>What seemed more closely aligned in my observations (note the >qualifiers) was that a number of fancy-coat fur fitch wound up in the >pet stock breeding pools and those fancies were preferentially bred so >that their genes wound up in a lot of the population. One reason that I >think this is a serious component is because folks have been sending me >death ages for blaze and panda ferrets for some time now years -- (Note >that this is not a well designed sampling method so could easily be off), >and while there are some of those who make it into normal old ages or 7 >or 8 years old there appears to be a huge number who just don't make it >to normal old age, let alone old-old. I think that an "appearance first" >mentality has damaged the viability of the pet stock in North America and >that we all need to be asking breeders for health and longevity records >when acquiring ferrets privately and simply walking out if those aren't >supplied, and going preferentially to private breeders with such records >when we aren't rescuing. That's very interesting Sukie and bears looking into. I like the idea of asking for records. I know when breeding rabits we had to provide 3 generations back, and if you were a member of the ARBA (Am. Rabbit Breeders Assn), we had to keep a breeding history on each rabbit. Warmly ~ Mary Herbalist The Conley Farm - organic herbs Online Classes ~ [log in to unmask] [Posted in FML issue 3955]