There seems to be a lot of controversy about this right now, but I think the most important thing to note is ferrets were kept in great quantity and used essentially like ferrets in the UK until the 1930s in the US, and there was no resulting 'American polecat' population resulting therewith. With the standard of neutering done before the majority of pet ferrets ever get to a store, I doubt we will ever be in another situation of Ferretville (a real place, in Ohio) where 35,000 uneutered ferrets were sent out in a breeding season to various people needing them for rat, rabbit and other hunting. A local newspaper from Toronto,Canada, where I live, noted during the second World War, that ferrets were being shipped from the UK to help bulk up the local population, which were needed to 'subsidise' wartime rationing. I feel that any impact rampant ferrets would have had on the population would have been made evident during their hayday as hunting animals, and have been as notable as feral cats and dogs of the period were. I am strongly disinclinded to believe the current, almost totally housebound animals are to pose as great a danger as they did 100 years ago, if any. Melissa Smith (nee Drake) http://www.blueskunkland.com/ferret/ [Posted in FML issue 4026]