Have too little time to address much so will try to get the minutes tomorrow; just wanted to say that Marshall Farms HAS supported (financially and in donated animals) multiple research projects designed to protect ferrets and improve veterinary care. This is NOT from Marshalls telling me so, but from the researchers doing so. The first one I know about was the original work which led to effective vaccines, the most recent one I know of personally (though there may be ones before vaccines, or after the shedding studies, or both) was the rabies virus shedding studies which saved more ferrets very rapidly (by getting quarantines rather than automatic brain testing) in even certain single states in just one year than were used in all the shedding studies combined. (Some states just did it on any little excuse -- kisses, fights by couple with no skin broken but a vengeful ex, etc.) There are most certainly improvements which Marshalls needs, but to get them to improve it pays to concentrate on what is wrong and to find effective ways to tackle the issues. Complaining about what they are doing right or assuming that they must be doing things wrong which are just fine isn't going to make for effective persuasion in the right direction. BTW, the complain mode has been tried many times over the decade plus without positive results. It might make the complainer feel good but it hasn't saved any ferrets. What broke my heart was when the move to try to get the USDA (?) to require kits to be older from ALL sources didn't work. That was a very valiant and hard fought effort by several marvelous folks here a few years back (which I read about but did not work on). It was really SMART approach. People had already tried many times to convince a number of large breeders to send out older kits, but they all said that the buyers want the cute little fluff balls even if they haven't gone through teething, yet (an angle tried), so they couldn't go with older ages if competitors weren't doing the same thing. My secret hope is that there will again be a strong call for the mandatory age limit to be older before shipping or sale, by federal regulation. If it's across the board then the problem will go away and the competition factor won't be there, anymore. Oh, and I know that Marshalls did have a fact sheet a few years ago. Might be that it went away, but it might also be that either the distributor or the pet store Mary saw just didn't give it out. Since it also included ads for marshalls products I doubt it went away. Have a call due in to find out more about the French thing. Hope to fit that in schedules on Tuesday (the day you'll read this). Let's hope it's not anything bad, okay? Re: fish -- remember the saying "moderation in all things" and also recall that the James Fox veterinary text goes into some very serious results which too much fish can cause. Can't recall particulars offhand and don't have time to look it up now or I'll never get to sleep, but know you'll look it up in the nutrition section of the text or at least use some moderation to be safe. Ditto corn. King James (or his staffer or other who ghost wrote if such existed) was a LOUSY translator. Wish us luck that Steve and I won't have to replace the entire AC unit tomorrow. [Posted in FML issue 2718]