For the sake of full info I think that I should point out that there ARE good reasons why a number of pet stores keep ferrets in what seem like extremely large aquaria, sometimes multilevel. These are designed to be well ventilated, BTW. Lessons learned from the past include those from a sadly lost set of kits in a New Jersey store. If memory serves, you can even find the info in past FMLs, though I don't know if it predates the archives. Since it is so long ago I don't recall specific details. What I do remember is that a parent with at least one child who insisted on poking ferret kits between bars was in a pet store. The parent did not stop the behavior. At some point a kit seems to have either decided that this was play, or was tired of being hurt and the kit grabbed the child's finger. Then the mother demanded that all of the kits, who were too young to have had rabies vaccines, be destroyed because she and the child could not tell the kits apart so could not tell which one bit or nipped. This is going to turn your stomach, but that is ultimately what happened. Sometimes there are excellent reasons behind choices -- ones which protect the ferrets -- which may not be readily apparent at first glance. BTW, I have heard privately today from a PetSmart rep that the IL ferret with the nipping or biting past is being adopted out to someone who can do rehab, so that perhaps just hasn't happened yet instead of a miscommunication occurring among the PetSmart branches. (I kind of hope that they change his name once he is in a safe home; we have found that new names seem to help ferrets start off fresh when rehabbing.) BTW, even though I dislike and disagree with at least one of the links (Can't recall if one or more that call for overt punishment.), this primary resource is a good one for ferrets with behavioral hurtles to jump: http://www.geocities.com/SoHo/Lofts/1083/probintro.html Always hoping for the best, Sukie (not a vet) Recommended ferret health links: http://pets.groups.yahoo.com/group/ferrethealth/ http://ferrethealth.org/archive/ http://www.afip.org/ferrets/index.html http://www.miamiferret.org/fhc/ http://www.ferretcongress.org/ http://www.trifl.org/index.shtml http://homepage.mac.com/sukie/sukiesferretlinks.html [Posted in FML 5660]