I am with Jeff & the others, regarding the implants. I want to share an example of something that happened here at our sanctuary. Several months ago, we were asked to take in Mercedes & her cagemate Feather from another shelter. Both were older, with health problems, and were not thriving at the shelter. Both had suffered ECE & were recovered, but fragile. Feather was ok--but Mercedes was very lethargic, and her appetite wasn`t good. Her poo changed from runny to almost ok, to slimy. After $415.00 worth of diagnostics, blockage & tumors, etc were ruled out--and except for her insulinoma, the blood panel looked surprisingly good. We nursed Mercedes back to health, during the next couple of weeks. Her appetite grew, as did she. We were so happy to see her playing! She was out of the woods, and looking GREAT!!! THEN--one night, a few weeks later, just as I was bringing her soup to her, she collapsed. She began to gasp deeply, & went down. In seconds, she was unresponsive. Certain that she was having a blood glucose issue, I quickly grabbed for the dexamethasone & injected her. On to fluids. No change. In three minutes, she was gone. Due to her very pale color, I suspected a bleedout. IF we had given a deslorelin implant to this ferret, we might have suspected the implant was the cause. (But Mercedes hadn`t HAD an implant. She never showed any signs of adrenal disease--just insulinoma.) The next morning, Dr. Katie did the necropsy--and we discovered something. (Yes, it had been a bleedout.) We saw that this tiny little "healthy" sable girl with the beautiful fur had had a very small, right gland adrenal tumor which had invaded the vena cava. It`s location was dangerous. Mercedes never knew what hit her. There was nothing anyone could have done... Imagine if there had been no necropsy, and we had posted that "Soon after the implant, she died of a bleedout." This would have been enough to unnerve a lot of ferret moms & dads, so that they wouldn`t even try these potentially helpful implants. It is important to get a necropsy (from a ferret-savvy vet) so you know what the enemy was. We have had many calls, after the fact, where people are beating themselves up "Maybe there was more I could have done" "I`ll never know what killed him/her--but at the time, I just couldn`t stand the thought of them cutting on him/her" "I never should have given this/that drug. I just KNOW that`s what killed him/her. No, you DON`T know what actually killed them, unless there`s a necropsy. Once in a while even those are inconclusive, but usually there are some answers. It`s worth the money for the peace of mind. You want to know what the enemy was... Condolences to all who have suffered a loss. I know how it feels. Love, Zoo [Posted in FML 7415]