I think people who talk about how ferrets are so easy to train must have
had unusual ferrets.  One of mine is fine -- if she finds newspaper on
the floor anywhere, she figures its fair game, but other than that she
uses the box.  But my other one...   even when we have him in his cage,
he won't always use the box.  When we give him a room, even if we have 2
or 3 boxes and stuff blocking the other corners, he'll just use the
middle of the room.  He has no inhibitions against eating area, drinking
area, or sleeping areas (putting blankets places makes NO difference
whatsoever -- it just means more laundry to do)...  and he doesn't do the
little back-up-in-the-corner-dance that serves as a warning.  We are as
consistent as we can be (we can't catch his screw-ups in the middle of
the night). We try and watch him, and anytime he screws up he gets
scruffed, yelled at, flicked on the nose, and temporarily restricted to
his cage (and whe he uses the box he gets a treat of some sort).  He's
gotten a little better than he was at first, but I can't seem to get him
to figure out that the area right next to the litter box isn't the same
thing as the box itself...
 
-Rochelle
 
[Posted in FML issue 0609]