The first Dutch symposium is now behind us and looking back it has been a wonderful success, people are already asking when the next one will be. Hanneke, Nanja and I worked on organizing the Symposium for nearly a year with ups and downs. The last week was very hectic and the day before the Symposium I was sure I would never ever do this again, but now with all the wonderful responses coming in, I am already thinking about the next one. We could seat 230 people but were sold out two weeks before the symposium and had to disappoint a lot of people The speakers Hanneke Moorman, "Ferret veterinarian," Nico Schoemaker " Ferret research and veterinarian," Gerry Dorrestein "Pathologist" from the university in Utrecht, Bart Jacobs, "Biologist" from Belgium and Bob Church all did a wonderful job and naturally Bob was a very big success, someone in the audience asked if he was married, so I got to see Bob blush, twice actually, someone really should teach Bob how to sketch, I won't embarrass him by telling you what his drawing of the onside of a ferret ear looked like, but the audience was in hysterics. Everyone seems to have enjoyed themselves immensely, Anyway to all of you that have sent me mail in the last few weeks and have not had a reply as yet I'm very sorry, I will try to catch up in the next few days, besides the symposium I have also been working around 48 hour's a week Thanks to all of you in America who organize symposiums there and gave us the idea to do it here in Holland, It has not only brought enrichment to the ferrets but also to the many ferret owners Stephenie Stichting de Fret [Posted in FML issue 4704]