by debferret

2013 Christmas Ferret Frolic

Every year the Manitoba Ferret Association holds an annual Christmas party. Although this post is from a few years ago, and it’s not the season, currently Winnipeg is cold and windy so close enough!

Santa

Christmas 2013 was both Turnip and Radish’s first. They met Santa, learned snow was cold and enjoyed playing with their brothers and sisters at the shelter. Radish and his brother were adopted out to two members, I adopted Radish and another member adopted his brother, because of this they hadn’t seen each other since late October/early November.

Don’t be surprised by their short attention span, ferrets are very intelligent animals, there was a posting I read on Reddit the other day of someone’s ferret who escaped and ended up at her work (she took them to work often).

During the frolic I placed Radish in the baby room, at this point he was maybe two months old, immediately his brother came directly for him and played for hours. It. Was. Adorable.

Brothers

Starting out Radish was half the size of his brother, last time they met he looked to be about twice his size!

(Animal safe) Packaging peanuts

The MFA Winnipeg branch is run out of a lady’s home where she has a room set aside for ferret play, pictured above, it has multiple cages surrounding secured on shelves. Below the shelves have ferret hanging beds, along the walls venting is secured for ferrets to run through. There’s multiple litter boxes, tons of toys and right in the middle for the party they placed a kiddy pool with (animal safe) packaging peanuts. (I would just like to say again, these are not just any packaging peanuts they are specifically made to be safe for animals).

Mommy cuddles

The frolics go for a few hours and at times Bandit and Turnip get a little tired from all the action, Radish… he never gets tired. Ever.

All my babies

One of the ladies husband dresses up as Santa and we all get pictures of our Monsters with him. If you are lead to believe ‘Bird People’ are strange – here’s a quick reminder they aren’t alone.

03.06.16

by debferret

2014 Camping With Ferrets

Summer of 2013 I decided I would take Bandit and Turnip (Radish wasn’t born yet) out camping with me, I’d never taken pets camping before so I wasn’t quite sure how exactly it would go. First thing was figuring out what exactly was required for camping with ferrets. The ferret specific supplies I took were; Food/Water dishes, Water bottle, Ferret food, Guinea pig cage (it was smaller to make living in a tent more convenient), Mini litter box (for the smaller cage), Hammock bed and hanging tunnel (they still needed to be comfortable), Leashes!

At night they slept in the Guinea pig cage with us in the tent, locked (unlocked Bandit could escape within 5 minutes..), before bed I did allow them to roam the tent for a while.

Bed Time!

During the day we put their harnesses on so they could explore but close enough to keep an eye out for unfriendly animals (there’s many birds, and other dogs around). They really enjoyed the many smells and sounds, although Turnip was a little shy of how open it was.

Once they discovered the picnic bench was essentially a large ferret shelter, they basically were determined to spend the entire day under there watching and smelling.

Picnic Table of Safety

Ferrets have very short attention spans, and pretty poor near sight (apparently it’s good far away – according to my vet), after a while of under the picnic bench adventure they noticed the tree line. Which commenced an almost impossible attempt from keeping them from running towards it. I suppose it’s just a natural feeling, but whenever I took Bandit out for walks she always tried to escape into the trees no matter where we were. I figure it’s to keep her safe from the birds overhead, I would put them away thinking they’re too nervous (cage in the shade and tons of water) but then she’d scratch until I let her out again.

Runaway Bandit

Turnip was only four months into being part of the family at this point, so I’m unsure of whether or not he’s been outside, which is why for him I was a lot more cautious with how he was feeling.

Later on we visited some friends staying at a cabin close by (and by close I mean a bit of a drive but there was a beach!) Although pets were not allowed on the sand, I did take them near by at least. With all the people here it was a lot louder than the campground and way more food smells,

Curious Bandit

It looks like they’re further away because of a little hill, the trees gave shade and it was waaaay less crowded.

Monsters on the Beach

Bandit became the scout while Turnip was determined to protect her, it was pretty adorable. They stuck together adventuring, then both came back to cuddle on my lap after a bit.

Being Distracted

On the way home miss Bandit slept the whole way, She was pleasantly exhausted 🙂

Sleepy Bandit

04.20.15

by debferret

Luna’s Great Adventure!

Luna and Garret are recent arrivals to the shelter. You may recognize Garret’s name. He is the young fellow who was surrendered because of aggression. Turns out he was an incomplete neuter. Once the testicle was removed Garret’s aggression disappeared and he was returned to his family. Unfortunately, the family decided to re-surrender both Garret and his cage mate Luna as they no longer had time for them with the new baby.

Luna and Garret are very high energy. With mostly older ferrets in the shelter, it is quite a change to have such energize bunnies running around. Love it most days!!!

Luna and Garret were out for playtime. About an hour into their play time, I heard the loud tinkle of a wind chime. I love wind chimes and I have several hung up along the walls of the shelter room. When the window is open, the breeze creates a lovely melody.

My prized wind chime was a gift from my husband. It is a large outdoor wind chime from Schrimer’s. Cost him a small fortune many years ago and it is so beautiful I don’t want it ruined by actually putting it outdoors. So, it hangs right in front of the shelter window and I smile each time I see it.

So, back to Luna and her adventure! I hear the tinkle of my wind chime. Each wind chime has their own unique sound. I recognized the tinkle as my prized outdoor wind chime. Hmmm, the window is closed and so I should NOT be hearing the tinkle.

I dash in to the shelter room and there is Luna. She is swinging on the wind chime. She has climbed up the Ferret Nation cage and from there onto the wind chime. She looked back at me when I hollered her name! The look was a typical teenager “whatever”.

As I approached her to take her down, she realized that maybe she was in trouble and should make her get-a-way! From the wind chime through the blind and hung up on the screen! I ALWAYS keep my window closed when ferrets are out playing. I never want to experience the tragedy of a ferret falling to its death because the screen gave way. Thank god I had that rule in place.

So many funny things happen in the shelter and I almost never get to document it on my cell or camera. This time I just happen to have my camera on the coffee table and grabbed it as I ran to the shelter. I was able to get some good pictures before I put the camera down and rescued Luna. Her thanks was a ticked off weasel war dance and an attempt to scale the Ferret Nation cage for another go at the wind chime!

Luna and Garret are up for adoption to an experienced ferret owner. These two are a real handful! Wonderful, but definitely a handful!

Enjoy the pictures of her Great Adventure. PS – she has claimed the wind chime as her personal diva spot and I am constantly taking her down now! Should I remove the wind chime – NO, some times you have to say “It’s my house damn it and I get to have something for me”.

Luna swinging on my outdoor wind chime in front of the window in the shelter room

Luna in her best Diva pose on the wind chime

Luna thinking of getting down-nope!

Luna back to sitting pretty and giving me the LOOK. She looks like a statue!

Luna deciding that Mommy is mad and maybe she should make a get-a-way

Luna realizing that she is stuck

Help Mommy= I stuck

03.31.15

by debferret

HOW TO COPE WITH A SUSPECTED BLOCKAGE

The most frequent health related phone call I get is “I think my ferret ate something he shouldn’t” or “My ferret ate…… and passed it, will he be ok?”

This remedy deals with your ferret eating material or very soft vinyl.

So, you find the bedding with a chunk missing. You pick up the toys at the end of the day and notice the toy mouse no longer has a tail. You go to change the dirty litter box and you notice a very colorful poopie. *Later on in the week, you will be folding your underwear from the dyer and discover your ferret has sampled several pairs-now you know where that rainbow colored poop came from”.

If your ferret is still eating and drinking and is NOT lethargic you have a window where you can apply these steps at home. If your ferret has had one mucky poop and the rest look normal he most likely has passed the chewed matrial. If your ferret is pooping long stringy lead pencil sized poops then most likely he has a partial blockage.

Ok, this is what you can do until you take your ferret to the vet. Give your ferret a 3 inch ribbon of cat hairball remedy; malt flavor. This is something you should have in the house at all times if you have a ferret. This is a product you should be using weekly in a dime size portion to help your ferret pass any ingested fur. Don’t have hairball remedy. Ok, a great substitute is plain old Vaseline or petroleum jelly. Hairball remedy is petroleum based with flavoring.

What will NOT work is using vegetable oil. The petroleum jelly coat’s the item and makes it pass smoothly and gently. The oil will make it oily but not coat the item.

You will want to repeat the 3 inch ribbon about 4 hours later. Meanwhile you will do the unthinkable unless you are a ferret owner. You will pick up the ferret poop, place in your palm and gently run warm water on it to dissolve the poop. You will extract the pieces of material and match them to the hole in the bedding/hammock/sock…

Once you have all the little pieces to fill the hole you are home free. When the ferret has a poop with no bits of material in it you can usually figure that he has passed everything. The choice will then be up to you if you still want the ferret checked out by the vet.

CAVEAT: If you suspect your ferret as swallowed something hard like a piece off a plastic or rubber toy, then your ferret needs immediate attention from your vet. You don’t want to push the hard plastic into the colon and rip something!

02.18.15

by debferret

Valentine’s Party Was a Blast

The 2015 members only Valentine’s Party was held on February 15th. The first human game “Steal Your Hearts” had folks picking up candy heart with CHOPSTICKS and transferring them into a dish. Sharon beat out everyone else with 12 candy hearts in 30 seconds. Sharon actually picked up 2 hearts at once and that put her in the lead from Sue’s 9 hearts. Sharon won a stuffed Frog for her fuzzies.

The first ferret related game was “Pick your Own Treat” We had 6 paper plates set in a circle. Each plate had a different treat on it. Bandit Chicken, Raisin and Bacon, Ferret Chews, Ferretone and Chicken Temptations. You placed your ferret in the circle and guessed which treat he would not just sniff at but actually eat! Both of Rena’s ferrets Jack and Baby chose her guess of the Ferretone. Sharon’s Sara correctly chose the Chicken Chew stick and her Diago correctly chose the Ferretone. All the correct guesses went into a draw and Sharon’s Sara won a stuffed Bear holding a heart!

Our next human game was the Left/Right Story told by our Melissa. You had to pass the gift to the person on your left or right as the story unfolded. You would think this is easy but after a bit, left became right and had you confused as hell. The gift ended with Andy who took home a stuffed puppy and a crinkle toy.

The Most Kisses in 30 seconds was hilarious in that only 2 ferrets deemed their owners worthy of kisses this year. Rena’s Jack gave her 5 kisses however Zoe’s Radish bestowed a whopping 25 smooches to win a stuffed Tiger which he promptly clamped on to and wouldn’t let go of!

Our net human game, Cupid’s Arrow turned out to be much harder than it looked. You had to BLOW a Q-Tip through a straw into a Valentine Pot. Zoe and Leslie sitting on the love seat behind the coffee table ended up “shot” with the Q’Tip arrows over and over. Dare I say everyone was full of hot air and overshot the mark! Melissa managed to get one Q-Tip arrow into the pot to win a Happy Face stuffy and mouse toy!

The Lightest ferret went to Dan and Melissa’s Bellie at 1 pound 07 ozs slipping past Nibbles at 1 pound 09 ozs and the Heaviest ferret went to Zoe’s Turnip at 3 pounds 06 ozs skipping past Duncan at 3 pounds 03 ozs.

The next game should have come with a warning to use the bathroom before we started. The game was very simple. Place cookie on forehead and move the cookie into your mouth. Easy Peasy! RIGHT! The facial contortions, the tongue antics, the shoulder wiggles, the desperate rolling on the floor trying to keep the cookie off the floor; honestly, you had to be there. If our wonderful photographer had taken a full length video, there would be much bribing to keep the video of the net!! Much laughter till some of use almost peed ourselves. All the successful cookie grabbers names went into the draw and Brandon won the squeeky bird and cat toy.

The final game of the day was pin the lips on the Heart Valentine. Brandon cleaned up by placing his lips almost on top of the lip outline!

Adrienne brought a lovely tray of cookies and tarts, Sharon had crisps and dips and Deb provided the tea, coffee, pop and potato chips.

All in all, it was a terrific party. All the ferrets socialized with only a few spats. Fred took lots and lots of pictures and we invite you to view them on our Flicker account.