Our sister organization ferret club, the Star City Ferret Club meets monthly at one of our local public libraries. We've done several educational spots with the summer reading program and the after school programs for the kids where we introduced them to our "good citizen" ferrets. During the most recent one, we had a young man about 8 years old join us with his mom. Mom has sever cat allergies and son has an extreme fear of dogs and is also very critter wary. At the story time meeting I wanted to introduce the little man to the ferrets but he was very standoffish. He would watch them from a distance as they romped & wrestled & played, smiling & laughing at their antics, but still wary of them. After about an hour of watching, he came up to me and tugged on my shirt sleeve, asking if he could sit with one on his lap. I obliged and little man sat up on a chair and I set one of the ferrets on is lap, me sitting on the floor next to them with tone in hand. He sat there petting the little furry critter for almost 20 minutes. His mom was almost in tears, tears of joy, saying she had never seen him do that. He even commented to me that his mom was crying cause he had never petted an animal before. My eyes are welling up again as I remember the joy of being able to share the love of ferrets with someone so fearful of any animal. Education is the key. Getting proper, correct, accurate information out there and exposure to them will let people see how special, and demanding these animals are. It was a good day! Debbie Saunders Shelter Director & Foster Mom Big Lick Ferret Shelter & Hospice Roanoke Virginia www.biglickferretshelter.org [Posted in FML issue 5321]