I took in an intact female Marshall's escapee...

[maharg]

I am a new poster to this forum though I've actually been a lurker on this list for quite some time. I'm not new to having ferrets.

Last night I picked up a female ferret who has quite a story.

She was found three weeks ago running across the road right outside of Marshall Farm(the "farm" is about an hour from where I live).

A good hearted person scooped her up and called Marshall. They said they would take her back but she then spoke to a different person (someone who had worked at Marshall) and this person said the ferret would promptly be euthanized because she could have become infected with something.

So, she did not bring her back to Marshall.

Instead, she gave her to another person who had ferret experience.
This second person however did not realize that she was not one of Marshall's pet line ferrets. She is not spayed or descented. She has no ear dots or toe dot. She does however have a metal ear tag that pierces her right ear. She was in all likelihood part of their research lines and was bred to be sold for research.
www.marshallbio.com/pages/Ferrets.html

So second person took her from the first person anyways because the first person had no clue about caring for ferrets. She was feeding her inappropriate human foods and she was in a plastic tote.

The second person advertised her on CL as intact and needing to be spayed....and up for rehome. I though that was quite odd and I figured maybe the person was just uneducated about ferrets being altered prior to going to pet stores. We corresponded a bit. She told me the story. She was unable to afford the cost for spaying and she was not having luck finding someone to adopt the ferret. I give her credit... she wanted someone who was knowledgeable about ferrets and a person with the resources to get her spayed. She knew time was running out because she might come into heat at any time.

I agreed to take her. This second person's set up was also pretty inadequate. She had the ferret in a guinea pig cage right in the draft of the air conditioner. She was shivering when I went to see her. She was being fed 8 In1 Wild Harvest Super Premium Ferret food.

I have no idea when this petite little girl was born but she is for sure not a 6-8 wk baby. I'd say she is between three and four months. She will be spayed ASAP as in- as soon as I can get her an appointment. She is not in heat yet, thank goodness, and I am praying she does not come in before I can get her an appointment.

Her ear tag has numbers on both sides. The one side has 3-5 and the other has three numbers with no dashes in between.
I am wondering if anyone knows anything definitive about these Marshall ear tags? Could 3-5 be her birth day/month? Or is that maybe her litter identifier?

I am glad I got her. She is sweet and ,so far, is quite reserved. I did see personality come out when she was drying off from a bath. She puffed her tail up, rolled and slid around the floor and even dooked and chased my hand a bit. She is a good girl. She tasted a bit of homemade soup but was not thrilled with it yet. I am giving her dry kibble since that is what she is used to eating. I have some commercial raw foods from Casey's Pantry that I will try with her too.

Oh , and I am calling her Gwyn..it means fortunate.

Anyone else heard of Marshall's escapee's. I wonder how often it happens?

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[luci]

Wow! That's an amazing story! I'm afraid I have no info about the tag, but thank you for taking insuch an unusual case. Will she be staying with you permanently?

[Heather]

She's a sweet little thing. Thank you so much for taking her in. Even if the previous people who rescued her hadn't a clue, a special thanks to them too. As you read my post further you will understand why We've got some breeders on board who may better able to tell you when the optimum time would be to get her spayed. Myself, I wouldn't spay her until her heat which should be next March or so up here. She would have a better chance against adrenal disease if you can postpone that spay until then, at least that's how I understand it.
She is from their research line She wouldn't need to be spayed or descented for that...hence no need for the tatts either
Are there any letters on that tag? If there's a cmo2 on that tag? It could be an autoimmune study that they were conducting. Seems there was also a cloning study going on as well. That's a couple that I found. I'm a little disturbed by the information that I'm digging up. These studies .... most of these studies have been performed at the marshals farms!!! They perform these studies on site because they have the vets to deal with it. I'm disgusted.
Here's another, no id tags numbers other than to identify that the ones with metal tags were the members of a study on the effects of nitrogen dioxide of the respiratory tract of children. Here's part of the study as a back up to my statements.
##During growth and development, young children are periodically exposed to relatively high concentrations of various air contaminants, including tobacco smoke and environmental pollutants generated by fossil fuel use. The effects of these exposures on respiratory function and lung development are difficult to determine because of interindividual variation and lack of accurate dosimetry. To provide information on the effects of chronic exposure to a common indoor and outdoor pollutant during lung development, a study was performed to assess the effects of exposure to two concentrations of nitrogen dioxide (NO2; 0.5 or 10 ppm) on tracer particle clearance from the airways of ferrets exposed during postnatal respiratory tract development. Separate groups of ferrets were exposed nose-only to the test atmospheres or clean air 4 h/d, 5 d/wk, for either 8 or 15 wk. Those animals exposed for 8 wk were subsequently housed in a filtered air environment until the particle clearance measurements commenced at 3 wk prior to the end of the 15-wk exposure protocol. Radiolabeled (51Cr) tracer particles were deposited in the respiratory tract of all animals by inhalation, and the clearance rates from the head and thoracic regions were separately monitored for 18 d. No significant effects of the NO2 exposure on head airways clearance were seen. In contrast, the rates of particle clearance from the thorax of both the 8- and 15-wk groups exposed to 10 ppm NO2 were significantly reduced, and did not differ from each other. Thoracic clearance was also reduced in animals exposed to 0.5 ppm, but the rate was not significantly different from that of the clean air exposed controls. These results show that NO2 at moderate concentrations caused highly significant changes in the deep lung of the juvenile ferret, and suggest that impairment of the clearance function may be only slowly recovered after chronic exposure. ##
I wish you and your little one all the best. Please keep us posted as to how she's doing.
ciao

[maharg]

Jun 5, 2010 19:39:50 GMT -5 luci said:

Will she be staying with you permanently?

Will I rehome Gwyn? can't say for sure yet, though in all likelihood, I will probably not go searching out a home for her. If the perfect person came along then I might let her go if I know that person can give her all that I do and then some.


Heather , Thanks for the research. No letters on her tag, just the numbers 3-5 and on the other side I believe it is 855.
I have looked up info on the Marshalls research ferrets, their ears tags, testing etc...all via Google. The finding were disturbing to me too.

One of the reasons I was hesitant to take Gwyn in was because of fear that Marshall's might be doing testing right there for ferret diseases...i.e., What if she was part of an ADV study....
She is in strict quarantine away from my ferrets , and I am being insane about following strict quarantine procedures. I'll have her tested for ADV.


As to spaying her, I am interested to hear what others including the breeders have to say about when it would be best to spay her. I was thinking that I needed to do it right away but what you said makes sense to lessen chances of adrenal.

[wepamperpets]

She is a VERY SMART Jill she escaped from the awefull horrid place, good girl!!

So glad someone found her and took her in. It doesn't surprise me that they would euthanize her, MF could care less about the ferrets, they are just another number and money making profit She's very lucky to have gotten out of there alive while she could, so happy she got to your home where she's going to be cared and loved for and treated like she should be!

Not too long ago on another forum someone acquired a whole MF ferret, this ferret had the same metal ear tags from what looks like in the pics. It had no tattoo's either. The ferret was sold to a university for lab testing (I*think* it was penn state university, in state college pa) once they where done testing on the ferret they sold it - thats how the girl acquired the ferret.

MF is always giving me more and more reasons to hate them, here's another

[wepamperpets]

The longer you wait to alter the ferrets the more the ferret benefits and helps keep the nasty adrenal disease away longer.

Should not alter a ferret before 6 months! even that is bit early. I'd at least wait 8-10months, longer the better. Ideally should have a 1st season, then alter. Its easier with the boys bc they dont go into a season that could kill them so there's not no worry like the jills, unlike the jills that it will be absolutely necessary she get jill jabbed. You have things like pyro that can kill the jill.

Not sure exactly when the jill jab is done from time they are in season, as I've not had a jill yet. If your going to wait contact a experienced breeder and I am sure they would be happy to help answer questions regarding this stuff! and they're gonna know what to do when.

[nwheather]

I agree with others suggesting that you hold off on spaying her.
Do you have a good ferret vet?

I would treat her as a private bred ferret, & let her go into her first heat cycle. When her vulva swells to the size of a chick pea, is when she would get her shot, to pull her out of heat. She'll go through a false pregnancy, & have "air babies". She will act like she had babies & you may see some "goo" about the time of her "delivery date".
Then you get her spayed, or you can let her go through another cycle, you will need to follow the steps again.
It's been almost two years since I went through this wiht Mystic, (private bred) so if I'm missing something, I hope someone catches it.
Julie (GFX) was great when I got the babies (Mystic & Majik). She told me what to expect & when to expect it.

Some jills can go into their first heat as early as 5 months (Mystic did) but she was also born in January, but it's usually at about 6-9 months old.

You will see behavior changes in her. She may become more "mothering". She may get kinda snotty, it depends on her personality. I didn't have any problems, when Mystic went through her heat cycle.

[novemberkris]

Aside to wepamperpets: * I remember reading somewhere when looking at graduate schools, that Penn State retires some of its research ferrets and adopts them out to live out the rest of their lives in a home setting, but I can't seem to find a link to it now. As funny as this sounds, I search "ferret" on PSU's website, and get a bunch of studies regarding the visual cortex response and ferret brain reactions to harmonic and inharmonic tones ...*

But off-topic. I agree to get a breeder's advice on the best time to spay your girl. What a lucky jill to escape there, especially since Marshall's does a lot of controversial research on its grounds. I'm glad Gwyn has found a home to get her on the right track.

[sherrylynne]

So glad this baby girl managed to escape! It should be interesting to see if she tries it again on you Sounds like she's going to have a great home, thank you for taking her in.

[mustelidmusk]

When I was at the Buckeye Bash the year before last, the recommenation from Dr. Nicco Schoemakeris is as follows: Allow the jill to come into season, give her a "jill jab" (hormone shot) to take her out of season. When she comes back into season again(which may be a matter of a couple of weeks only), have her spayed.

This will not prevent adrenal disease, but it may put off development of the disease.

PLEASE remember that , if you allow your jill to come into season, a hormone shot will need to be given to make sure she does not develop aplastic anemia. My recommendation is to make an appointment for two weeks later AS SOON AS your jill 's vulva begins to swell. Give the shot (or have her spayed if you're not going to give the shot) two weeks after her vulva begins to swell. This should given her the benefits of hormones without risking development of anemia.

If you're doing the shot for her first estrus, be sure she really comes out of estrus (her vulva and behavior return to normal within the expected time frame). Ask the vet how long it should take her to come out of season so you can make sure the shot is working. Once she is out of season, she may come back into
estrus within a matter of a couple of weeks. Again, make the appointmet to have her spayed as soon as she comes nto season. would make the appointmen 1-2 weeks after heshws her first symptoms of estrus.....timimg is very important because you don't want to be sending an anemic jill into major surgery.

Here is another thing to consider... I've heard some vets prefer to perform spay surgeries when the jill is NOT in season since they feel there is greater risk for blood loss issues - I've heard that some vets will even charge more for the surgery if the jill is inheat. . My vet feel that spaying a jill in season present any additional risk (as long as the jll has not been in season too long), but he does tons of ferret surgeries all the time.

Jills in the US will most likely start coming into estrus around the January/early february time frame. Some may even come into season in Decmber.

so, start saving money now and be sure to talk to your vet well in advance of your jill's estrus so you can be prepared to deal with the logistics.

She's a cute little girl

-jennifer

[lorelei0922]

here in the UK we would wait for her to come into season and book her in for a jill jab.. a chemical hormone injection that will begin to bring her out of season, then a spay apt is made 2 weeks later. This .. many believe allows the jill to fufill her designed lifecycle through to adulthood before being spayed.

[msktty89]

What a crazy story! I also have no information to share, but am jumping in and saying "thank you" for taking her in.

[tink80]

What a lucky and very smart girl.

[acampbell89]

That is an amazing story! My heart goes out to you and those who helped save her! It makes me feel so good to hear rescue stories such as this one!

What an amazing and beautiful little girl!

[maharg]

Thanks everyone.
I have decided I will let her come into season, get her the injection and then have her scheduled for a spay.

Gwynnie and I are getting to know one another.

She is a VERY active and determined girl. I can see how she was crafty enough to escape from Marshalls. She is quite the climber and is very fast.

She is using her litter box religiously. She eats very little. I ended up buying some of the Marshall food ( yuk) because I was getting worried that she was not getting enough calories to maintain. I thought maybe she was used to that Marshalls food and would not eat anything else. She is eating more of that and I am mixing in some of the better dry with it. She is not a fan of the duck soup yet. I'll keep trying.

She is easily handled to get her out of the cage. She comes right to me and I can pick her up and carry her. She allows me to carry her around and does not squirm to get away.
Once she is on the floor in her room, she gets super stimulated and fluffs out her body and gets a bottle brush tail. She gets excited and becomes bitey during these times. I just have to be careful. If I forget and reach down to pet her her or if I just have my hands out there for her to grab, she will bite and she bites hard.
She just does not knowto not do this yet.
She does not take kindly to scruffing and to make it worse, she seems to have very little scruff-able skin on her neck area!
I have been hissing when she bites too.

She is obsessed with the rubber of my Croc shoes. I slip them on when I am in her room and she will bite hard onto the toe area, the heel or the strap and then shake her head all fierce-like. If I do not have on those shoes though, she leaves my feet alone so she has a thing for the rubber material.

She has been investigation some toys. She goes through the see through tunnel sliding along on her back and digs in there and bites the tube like crazy.

She is not sure about the big ceramic water bowl/pool but she has dipped a bit of her toes in.

She has had a few episodes of dancing and dooking. IT is good to see her relaxed and happy.
She is just a bit of a thing. So tiny. I wonder how old she really is. She just does not seem like a youngster to me by the way she acts.

She had very dry skin when I got her but that already is much improved probably due to bathing her and using the Ferretone as a supplement.

So, that is the update.

Oh, by the way, My husband spoke to someone who works at Marshall Farm. This person said that ferrets escape all the time from there and that there are some who escaped and are now living wild on the grounds.
He said there are so many ferrets there that they do not even worry about it when they escape.
Grrr. I seriously had a dream the night I heard this that I went there to round up escaped ferrets....

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