We all worship our animals, myself and the whole family do a lot of rescue work and take on nasty, unwanted, abused animals.All the ferrets I have are rescue ferrets and have had trauma in their lives. Jaffa the one we just lost was found in a net ad, her owner was neglectful and didn’t care for his ferrets. We just seen him and wanted to get her away from there as quick as possible.He said he was reluctant to let her go as her back legs weren’t developing well and she was having trouble walking. He was the type of person to have culled anything that wasn’t perfect as his other ferrets were working ferrets and she was the last of the litter no one wanted as she turned out to be a cripple so we said don’t worry about the legs we will take her.
We took her to our vet which have always been amazing with our animals and they didn’t hold out any hope for her.Their advice actually was to put her down as we were told she would never be able to do anything other than sit on our laps or waddle like a seal. They thought that the mother wasn’t given the right food and care while pregnant so Jaffa was either born with deformed legs or born with broken legs as they never formed properly. She was a tough little cookie though and in time learnt to walk and even run and manage stairs just to keep up with her two “adopted” brothers that we bought her as company (they were another net ad, the owners were getting rid of them to go on holiday and no one would go near them to feed them while they were away.)
Biscuit and Aly (Alianne) her cagemates are HUGE compared to Jaffa who was the size of a large rat but she couuld handle them and bowled them over playing.She always tussled with any new ferret we bought in and was a big part of our lives. She was too deformed and sick to have a speying op so she was on hormone treatment and meds all her life to stop her coming into season, the treatment she was receiving we were told was experimental but it was either that or we could lose her as she was too small for anaesthetic.She cost a financial fortune as she was in the vets all the time for ongoing treatment but we just tightened our belts and did whatever it took. She was doing really well and lived for just over 3 years which was good for such a poorly ferret. Our vet thinks it could have been a blood clot as it was very quick, she was quiet the night before she died but that wasn’t unusual as sometimes her morning run was enough for her and she had a snooze during the evening run.
The next morning my daughter found her dead.
We were very lucky to have her the time she was with us. Til last week we had 10 ferrets. Our first ever ferret was Pinky she was abandoned (we think maybe as we have an animal reputation someone may have thrown her in the garden.) We found her in a rubbish bag during a heatwave nearly dead, we knew nothing about ferrets at all so put her in a rat cage to get her out of the heat and we were so ignorant we tried to give her some rat food which she tried to eat she was so hungry.
We went on the net, bought books, rang vets to learn all about them so learnt quickly to care for them. Unfortunately Pinky is now a one eyed ferret as she annoyed one of our cats by pulling her tail one day, we tried to save her eye but it had to be removed, she is now a very old ferret but she plays like a youngster.
Then came Jaffa and her adopted brothers Aly and Biscuit, they were in a rabbit hutch in a garden, their owners didn’t want them as they were going on holiday and no one wanted to feed the ferrets.They came to us as babies and quickly overtook Jaffa in size. Then my sister went to live with her boyfriend at the time and badly missed our ferrets so bought two from a homing centre. A Siamese called Socks and an Onyx eyed albino called Baby, she was an elderly ferret and is a very regal little lady. Socks is the dozy one of the family and a gentle giant.
The relationship with my sister’s boyfriend broke down and she came home and he threatened to get rid of her ferrets so she bought them home to us.They had been in and out of homing shelters all their lives.
Then we had a knock on the door one day and a little boy from up the street told us he had a ferret he didn’t want anymore so he was giving him away and did we want him. He is a beautiful little siamese and was called Stinkie but we didn’t like that name as he is too gorgeous to be called that so as my daughter is into fantasy and dungeons and dragons we called him Tiamat which means Mother of all dragons. He is currently on palliative care and is in remission for cancer and has had a hard pull and at one point our vet said he could have hours or days to live but he is still battling on.
Then there came Pepsi, a man across the road knocked our door one day and said there had been a ferret on the loose for weeks and it had wandered into his kitchen, he didn’t want to but he said if we didn’t take her on, he would have to put a spade through her head. We went across to rescue her and she was in a corner, we put our hands out to her and called her and she came running to us, my mam picked her up and she gave her kisses when put to her face. She was a hell of a mess and had a growth on her face nearly the size of her head. We took her to the vet and was told it was an abscess and it needed draining so for the first few weeks she had tubes and piping hanging from her face and she sort of looked like Frankenstein’s monster with all the stitches etc. The draining was unsuccessful so she ended up having to have an op to remove it and is now a happy healthy “waddly” overweight little ferret.
Then about 2 months ago we seen an ad on the net for a little ruby eyed jill needing a home from a homing centre in Newport so we drove to get her. The lady said she didn’t particularly like or know much about ferrets so when we got her she was desperately in need of spaying. She had the op and it was successful and she is now a sweet little ferret called Tiyg with a fetish for socks, shoes and toes.
Then our last rescue was about 2 weeks ago, a man next door who owns the property was doing some work on the house to rent and he rang us and asked us had we lost a ferret as there was one in his garden. We ran up the lane to look in all the gardens but then i went into our kitchen and i found her on our floor looking for food.
She was absolutely starving and about the same size as Jaffa when we found her. She is still very small but she has put on a lot of weight and the vet says we have done well with her. She is another little ruby eye called Cola. So far that is our ferret family history. It won’t be the last as there are always others who need second chances.
Thanks to all for taking the time to read this.
To those we have lost, and those still with us we love you all. X X X
| Jaffa |
| Margaret, Fiona, Peta, Ria, Jareth, Molly |