Just a simple plea to the ferret breeder - AVOID INBREEDING ! My thanks to Matt Oestings for the warm words, and for our finding each other. Matt recently adopted a little silver mitt, spayed and descented, female ferret with a name that may be unusual to the eyes of thee and thou: GETKO - go, where "go" is the Japanese word for "5." GETKO is an abbreviation and combination name of this little lady ferret. It is a name derived from the two ferret parents who conceived and birthed GETKO right here at Ferrets NorthWest. The father ferret's name: GETAW - ni. The mother ferret's name: KODO. GETAW - ni is a pedigreed ferret, also born at FNW. KODO is a non-pedigreed ferret (born of unknown parents) in Colorado and later turned into FNW, in heat for the 2nd time, by her owners. These two ferrets were not related to each other, so the likelihood of inbreeding was very remote, if non-existant. Six weeks following the first of three copulations (three to absolutely ensure fertilization and the termination of estral swelling of the vulva) a litter was birthed by KODO. As stated above, the father ferret was GETAW - ni. The name of the litter is determined by the names of the father and the mother. Hence, we have from GETAW - ni and KODO the litter name of GETKO. All, everyone of the kits is named "GETKO." As the kits (usually held until they are juveniles) are adopted into "qualified" homes they are assigned a number that is consecutive to the time they are adopted; id est, the first GETKO juvenile that is adopted receives the suffix -1, the second -2, the third -3, and so on. However, rather than use the English language numerals suffixed to their bionames, we have chosen to use the Japanese language. Two reasons for this: 1.) A foreign language numeral is "romantic." 2.) All Americans can pronounce Japanese numerals, since they are phoneticized from the Japanese Kanji or Katagana painted characters. Note that most Americans have lazy tongues and cannot or do not want to properly pronounce numerals in other foreign languages. A superb example here is to compare pronounciation of German words to Eubonic words, the near language of the "American" Negro, erroneously termed "African-American." So in the above case, GETKO - 1 becomes GETKO - ichi, GETKO - 2 becomes GETKO - ni, and GETKO - 3 becomes GETKO - san. In Matt's case, his ferret is named GETKO-go, where "go" is number five. Thusly, in the event a GETKO adult (a F2 generation) is to be mated, we will avoid selecting another GETKO ferret as the spouse, and depending upon the sex, we will avoid backbreeding to the father or the mother, referred to as the F1 generation. We also avoid mating ferrets that have similar names either in the first or second position of the bioname; id est, GETBA-koo to GETKO-shi. The biological name and Japanese suffix is entered on the dual copies of the ADOPTION AGREEMENT AND LIABILITY RELEASE forms, along with the adopter's name, address, phone, e-mail address, the ferret's sex, its reproductive state, its color, its weight, and its innoculation status. Since the owner's name is tied to the bioname on the ADOPT AGRMNT & LIBILTY RLSE forms, the identity of the ferret is preserved in the files of FNW, even if the owner of the ferret changes the ferret's name. To prevent sale of the adopted ferret to a second owner, a $500 transfer fee liability is imposed on the adopter upon his signing the adoption agreement. This helps to maintain the ownership trail of a specific ferret adopted from FNW by impeding, if not outright inhibiting resale of FNW ferrets. This "system" for maintaining blood purity in FNW's ferrets sometimes results in some humorous names, as in the mating of the male ferret named "FERRET" and the female ferret named "QUEENIE." This litter was termed "FERQUE," and in Tel Aviv, the tenth ferret would not be too popular with the name of "FERQUE - joo," unless it was owned by Yasir Arafat. Quantum sufficit. [L.] Enough already. Edward Lipinski, Frettchenvergnuegen from the Frettchenlustbarkeitsfuehrer ! Frettchenvergnuegen [G.] Joy of Ferrets. F...fuehrer [G.] Ferret frolics leader. [F]erret [E]ndowment for [R]esearch,[R]ehab, [E]ducation & [T]raining [S]ociety, NorthWest. [Posted in FML issue 2228]