I would like to announce our ferret web page at "http://www.astro.umd.edu/~wls/ferrets.html". See also our photo gallery at "http://www.astro.umd.edu/~wls/images/". The ferret page starts with a description of of our ferrets. I would like to include the text of that description here. Some of this information is old, but some has not yet been posted. I have not before announced Jasmine who we acquired in October. I previously announced Bridgett, a ferret we rescued last April. I can announce that she *finally* was accepted by the other ferrets. This took 7 months. I think this goes to show that even if the other ferrets do not accept your new ferret for quite a long time, don't give up --- there is still hope. BEGIN EXCERPT We now have 5 ferrets. Ben and Jerry, our first ferrets, came into our lives in January, 1990. They were two little silver-mitt kits. The pet store had booths for people to interact with prospective pets. Clare fell in love with Ben when Ben tugged on the bows of Clare's shoes. We wanted two ferrets to keep each other company. I picked Jerry, who had been Ben's cage-mate at the pet store, so that the pair could remain together. We were told that Ben and Jerry were litter-mates. We had already decided on the names Ben & Jerry but then discovered that the two new ferrets were girls. We were set on those names and kept them anyway. We then needed to decide which ferret would be "Ben" and which "Jerry". I decided that the ferret Clare chose would be "Ben" because she has a dark black nose and the words "Black" and "Ben" both begin with a "B". Ben and Jerry were our only ferrets for four years. Around Valentine's Day, 1994, we decided to add another little kit to our family. We met Buttercup, a pretty little chocolate sable kit, in another pet store. She could fit easily in the palm of my hand. She would rest in my winter coat pocket, where she would gnaw on my little finger. Needless to say, we fell in love with her too. We definitely wanted a feminine name for the new ferret and the name of a flower suggested itself. "Snapdragon" was considered and rejected -- we did not want a self-fulfilling prophesy. We settled on the name "Buttercup". For the first year she was mostly called "Baby". Ben & Jerry accepted her surprisingly well, considering what a pest she was to them. This was especially surprising in retrospect considering what difficulty we later had in getting the older three to accept Bridgett. Buttercup is the most petite of our ferrets. The fourth ferret was a rescue ferret. One of our neighbors is an insurance adjuster. One day in April, 1995, while at the home of one of her clients, she saw a ferret in a cat carrier in the basement. It had been given to one of the children of the family and was now unwanted. Our neighbor told the woman there that she knew of someone who might find a home for the ferret. Thus Bridgett came into our lives. She is a sable ferret, lighter in color and larger than Buttercup. Bridgett came to us in a cat carrier (which they wanted back) filled with cedar chips. Her possessions were a bag of cedar chips, a can of "Sun-Seed" ferret food, a piece of an old shirt and a small plastic dish. We were told that she was "less than a year old". The cedar chips went immediately into the compost pile. She was so thin that I could easily feel her ribs. That is now no longer true. Her spirit was so stunted by neglect that she didn't know how to play. She would just stare at a dangling toy and not know what to do. She also had a bad biting problem: she would bite "hard". I trained her to moderate her biting in the first week. However, the hard part was yet to come. The other ferrets decided that they didn't like her. She, for her part, did not have any social skills with other ferrets. She would react to the other ferrets by staring at them. It took about 7 months (and a lot of work) until she was accepted by them. For the most part, Bridgett would run from them to a tube and then defend herself by biting at the other ferret's face. If she couldn't reach the face she did not know what to do. Buttercup could push her away by backing up into her. We got Jasmine in October, 1995, at the same pet shop Buttercup came from. We were hoping that a younger ferret would be a friend and companion for Bridgett. Jasmine had arrived at the pet shop in late July. By October she was already four months old. She is a dark-eyed white with a sprinkling of dark guard hairs down her back and sides. She is our biggest ferret, weighing in at 2.2 pounds. The name "Jasmine", continues the flower theme: a white flower that "smells nice". The reaction of the older three to the newcomer was at least neutral rather than hostile. She would zoom around them before they would react. To our surprise and disappointment, the main hostility came from Bridgett. Bridgett, the ferret who did not know how to fight, now instantly discovered how to bite and shake Jasmine's neck. However, the coming of the newcomer brought peace to the house in an unexpected manner. Now Bridgett was not the newest ferret. The older three now tolerated her more, and the older three were now occasionally spotted sleeping with Bridgett. The older three also seemed to get along reasonably well with Jasmine and they were also occasionally spotted sleeping with her. By November, Bridgett seemed to be dropping her hostility to Jasmine and now occasionally would sleep with her. Bridgett would still chase Jasmine, but now some of it seemed like play. Jasmine is a big ferret and is quite capable of taking care of herself. By December, all five ferrets were able to live together in one cage. Jasmine and Bridgett accompanied us to Ohio for Christmas. They shared a small cage for several days and were inseparable companions. Six-year-old Ben still maintains her "alpha" status in the "pack". --- Bill & Clare Sebok [Posted in FML issue 1461]