That is an amazing percentage! That means nearly three out of four ferrets are suffering from a preventable, serious dental disease. If you recognize that some of the unaffected ferrets had the disease, but it did not cause enough changes to the bone to cause it to be counted, then the statistic is absolutely frightening because it means the number of ferrets suffering is a larger number. It would mean that the disease at the top of the list of ferret aliments would not be ADV, or ECE, or adrenal disease, or insulinoma, or anything else. The number one disease effecting ferrets is periodontal disease. It also has another implication: vets aren t looking for it and owners aren t treating it. Why is this important? Because studies in humans and many animal species show periodontal disease has been linked to cardiomyopathy and other cardiac diseases, lung diseases, liver disease, kidney disease and failure, bowel disease and irritable bowel syndrome, various autoimmune disorders including arthritis, food-related allergies, skin disorders, splenomegaly, microscopic lesions in liver, kidney, and brain tissue, bacteremia, bone marrow depression, weight loss and poor physical condition, cardiovascular lipid deposition, pancreatic disease, degenerative joint disease, and a variety of reproductive disorders. These disease associations were a few gleaned from searches on Biological Abstracts and Medline; there were many, many more (just run a search on Google on Pets, Periodontal, Disease and you will get thousands of results). One point regarding my approach is in order: I make the assumption that if an association between periodontal and some organ disease is shown in humans and two other species, there is a good likelihood that it would hold true in ferrets. You may not appreciate that association, but I prefer to err on the side of improved ferret health. The best treatment for periodontal disease is prevention, pure and simple. The cornerstone of oral prophylaxis is brushing the ferret s teeth every single day. Periodic tooth cleaning is required (at least once a year), and DO NOT attempt to do this yourself. Ferrets will NOT cooperate and the only way the teeth can be cleaned and polished, the gumline explored for pockets, restorative work done, and perhaps antibiotics directly injected into problem areas is to have the ferret anaesthetized. If the periodontal disease is extensive, and for some ferrets it probably is, then antibiotic therapy and other measures may be necessary. Providing safe objects for chewing, as discussed in the section on dental calculus, is helpful, but I am convinced that, outside of feeding the ferret whole animals, the only safe and reliable solution is daily tooth brushing and yearly professional tooth cleaning. If your ferret has any of the listed symptoms of periodontal disease, EVEN IF IT IS JUST BAD BREATH, see a vet for treatment. It is very important to realize a soft diet will not necessarily make periodontal disease worse any more than a kibble diet will help it. How do I know that is true? Because 94.1% of pet ferrets had dental calculus, and 72.3% had reactive bone indicative of periodontal disease. The vast majority of these animals were on a kibble diet. What keeps the ferret s mouth healthy is mechanical abrasion, not the food or how it is prepared. Can some foods laced with anti-tartar agents actually help reduce the build-up of dental calculus? So what if they do? They don t prevent it and many ferret owners read the claims and assume they do, so do nothing to help their ferrets. This can make these foods more dangerous than feeding ferrets something you KNOW causes dental calculus. If your ferret eats nothing but intact animal carcasses, they probably have clean teeth or only minor gingivitis. If they eat nothing but anti-tartar kibble or Bob s Chicken Gravy and you do not brush their teeth or have them periodically cleaned, they will probably have some degree of periodontal disease. THAT is the bottom line, and if anyone tries to suggest something different, demand proof. In the next installment, I will discuss dental abscesses in ferrets. Bob C Questions?: [log in to unmask] Communications? [log in to unmask] [Posted in FML issue 4518]