Hi, everyone, Hi again from Huntsville, Alabama. (By the way, if there are any other north Alabama people here, I'd sure like to meet you. I've had ferrets for a little over a year now and have yet to meet anyone else in my area, even though the pet stores are selling the guys like hotcakes.) I've been reading about the "lick, lick, CHOMP" thing and thought I'd add my $0.02. I have three ferrets (which, by the way, you can now see on my very simple web page: http://fly.hiwaay.net/~guys ) and of the three, only one does this... sorta. Buster, who will be a year old next month, licks me while I'm holding him. He licks just about anywhere there is exposed skin, but usually ends up licking my arm or leg while I'm sitting in the floor holding him. Most of the time I have to actually stop him because my skin starts hurting! I've sort of wondered if this was a mutual-grooming-type behavior. I usually use the time that he's licking me to inspect him for fleas. (He had 10 on him a few months ago due to a friend who let Buster play outside while babysitting.) When my skin has had enough (Boy! Their tongues can get ROUGH after a while!) I put him down and he follows me around for a while, until something else distracts him....(like Guy, in the kitchen, fiddling with ANY type of food!) Snookie, on the other hand, will lick you when he has been playing for quite a bit (either with the other two ferts, with Guy, or with me). If you ignore him, he stratches you, NONSTOP, trying to get your attention. If you still ignore him, he'll lick the place he was just stratching you and will start the whole "stratch, stratch, stratch, lick, lick, lick"-thing over again. I've actally watched him do this to Buster when Buster was wanting to take a nap and Snookie was wanting to play. Boomer, my 1 1/2 year old, will sometimes lick you when you wake him up from a nap, but that's about it...unless, of course, you just happen to have peanut butter on your hands... :-) -Mark Zmyewski Lockheed Martin Missiles & Space Huntsville, Alabama [Posted in FML issue 1645]