The best way to describe what is meant by "complexity" is to go to the woods, sit on the ground, and record as many different smells, sounds, situations and things as possible. If you do the job correctly, as a ferret would, it could take days. An area the size of a front room in a typical wooded forest is incredibly complex, with quite literally thousands of potential investigations, foods, smells, sights, tastes, textures, sounds, physical challenges, problems to solve, and other things, ALL positive mental and physical enrichments. Contrast that with the typical cage containing a litter box, water bottle, food dish, hammock, and a couple of toys. The typical cage environment is the opposite of a complex one; it is sterile to the ferret caged within. The reason ferrets find typical caging conditions spartan is because they are domesticated polecats, and polecats are the end product of millions of years of evolution, having survived the complexity of the wooded forests and grasslands of Europe and Asia. They not only have the tools to survive in such an environment, but the mental abilities as well, including high intelligence, superb memory, and advanced problem-solving skills. Because of these abilities, MOST cages are the ferret equivalent of solitary confinement for humans, with little to investigate and even less to experience. If you really stop and think about it, housing ferrets in environmentally barren cages is a form of cruelty--in this case, mental cruelty. Even in the presence of toys and other ferrets, most cages are such bleak environments that ferrets sleep their lives away, stress out, or spend much of their waking moments in a struggle to find a way out of the cage. The solution is to add complexity to both the cage environment as well as to the play experience. A complex cage environment is not necessarily one filled with a transplanted forest. While forests--by their very nature--are complex environments, such complexity can be approximated in an artificial environment by following a few simple rules. First, assume the largest possible cage is WAY too small. Depending on the richness of the local ecology, polecats can have a territory the size of a city block, which means they must be quite active to monitor the boundaries and chase off interlopers, find enough food to survive, locate shelter from weather and predators, and make babies. There is no cage in the world, not even a free-roam house, that can approximate such an environment. This is why I argued earlier that it wasn't the size of the cage--rabbit hutch or free roam home--that was important, but the CONDITIONS of captivity. You simply cannot design a cage (or home) large enough to accommodate a ferret's physical and emotional needs for space. Accept it and move on. Second, complexity BY ITSELF is just as limiting as novelty by itself. Remember the toy that was energetically investigated, then either hauled away to anguish in a dusty hidey-hole, or just ignored altogether? Once novelty wears off, if the toy has no other redeeming value it will be abandoned. Complexity is the same way; there has to be some sort of "newness" to the environment to insure ferrets will be prodded to continue exploring it. This can be done by frequently hiding "browse" in different locations; that is, hiding treats within the "complex landscape" for ferrets to, well, ferret out. I clean the room, rearrange or replace the playground furniture, change the bedding, spread a liberal amount of sweet hay and straw on the floor (increases odor, sound and textural complexity, AND sops up messes!), and add "browse" treats liberally around the room. You should see the ferrets when I let them back it! Third, complexity isn't exactly associated with clutter, but the two are very hard to keep separate. Ferrets LIKE clutter, and clutter challenges ferrets in physical and sensory ways that a clean, open floor cannot. If you want a room to be complex, it will follow that it is also quite cluttered. If you don't like clutter, consider trading your ferrets in for pet rocks. Fourth, complexity challenges MULTIPLE systems, not one. A complex environment should challenge the ferret's problem-solving skills, memory, physical body, and senses (smell, vision, taste, hearing, touch). My ferrets die for baby chicken, so I dip a sponge in a diluted solution, then create "trails" within the room that can be tracked down to an area containing some sort of physical or mental barrier that has to be overcome to obtain the treat. Fifth, just because an old or sick ferret is old or ill, it doesn't necessarily follow they no longer have a need for complex challenges. Just modify complex enrichments for the individual ferret. For example, Tori the Tiger is blind and needs daily care. She in not capable of completing many enrichments, especially the physical ones, but each day I give her new odors to sniff, new foods, and allow her the dignity of choosing foods and bedding. The need for enrichment might be considered by some even more important for the old or ill. Last, the greatest complexity is found in situations that are not scripted. If the ferret cannot predict what will happen, then they are challenged all the more. One of the hardest things to predict is physical play with an owner. Physical play is a very effective enrichment, as I will discuss at greater length at a later time. Just being in an area with human activity can be a complex enrichment. Bob C [Posted in FML issue 4197]