Sharp nails About a month ago a male ferret, Davit, was brought in, I run some sort of shelter for unwanted ferrets, with an very bad neck sore, the owner made some excuse shifting in with some friends keeping dogs and one of them got hold of the ferret and dit quiet some damage, creating an wound that dit not heal, covering the total area between the shoulder blades. In a case like this I always's start with antibiotics in case of an underlying infection. The best and all round antibiotic here in New Zealand is "Clavulox" (a compound of Amoxil and Clavulonic acid) obtainable in syrup or tablet form. After about a week most of the scabs had disappeared but new ones would reappear. Now what.........!!!??, they came up as tiny pinheads, disappear only to reappear in a other place but always on the neck. I was about to take Davit to the vet for a skin test a least to be tested for mites, the ones that burro under the skin. One evening I was watching him having a good scratch, no damage to the skin add least what I thought, but wen I picket him up and had a good look with a magnifying glass I could see a number of tiny scratches. Wen we, humans have a healing sore, in most cases it start to itch. So the answer was simply trimming the very sharp nails of the back feet. I have, in the 12 years of keeping pet ferrets, had some similar experiences and used special shampoo's, oil or powders and even a skin autopsy , which was negative for mite, any thing that I thought was right with mixed success yet, in this case the answer was simple. At the moment his fur has completely re established itself and.......NO more scratching. BILL [Posted in FML issue 1323]