I can understand the hesitation Never-Doners have to staking out a ferret on a level lawn with tall conifers around. And in that assumption I have been blessed, if that's the right word, by Mother nature. He, She, or It (not too certain of Mother nature's gender - will assume neuter until otherwise made known) has blessed me with the dear and devoted friendship of the Corvidae, or crow. Two of them in fact, one female and one male, who seem to be a mated pair and who have produced two litters of baby Corvids here adjacent to my home. Unfortunately only a single survivor of the two litters is here with me this day, his siblings having met with accidental deaths due to my negligence and a neighbor womans ignorance. My blessing is this: Every morning I am greeted by papa crow (name is Forty) every time I step outside. His greeting is two caws. I answer with either a whistle or by rapid tongue clicking which makes a sound just like a crow snapping his beak one upon the other. The crow's clicking sounds like a slow firing machine gun but at a very, very low register, almost inaudible. On those mornings I do not get outside, Forty flies to the kitchen window and there perches on a railing to show himself to me and possibly also to determine if I'm up and around inside the house. I make it a point to feed him daily with people food or even ferret food. OK, so what's with this crow business and how's it related to staking 8 ferrets outside? First, the crows know that some time during the day I will broadcast kibbled ferret chow down onto the assembled ferrets for their fare. Within a short time the crows are down there on the ground strutting among the tethered ferrets and helping themselves to food that the ferrets overlook. Second, a tremendous cacophony of screaming/cawing erupts upon the arrival of a strange crow or other large bird, with the crows diving upon the newly arrived stranger and peck at him without mercy. In other words there is a lot of noise from highly excited crows and feathers do fly until the raptor decides to leave and with the crows in hot pursuit for about 100 yards. Most of the ferrets stop their digging or wake up to watch the events taking place in the high Douglas firs and other conifers. So what we've got here is a living and breathing alarm system that is remarkably ferret protective. And, at the same time is an alert system for me too. I am baffled by Mary McC's statements praising the double-looped harness, the so-called H harness made of stiff nylon and which in her experience she finds superior to the supple and soft leather, the Figure 8 harness with only a single buckle instead of the two snaps, as on the Chinese nylon job. The soft and supple leather harness conforms to the ferrets body and neck in a most natural way, a way of conformity that is impossible with the Chinese junk. Mary may have missed my installation tip of properly snugging it like a saddle on a horse, the harness by actually lifting the ferret off the ground and jiggling it by the end strap that has already passed through the buckle. As stated before, it's tantamount to snugging a saddle on a horse by pulling up on the belly strap and then locking it by inserting the tongue of the buckle through the correct hole in the leather strap. By the way, if one punches extra holes in the leather strap, then it will fit any and all ferrets, regardless of size and is therefore self adjusting. My experience with the leather Fig eights has been completely satisfactory compared to the stiffer and cheaper nylon , Chinese made H's. I would hope that all of us could give our ferrets this opportunity to commune with Mother nature, would give our ferrets the feel of the natural world with all its smells, textures and sounds. And if for no other reason, to let them dig. I know for a fact that's what the front end of a ferret is made for...to dig, dig, and to dig. Edward Lipinski @ Ferrets North West Foundation, who says: Yesterday is history. Tomorrow is a mystery. And today? Today is a gift. That's why we call it the present. B.Olatunji [Posted in FML 6078]