I've had a ferret for about 6 months now and I just love the whole experience. You might say that I'm fully hooked on them as I'm sure most of you can relate. I do have a warning, though, for everyone to be very careful, as hopefully you already are. I became interested in owning a ferret after moving in with the current roommate I have now. He owned a wonderfully sweet ferret by the name of Mud. Through knowing Mud, I eventually got my own. Shortly after getting my baby, Mud became very very ill. She stopped eating and dropped tons of body weight in just a couple of days. She became so weak that she could only get around by draging her body around with her front paws; and even that was quite a task. Naturally, we took her to the vet as soon as we started noticing something was wrong. Unfortuately the vet misdiagnosed her as having some kind of parasite. So, even though she was on medication, she did not get better and she died. After Mud's death, we ok'd an autopsy. This discovered that she had gotten into some kind of poison in the house that her kidneys could not filter out. Eventually, she died of kidney failure. To this day, we have no clue what it was that she got into. And, since we are used to having lots of animals around the house and are very careful about these things, the whole thing bothers me. I certainly hope this does not happen to you. To be absolutely sure, though, it couldn't hurt to do a complete walk-thru of your house to make sure nothing is in reach of your ferrets (if/when they are allowed to ever run around and play). Anything from a cleaner on a rag left out in the open, to roach and bug poisons are common, everyday, usually out of sight, sort of things that could be deadly. Please be careful. p.s.- since this incident, our house is again filled with the sound of two ferrets running about with noises of merriment...... eeeeuuuueeeeeeeeuuu. :-B) Matthew Guest Tampa, FL [Posted in FML issue 1827]