A friend of mine has a couple of kids who keep Ferrets, The other day one escaped, so they are now wondering if said Ferret will meet a swift death, of manage to stay alive. They live in a semi built up area with lots of treed areas and parks. I assume that apart from dogs and foxes there would be few predators. There are plenty of Rabbits in the area.
It would depend on their ability to avoid becoming prey, their ability to combat disease, and their ability to find adequate food stores. I don’t think tame Ferrets are that different from their wild counterparts, and they seem to be fairly adaptive, but it would depend on where they were released. How would it know how to avoid street traffic or people who might try and catch it?
I’d think it would stand a better chance than a cat or dog that was let free. My two cat’s were raised in doors for 5 years before I got them, feet never touched the grass. Once I got them home I let them into my fenced in backyard and almost immediately stated seeing dead mice and chipmunks at my doorstep. They never ate them, but then again they are well fed. I think a ferret would do fine outside unless there were snakes about.
Aren’t ferrets illegal in Australia?
California has outlawed ferrets supposedly because they fear they will establish feral populations. Most of the ferrets I have heard of getting loose actually find humans similar to the way dogs do. I have had two ferrets over the years that were strays. They were very happy to turn themselves over to a human with food.
Feral ferrets are unlikely to survive long in a built-up urban area without an abundance of prey. Unlike cats and dogs, they’re not large and heavy enough to knock over or jump into trash bins and other containers where food can be scavenged. They might stand a better chance in the area you describe, where there are lots of parks and rabbits, but even then I suspect they’d have a hard time.
I am not convinced that there is any such thing as a tame ferret - they are all little monsters. My son’s Ferrets are foolishly bold and curious. When he takes them for walks he says if he didn’t restrain them they would eagerly walk up to a large dog with little sense of danger. One of his books on ferret care warns that they have a high likely hood of getting themselves into lethal trouble unsupervised.
That being said, having observed their cousins the Marten and to a lesser extent Weasels and Ermine in the wild, their tenacity, energy and pure determination are powerful survival skills. I have honestly had to fend Martens away from my food with kicking and a ski pole. They have walked over me in my sleeping bag to get at a food stash and growled at me when I stirred. I would expect them to be significant urban pests like Raccoons but for some reason the urban environment doesn’t work for them.
I don’t know how closely related the stone martin is to the american pine martin but they seem to do quite well in the city. Curiously enough a small population was introduced into a Wisconsin suburb where they seemed to thrive but over 60 or 70 years have never really spread out.