Virgo, the female ferret with the infection on the neck was taken back to Dr. Dutton. She was in terrible pain and couldn't even swallow Duck Soup. The infection was in one of the lymph nodes. While cleaning out the one infection pocket,he found another on the other side. He did a needle aspiration of the infection and pulled out 3 cc of pus. Dr. Dutton thinks that, considering the location of the infected lymph glands, that the source of the infection might be the teeth. They are badly covered with tarter. Because of her heart condition, he was reluctant to keep her under the anesthetic very long, so did the best he could in the short time he had. The plan is to get the infection cleared up, so we can somewhat control the cardio. and get her strong enough to put her under and scale the teeth thoroughly. Sort of the chicken and egg problem. The teeth are causing the infection, but he can't clean the teeth completely until he gets the infection under control. The tumor removed from the other female was described as ovarian, and the size of two woman's fists placed side by side. There was no room left in there for ferret. It was cancerous, but he said that such cancers usually only spread to the other ovary, which he removed during the spay. He said that she would probably be OK. All we can do is hope. The removed kidney from the other ferret was the "size of a golfball". We're still waiting on Tom and Brenda's report from the biopsy on the tumor removed from the male ferret's penis; and the 6 year-old female still has to deliver. At least 3 of these ferrets would very soon have been dead if Tom and Brenda hadn't rescued them when they did. What a mess! Only two of the seven are not in some sort of critical or potentially serious condition. Dick B. [Posted in FML issue 1762]