Our experience with ferrets began last November with our two girls, Drizzle and Kismet. About 3 weeks ago, we became the proud parents of our first baby boy (ferret, of course). He really poured on the charm when he first saw us (we later found out it was part of his master plan to overtake us). His first week was spent mostly in the cage, and had supervised getting acquainted/play time with the girls. All seemed OK. Well, now he's allowed to be out most of the time--and this is where our problem is. (BTW, his name is Sampson.) He is a biter--the girls are not. Sampson is making a valiant attempt to be alpha-ferret. What concerns us is that he does not heed their hisses, attacks them when they're using the litter pan (which has caused *someone* to christen yet another corner and help keep the litter pan company in business), gets into some heavy-duty play (?) biting and vigorous shaking of the girls' heads when he has them by their necks. There are traces of dried blood in all of the kids' ears, I found reddened teeth marks in the back of Drizzle's neck, and both girls let out squeals from pain (our interpretation). This has caused a lot of frustration for us. Drizzle and Kismet don't seem quite the same, a little withdrawn. We used to put all three in the cage at night, but Sampson would start in on one or both of the girls. Our problem with caging only Sampson is that he gets very upset that he's the only one in the cage and starts loudly crying and moaning, it's almost bone-chilling at times. I hope someone has some suggestions. We are literally losing sleep over this situation. We love our little bed sharks and we're looking forward to getting more and more involved with the ferret world. Dennis |-------------------------------------------------------------------| | [log in to unmask] = Dennis, Leslie, Missy (Sheltie), | | Pumpkin (red Persian), and the babies: | | Drizzle, Kismet, and Sampson | |-------------------------------------------------------------------| [Posted in FML issue 0904]