>To: Kimberly Platz and Toby <[log in to unmask]> >You think Toby is a Moose at 2.3 pounds? Pogo weighs 3.8 pounds! Now >that's a MOOSE! Hah!! You think Pogo is a moose at 3.8lbs?? Milo's summer weight is 6.2lbs, and his winter weight is around 7.5 - 7.9lbs. Yes, he's neutered, he's just really really fat. We have a few hobs who weigh in around 4 and 5lbs, and they're a scant 6 & 7 months old ... >From: "Bryan H. Hall" <[log in to unmask]> >Subject: Fredonia Ferret Faiure... and my last post. >This will most likely be my last post to the FML. I no longer feel fit to >keep such august company, as I am now no better than Mr. Friend, whom the >Fredonia fuzzies survived. Bryan, you shouldn't be so hard on yourself. Not every person can be the perfect parent to every ferret. There are personality conflicts between ferrets and people - you just need the right person to deal with the right ferret. We had a rescue in here that came in at 4.5 weeks old. I also have her sister. Her sister has turned into a dream at 13 weeks, but the other turned into a monster. She bit everything, tried to locate the bones in your body with her pointy teeth and then remove them through the skin. She was beyond simple "kit-nippy". I couldn't bear to be bitten anymore, and I fostered her out with the President of the Ferret Association. Under her handling, Mocha gets better and better all the time, and has almost entirely stopped biting now - it's been 2 weeks. I just wasn't the person to break her of that habit, but I know it wasn't me (I've raised lots of wonderfully good natured kits) and it wasn't her (she's gone from being called "The Sewing Machine" to "The Angel") it was _us_. We were a bad combination. So try not to feel you've done the ferret a disservice by reacting to the pain he caused you. My very first ferret, BooBoo, had a real passion for nipping ankles when he was young. I went out of town for a while, left him with a friend, who got the BooBoo Chomp one evening and, with a reflex kick, booted my baby across the room. BooBoo is 7 years old now, healthy as a horse and the sweetest ferret in existence. In fact, he's never bitten an ankle since that defining moment. Now, it wasn't the method *I* would have chosen to go about training him out of it, but it certainly hasn't harmed his love of people (it's just a fleshless love now) or his sweet personality. Rehabilitating ferrets who were mistreated and never handled is a task that few people are equal to anyway, and you can hardly blame yourself for not having the experience or supreme patience it can require. And again, there is that personality conflict matter. We get ferrets in here all the time that were brought in because they were "nasty biters" and most of them wouldn't even think of chomping me. On the other hand, we've had problems with a few apparantly sweet ferrets who've come in and decided I was on their hate-list, but with other people they do just fine. Consider, too, that these ferrets were mishandled and mistreated by men. Could be some of these ferrets need a woman to rehabilitate them. But whatever the reason, don't beat yourself up over it any longer ... you have other wondeful ferrets who love and trust you, don't you?? Look to them as an example of your patience, kindness and interaction with fuzzies. One failed attempt does not a bad ferret owner make. Sheena - [log in to unmask] |To Err is Ferret | Director - Wherret Ferrets Halfway House & Ferretry |To Forgive...well | VP - Ferret Association of Greater Vancouver |...That's Our Job!| We're on the Web! http://ww2.portal.ca/~cmc~/ferrets/fagv/ [Posted in FML issue 1734]