I read it on a news group. There is a very ferret knowledgeable person who lives right near the ocean. This topic came up and he shared his knowledge about it. It's been a while, so I don't recall the particulars, but he strongly discourages letting ferrets swim in salt water. He cited a bunch of technical stuff that I don't understand, but he seems to know a lot more about it than I do, so I take his word for it. He never lets his ferrets get in the ocean, only to the edge of it (he takes his ferrets to the beach regularly). E-mail me privately and I'll give you his name and you can discuss it with him. Gary [Posted in FML issue 4340]