Meltdown is playing again! Last night her legs began to be more within her recent normal range for strength, this morning she had her first normal stool since her GI bleed, and this afternoon she began to play. Quite the old lady. She over-did it, but not badly enough to blow up with ascites. Today she rearranged cage catnip mousies, played in paper bags, played with paper napkins, and got her own stink all over the other ferrets' cage. Not bad at all. It's been a long time since we have seen a fitch. Around a dozen years ago there was a problem in N.J. for a while with some backyard breeders thinking to make a quick buck and breeding from fur fitch stock which they could get more cheaply rather than from pet stock. The temperments were more mercurial (extra tender training needed and extra care to not startle), and their eyes were quite a bit closer together than any of the pet stock (from something like 5 breeders) which have been family members through the years, or any of the pet stock we have seen belonging to breeders. I doubt this now is a common problem, since the large breeders and reputable small breeders are now widely spread and have distributing networks in tact. Still, we all know that there still are those who breed without having any blasted idea what they are doing, and there will always be greed, so small as the problem most likely is it can probably be expected to show up now and then. Sukie [Posted in FML issue 1827]