While I do not doubt that many of the allegations being made against Petco stores are probably true, I must agree that we can't indict the Petco chain as a whole, but must target the offending individual stores. The ferret cage in the local Petco in my area is always clean with plenty of food, water and toys, and they use recycled paper, not wood chips, on the floor. The ferrets there always seem healthy, though an employee admitted to me that they don't get much handling simply because the store doesn't keep adequate staff to allow them time for that. Our second ferret, who my daughter bought from this Petco, did bring home ECE, but none of the babies had shown any symptoms while in the store. I don't know what they do with sick ferrets there, and I'm sure this isn't the best of situations for the ferrets, but it isn't the worst either. Recently I was in this Petco buying Ferretvite for my babies, and the cashier mentioned to me that someone had brought in a "found" ferret earlier that day. They thought she might be sick, because she wasn't as active as their babies usually are, so they were keeping her in the back for observation for a couple of days before adopting her out. I asked to see her, and was taken to the back room where a beautiful little red-eyed white was sitting in a 20-gallon aquarium. She looked perfectly healthy to me, and was very sweet when I held her. I think she wasn't as active as they expected a ferret to be because she was no longer a kit, and was probably terrified from whatever ordeal led her to be loose. I told the cashier I wanted her and left my phone number, not sure how we were going to handle another ferret, but unable to think of her staying in that aquarium any longer. The girl called me later and told me that one of the store managers, who "knew a lot about ferrets," had decided to take her. I hope she's in better housing now. Anyway, I digress. I don't mean to sound as if I'm defending Petco or any stores selling animals as merchandise, but before we attack an institution, we should make sure we have the right target in sight. Cheri, Chadley, Dana, the eight kitties, and Alex the dog [Posted in FML issue 2586]