A Rude Awakening (A Ferret MPSIMS)

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
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I’m a ferret owner. Two of them, actually. One is a silver mitt, and the other is white. I adopted the white one after the very wealthy Iranian couple who owned him returned to their home country last year.

He led a very sheltered life under these folks. He was not allowed free roam, and was restricted to an oversized ball (a larger version of the hamster ball) for exercise. When he first came to live with us, his fur was perfectly, blindingly, bright. He looked every bit the arm decoration that a king would have had as a pet in medieval times. He was very puzzled at being able to walk wherever he wished, and he was definitely overweight.

After a few weeks, he had slimmed down a bit, and his fur had taken on an off-white colour that comes from a happy ferret playing underneath of dusty furniture. However, he has never had the same playful quality that the silver one does. They play-fight occasionally, but only for a very short period when a domination dispute occurs (That hammock is MINE!), and the white one always submits very quickly. He just isn’t a rough and tumble ferret- He is a piece of arm candy. To top it all off; he is as deaf as a post.
So, last night I put them in their sleeping cage (lest I be woken up in the middle of the night for a round of “Chase the Ferret”), and went to bed.

I was somewhere off in dreamland, when I awoke to a scream.

Not just any scream; it was one that I recognized.

A few months ago, my apartment suddenly came under attack from rats completely out of the blue. It took several weeks to rid the building of the pests, but glueboard by glueboard, I got my place clean. Every time one of the little (Little?? These things were HUGE! Usually 7-8 inches long- not including the tail) suckers would get stuck, it would let loose with this god-awful shriek that sounded like someone was gutting it with a knife.

This was the sound that I heard. At 3:45 in the morning.

At first I ignored it- I thought perhaps it had gotten stuck in some of the hardware cloth I had used to patch a few holes behind my kitchen stove. Whatever. He will get himself loose in a minute, and I’ll fix it in the morning.

Then another scream came. Another. Another longer, louder scream, and this time it was accompanied by a scurrying noise coming from the direction of the cage.

I decided to investigate.

I got out of bed in my boxers, and flipped on the light. From across the room, I could see the white ferret on the floor of the cage with his back to me. This was odd, because both of them were usually at the side of the cage with noses poked through trying to see what the fuss was about whenever I caught a rat in the past.

My attention was now diverted to the ferret, so I walked over, and I could see that he had wedged himself in the gap between the cage wall and their litterbox. From the other end, I could see a tail. The ferret was not moving.

Expecting the worst, I quickly opened the cage- There was no way this weak, non-aggressive ferret had fared well against one of these rats. I grabbed him and he looked up at me with blood running from his nose. He was alive! Not only was he alive- he was perfectly calm. I got the other one out of their 4 story palatial estate (who was still sound asleep, BTW), took them into the bathroom, and shut the door.

I then went back to the cage to see what I could do with the rat. What I saw was stunning.

My sweet, never-had-to-want-for-anything, little snow-white ferret had damned near killed this rat.

His tail was nearly severed. His head was bloody. An ear was missing.

The most impressive part, was his right haunch. Unfortunately for the rat, my Fiancee and I had been gone on vacation, and his claws had not been trimmed in nearly three weeks due to my forgetfulness. Even though they are long, they still aren’t all that sharp, so it took a lot of force to rip the gaping hole that was flapping about on the rat.

The rat still had a lot of fight in him though, so I pushed the cage out of the front door (it’s as tall as I am), and opened it. The rat took off down the street, never to be seen again.

I darted back inside to check on the ferret and his bloody nose. It turned out that the rat did indeed get a hold of him- once. He had a scratch just below his nose that had bled for a moment, and then stopped. Other than that, there was not a scratch, nor a speck of blood on his entire body, and he was still just as cool as a cucumber.

I honestly did not know he could move at the speed that it would take to catch such a quick piece of prey- he did his damage with surgical precision.

I spent the next hour doling out raisins as a reward, and much petting was had.

I’m impressed. :cool:

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Yay for White Ferret! (Names and pics?)

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I, too, am a ferret owner (up until very recently, two, but now only one :(). One of my vets once mentioned that domesticated cats like to pretend they are predators; domesticated ferrets are predators. He suggested feeder mice as a treat (frozen then thawed, not live). The rat never stood a chance. I would also suggest never leaving a ferret in a room with any other rodent-ish pet, or a rabbit.

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One of our ferrets gets the whole predator/prey thing. She’s “instinct-smart” but a real ditz about other things like problem solving. She goes near-feral when presented with a pet guinea pig, recoils in fear when an equally instinctual tiny terrier dog is growling at her, etc. The other ferret, the “smarter” one, apparently gave up his instincts to have room in his brain for things like opening cage latches and such. He was the one who walked up to his side of the cage wall with a “do you want to be our friend?” attitude when the terrier was snarling and being held back.

He would have probably welcomed the rat in as a friend, then our female would have rolled her eyes at him as she pounced the rat and tried to tear out its throat.

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Nice story, Herder. Someone at a store once told me that ferrets don’t climb. I nearly died laughing. Ferrets climb. Not only that, but ferrets are suicidal about heights. They never climb back down, they always choose the express route.

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setName.whiteFerret == RikiTikiTavi

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Every now and then Hallboy mentions something about wanting a ferret. As we have a rabbit, this is absolutely a current no, however, if we encounter rodent pests, I’ll keep this story in mind.

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I had ferrets when I lived in Texas. I also had – ahem – “Palmetto Bugs.”

For those of you not from Down South, PB’s are roaches big enough to ride. And they fly. Towards you. Usually your face. :eek:

Fortunately Zorro and Jester loved them some fresh protein. After a month I had two fat, happy furries and no 6 legged freaks.

Yes, I was totally squicked out by the carnage but a full ferret is a happy ferret and an unhappy ferret is a destructive little sonuvabitch. :smiley:

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I know Palmetto Bugs. They are like VW Beetles, only slightly larger, and with a stronger body. The idea of my ferrets munching on them squicks me out a lot more than mice and other small rodents.

ETA: and as you noted, those bugs FLY. I’m an atheist, but seeing that thing airborne almost had me believing in a malevolent creator.

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May I present:

The ferrets of lof

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TroubleAgain: My silver mitt is named “Halo”. The White one is named “Paris”. Like I said…he was a pampered pet. :stuck_out_tongue:

The odd part was that I would not have been shocked if Halo had done this- Once when he was barely 3 months old, I was sitting on my sofa when a mouse went running down the edge of the wall. It appeared that he had come in through a hole that was drilled into the basement for coaxial cable, and was making a run for the kitchen. Halo was sitting on the floor a good 9 feet from the wall playing with a stuffed animal, when as the mouse darted by, he seemingly had a 6th sense something was up. He dropped his toy, and moved faster than (still to this day) I have ever seen toward the wall, cutting the mouse off from his goal.

It all happened so fast- I saw a flash of mouse, then a flash of ferret…Then a mouse head rolling one way, and a body falling in another. :eek:

Mouse problem solved!
Paris OTOH…Wow. He is just so mild mannered and non-confrontational. I suspect that the rat got into the cage by pushing against the wire, and when the spring stretched, slipped in. (The springs then rendering it impossible to get out) From there, he went up a level to their food dish, which is right underneath Paris’ hammock. Paris goes to sniff the rat, gets bitten…Then turns into Kirk Douglas from Falling Down.

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Heh. That put a ray of sunshine in my coal black heart.

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I saw that! It was cute!

Was it on cuteoverload.com that I first saw ferrets referred to as “carpet sharks?” I love that term! It always makes me giggle.

Nice names, Spit.

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Not ferrets, but when I adopted two feral kittens, I was delighted that they learned to not take their hunting instincts out on the guinea pigs, but rather focused all their attentions on cockroaches, houseflies, African shield bugs, and whatever creepy-crawlies dare enter our domain.

Good kitties! Ooooh, such good kitties!

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[ nitpick ] Michael, not Kirk. [ /nitpick ]

Your ferret has had a rabies vaccine, right? Do they even HAVE rabies vaccines for ferrets? I know little of ferret care.

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Our ferret used to climb to the top of a recliner and launch himself at the kitchen counter, which was at least fifteen feet distant; he seemed to have no concept of distance and no ability to learn from experience. God, I miss that little guy.

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I’d love to have a ferret, but Himself’d never go for it, plus I have cats and a dog that would probably not take kindly to having a carpet shark around.

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Awesome story, good job little guy! I’ve always wanted a ferret, they always seem like awesome pets, but they’re not allowed in my state, which always disappoints me.

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Yes, there is at least one approved rabies vaccine strain for ferrets. (They’re also susceptible to canine distemper, but not feline, and should be vaccinated against that as well unless there are medical contraindications.)

I agree with those who are saying that ferrets must think they’re part flying squirrel. We had one Mostly Smart Ferret who just had to figure out everything. The other ferrets would watch him do whatever it was and then reproduce the behavior later if given the opportunity! For instance in a previous apartment we had a baby gate up to keep them from getting into the bathroom and bedroom when out for play time. This baby gate location was very near the dining room table. MSF would climb up on nearby chairs and vault off towards the baby gate, attempting to grab onto the top. (We put some padding at the base, atop the carpet, once we figured out he was not to be dissuaded.) He would keep adjusting his angle of launch, what chair he would choose, positioning on the chair, etc., and the others would keep an eye out during their play. When he would manage to get onto the top of it, the others would run to that chair while we would grab the errant ferret, then try to move the chair again to make that one not useful. We ended up having to move all nearby chairs, and the table was just a bit too far, discouraging him from trying further after he tested to determine that was indeed the case.

He was also the one who could pop any cage latch. He’d spend hours pulling, twisting, whatever he could manage. Twist-ties would get worked loose or broken from repetitive strain. We had to resort to those clips like you find on the end of leashes before we could trust that the escape artist would be stuck in the cage - and even then we had to be sure that every single door and side access panel was clipped down.

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Look on the bright side, Spit; you’ll always have Paris…

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