To Jen Marie - >I just got off the phone with Jen & She says that Tiki is hard from the >penile sheath to the anus-- sort of a hard knot shaped like a finger. He >now has begun to squirm if the area is examined and the hard mass seems >to have gotten larger. He appears to have difficulty in going to the >bathroom, & when he is successful, his bowel movements are thinne r & >less than usual, although his appetite is normal and so is his behavior. >He is also leaking fluid from his penis... not as if to mark territory, >but randomly, as he walks & plays, etc.... Jen - first, I would make sure that you are not feeling the os penis (ferrets, like several other mammals have bones within the penis). Something else that I would be concerned about is a tumor of the penile sheath. Ferrets have numerous cysts and tumors fo the scent glands in this area. There is a fairly high rate of malignant skin tumors in this area (higher than any other spot on the body), so I think that a biopsy is definitely warranted in this case. Best of luck, Bruce Williams, DVM, DACVP Dept. of Vet Path, AFIP [log in to unmask] OR Chief Pathologist, AccuPath [log in to unmask] [Posted in FML issue 1291]