Hi All!!! A couple of observations from the last FML: I wanted to comment as a non-vet person about my personal experiences with heliobacter. I have only come across this as a secondary and perhaps opportunistic problem with ferrets with ECE. Heliobacter, as I understand it, is a naturally occurring bacteria in the stomach, which in normal numbers, aids in digestion. If, however, it is allowed to go into hyper-mode and reproduce exponentially, it causes a lot of problems in ferrets, including nausea, ulcers and diarreah. I have been successful in treating this symptomatically with sulfacrate, duck soup, pedialyte and sub-q fluids if dehydration is occurring. I consider this to be what causes so many ferrets with ECE to go downhill so fast - the immune system is suppressed by the virus and the bacteria is allowed "free rein" in the digestive tract. Anyway - like I said, just a layman's eye-view of heliobacter. Declawing - I consider this to be cruel and unusual punishment - sort of like saying, "ok, you're a ferret and you dig at the carpet and I can't break you of the habit, so I am going to take your toenails away." I had one opportunity to be around a cat that had been declawed because of excessive scratching, and while removing his nails may have spared some damage, it caused the cat to become a very nasty biter! He also then began to CHEW on the furniture! I think that surgically trying to correct a behavior problem is WRONG. Either sacrifice the carpet, or live with the destruction! Its a lot easier for me to rationalize why I should change my behavior about the carpet or plants than it is to permanently remove a part of my ferrets' body. Eye color - again, a laymans point of view - I have noticed that the ruby-red eyes of an albino reflect back orange, the burgundy eyes of some badgers/pandas/mitts seem to reflect back red, and the brown eyes of all other ferrets reflect green. Maybe of test of people's eyes are in order - do brown reflect differently than green? hazel? blue? I dont know. Perhaps the reflective color has to do with the pupils color? Snoring ferrets - is it me, or is it just the boys that do it? the wheezing, the whistling, the generally "i'm-gonna-keep-you-awake-by-making-noise-at-2am" stuff that you hear as you are trying to drift off? Anyway - thanks to Georgia Wood, and the SOS gang again, and I hope each ferret has a happy, healthy and thoroughly spoiled Christmas/Hanukkah! Ferret Navidad, folks! Lisa [Posted in FML issue 1793]