they later died of the problem. (For those who don't know; there are some forms of genetic defects in which the protocells which lead to various later forms of more specialized cells are altered in bad ways. One of these groups is called Neural Crest Disorders and includes things like WS, while one other grouping is the Aortic Arch Defect one in which the head coloration tends to strongly have a unilateral aspect and the aorta is often malformed.) Didn't know that it could be an anti-coagulant but so many anti-inflammatories are. Some ferrets are very tolerant of anti-coagulants but others get GI bleeds very easily. Like anything else, it has it good properties and it's bad. There are a number of studies in Pub Med in which it was helpful in reducing risk or expression of some malignancies, nad in which it was very useful as an anti-inflammatory. ----- >As herbal medicine tries to use the purest form of herb, I would not get >the powder from a grocery store, but a health food store. Many of our >grocery imports are irradiated at our place of import (not at the >exporters). That doesn't matter; it is a safe process. Steve's doctorate is in high energy physics and put most concisely: the food is not radioactive. It merely kills organisms which could be in the food and which do pose health risks. My favorite story of tagging along health risks involves the small walled cities of Europe which now and then would be be turned into asylums because the grain brought to the communal bakery was tainted with ergot and the city driven insane by that fungus. ----- >Another reason for shortened tails is a genetic defect mainly in true >born dark eyed whites. Sometimes when two dew's are paired together >their offspring can have tail defects. These can range from kinks and >bends to short curled tails. There are FHL vets' posts on genetic defects that can be involved: http://www.smartgroups.com/groups/ferrethealth and http://fhl.sonic-weasel.org/ We have little boy who lost his due to gangrene from an injury that happened before he was given to a local shelter. ----- Lupron: There is one on-going study to see if it might slow growth of a tumor (with early indications that it might), and another to see if it might reduce the chances of a second one developing. (I don't know how formal either study is or if publication is the goal, but each is by a ferret vet.) In addition, controlling some the symptoms often improves quality of life, so from that regard it might be called a treatment even though surgery is certainly preferable. That help? [Posted in FML issue 3890]