Hi all! Sorry to not have posted for a while, but things have been rather hectic lately - two adrenal surgeries, one adrenal/insulinoma surgery, one malignant tumor of unknow origin removed, one "heart attack" ferret relapse, and three lost ferrets! I try to help out as much as I can whenever I hear of a lost ferret, and one was very near my home. This is the sad story - all those who don't like sad stories, scan on. Those who think their houses are ferret-proof - please read. I received a phone call from "Joyce" whose ferret escaped her house on Monday. "Lili" the ferret was last seen Monday morning. This person worked out of her home and was calling me for assistance in locating her ferret. I told her the usual stuff - squeak toys, leave food out, search everywhere within a quarter mile of her home, enlist the help of the neighborhood kids (this is the BEST thing to do, don't kid yourself, the neighborhood children know everything that is going on and anywhere an animal is, they would have seen it), put up posters, run an ad in the newspaper, call the SPCA and animal control daily, but nothing worked. The weather stayed warm enough so that if the ferret found food & water, it would still be alive. Three more days passed and the daily contact continued. I got to know this person solely through phone contact and I could tell the strain of not knowing was getting to her. Finally I asked her if she was absolutely positive the ferret got out of her house, and she said yes. I told her to search the house room by room everywhere! Especially if she thought there was no way the ferret could have gotten to that place or in that spot. Two hours later, I got a call. "Joyce" found "Lili", and she had died. She was indeed trapped in the house. She said it looked like Lili had chewed her way into a box of christmas wrapping paper and got her head stuck in the cardboard tube and suffocated. "Joyce" was heartbroken. She feels so guilty that her ferret got trapped and died without her knowing it inside her house. Please make sure that places/stuff that you don't want your ferret to get to are out of reach of ferrets! They are so inquisitive, its second nature for them to stick their heads in a hole, as if so say, "whats in there, and do I want it?". Everyone always wants what is best for their pets, so I am posting this so that maybe another ferret will be saved. I hope that tonight finds all ferrets, safe and sound. Lisa [Posted in FML issue 1727]