Stephanie Rusk: I used to take my first ferret Snoop camping all of the time. I brought her carrier (It's quite large), leash, food/water dishes, blankies, etc. Just make sure that you are in a well shaded area, so that it doesn't get to hot. If you want to take a swim, take the babies with you. Snoop would do her slow paddle next to me in the water. I would try it overnight at a local campground first, not all ferrets are alike, some will love it, and others won't. I was reading my backlog of FML's today and was kind of upset at the way people were acting towards people who use nose flicking or thumping to stop biters. They are making it sound like you're smashing the ferrets face in. It is kind of hard to see what people mean by "flicking/thumping" I personnally used "thumping" on all of my ferrets (except Oscar who was a lover from the beginning) to stop biting. I never hit them, the thump was no harder than if I were petting their noses. It's just hard to find a word to describe it. "Thumping/Flicking" are really the only 2 words to describe the action. It describes the ACTION not the FORCE applied. The sudden action is what makes them stop, not the force. And yes, I did try scruffing, hissing, saying no, etc, etc. and none of it worked (5.5 months worth of trying) 3 days of "thumping" was all it took. Snoop never bit anyone for the rest of her life (almost 8 yrs), and Miko hasn't bit anyone since she was just over 6 months old (she's almost 2 now). I see nothing wrong with it as long as you've tried all other methods and given the ferrets all a fair chance to clue in, and you don't use it on abused ferrets or fear biters for obvious reasons. Isabelle Miko: Let's go steal mommy's socks....while they're still on her feet. heh, heh, heh Oscar: You go ahead, I'm going to go dig the cr*p out of that carpeted thingie that she got us for Christmas. [Posted in FML issue 2663]