Post by katt on Apr 6, 2013 16:05:14 GMT -5
Toy Safety
Hard plastic toys are the best toys. They are a lot harder to destroy and non-chewable...for the most part. Good toys are baby toys that do not have rubber pieces, noise making toys, and foraging toys. Toys should have no small parts for the ferret to chew or tear off, and ABSOLUTELY NO RUBBER!!!! If you have any rubber toy, it MUST be HARD rubber and inspected Daily for any signs of chewing or missing pieces! This is VERY VERY important! I had to pay $800 to have rubber removed from Koda's stomach. You do NOT want your ferret to chew on rubber toys! Period. It can be life threatening. The best thing to do is to adhere to the NO RUBBER rule.
In my house, rubber items do not enter the play room. I do have some rubber items in my bedroom and Shane's room where they also play, but we keep them out of reach and locked away in sealed containers that are ferret proof and in a spot where the item cannot inadvertently fall onto the ground to be found by a sneaky ferret.
Toys should not have small places that the ferret could get tangled or stuck. Long strings are strangling dangers, ropes can be eaten and (if enough is eaten) cause blockages. Tennis balls can be chewed up and usually have rubber lines and insides that are tasty to nibble. Paper towel or TP tubes are ok but there is a very definite risk of getting the fert's head stuck in the tube so you should always supervise play time with these toys. A toy that Koda really liked was a TP tube with a cat jingle ball stuck inside. The ends of the tube were smooshed so that the ball could not fall out, but Koda could see it and hear it. haha Jingle balls by the way, can be bitten and broken, at which point the bell inside can be eaten. The best jingle toys are solid, such as the Marshalls Dance and Dook Sports Balls jingly toy set. These do not have little holes for ferret teeth to get wedged in (and possibly stuck) and thus are not as easily broken open.
If it fits in their mouth, it can be eaten. If it doesn't, it can probably still be eaten, but will be a lot harder to eat. Tunnels and mazes are GREAT for outside of the cage. You can collect and connect boxes (cardboard boxes, liter bottles, black drainage pipes...anything works) to make mazes, and rearrange them to make new mazes. Hide treats in the mazes for even more fun!
Stuffed animals should NOT have ANY hard plastic eyes or noses! Stuffing is important too. Ferrets can rip open the stuffies and eat the stuffing. There is a thread around here somewhere about a type of stuffing in children's stuffed toys that turns to gel in animals' stomachs and kill them. Children's Toys are often treated with a flame retardant that makes the stuffing VERY toxic. If you use stuffies try to stick with ones made for pets. These tend to be a bit sturdier anyways.
Scrivenger's Retreat makes THE best ferret stuffies. They are adorable, high quality, and a very good price!
www.etsy.com/shop/scrivenerferret?ref=seller_info
Small stashable stuffies are great toys too, like McDondalds toys and such.
Here are a few toy suggestions...
Hard plastic balls
Babble Balls
Very Well Rinsed Medicine Bottles filled with rice and beans and other rattling objects
baby rattles
McDonald's Toys (NO small parts)
Crinkle Tunnels
Crochet/Derby Eggs
I want something like this...
www.google.com/products/catalog?q....ed=0CGwQ8wIwAA#
Hard Plastic Blocks that are a good size to be carried...
www.walmart.com/ip/Fisher-Price-B....&ci_sku=6006715
www.ferret.com/Search.aspx?PageNo....sort=descending
www.amazon.com/Fisher-Price-H5703-Activity-Tunnel/dp/B0007WWZKO
www.ferret.com/item/marshall-pet-octo-play-ferret-interactive-toy/650847/
www.kmart.com/shc/s/p_10151_10104....90000066660511P
Foraging Toys:
www.petco.com/product/109703/Supe....at=FerretHPToys
www.petsmart.com/product/index.js....r:referralID=NA
www.drsfostersmith.com/product/pr....LAID=525384 414
Foraging Toys
These are a great way to keep only ferrets out of trouble when you are busy or not at home. Have several types of foraging toys. Put treats in some of them, and hide them in different places. The next day, put treats in different ones, and hide them all in new places. That way they have to check every toy every day because they never know which one will have a treat in it! and they have to figure it out to get to it!
Dig Boxes
Get dig boxes and lots of them. They are easy to make - get a cardboard box, or a plastic rubbermaid container. Cut a hole, or holes, on or near the top (be sure the ferret can reach it to get in) (you can even attach a tunnel!) and fill the box with stuff to dig in:
long grain rice (NOT the Instant kind - if your ferret eats instant rice it can expand in their stomachs and kill them and/or cause a blockage!)
balled up paper/newspaper
shredded paper
plastic Easter eggs (do a double dig-box/foraging toy by hiding treats in some of the eggs!)
ping pong balls
dried beans
Starch peanuts (NOT the Styrofoam ones, Starch only!)
in the fall, dead leaves work well
organic soil (bake in the oven at 400 degrees F for an hour to kill any residual germs/parasites))
blankets/fabric scraps
water
anything you can think of!
If you can, attach a tunnel to a dig box to the cage. Have multiple dig boxes around the room with different materials in each. Move them around and swap them out periodically. If your ferret is getting bored with them, take them away for a week or two and then put them back out - it is like a whole new toy!
If they are digging in the cage, make sure they have fresh toys, get more time out of the cage to play and burn off destructive energy.
Hard plastic toys are the best toys. They are a lot harder to destroy and non-chewable...for the most part. Good toys are baby toys that do not have rubber pieces, noise making toys, and foraging toys. Toys should have no small parts for the ferret to chew or tear off, and ABSOLUTELY NO RUBBER!!!! If you have any rubber toy, it MUST be HARD rubber and inspected Daily for any signs of chewing or missing pieces! This is VERY VERY important! I had to pay $800 to have rubber removed from Koda's stomach. You do NOT want your ferret to chew on rubber toys! Period. It can be life threatening. The best thing to do is to adhere to the NO RUBBER rule.
In my house, rubber items do not enter the play room. I do have some rubber items in my bedroom and Shane's room where they also play, but we keep them out of reach and locked away in sealed containers that are ferret proof and in a spot where the item cannot inadvertently fall onto the ground to be found by a sneaky ferret.
Toys should not have small places that the ferret could get tangled or stuck. Long strings are strangling dangers, ropes can be eaten and (if enough is eaten) cause blockages. Tennis balls can be chewed up and usually have rubber lines and insides that are tasty to nibble. Paper towel or TP tubes are ok but there is a very definite risk of getting the fert's head stuck in the tube so you should always supervise play time with these toys. A toy that Koda really liked was a TP tube with a cat jingle ball stuck inside. The ends of the tube were smooshed so that the ball could not fall out, but Koda could see it and hear it. haha Jingle balls by the way, can be bitten and broken, at which point the bell inside can be eaten. The best jingle toys are solid, such as the Marshalls Dance and Dook Sports Balls jingly toy set. These do not have little holes for ferret teeth to get wedged in (and possibly stuck) and thus are not as easily broken open.
If it fits in their mouth, it can be eaten. If it doesn't, it can probably still be eaten, but will be a lot harder to eat. Tunnels and mazes are GREAT for outside of the cage. You can collect and connect boxes (cardboard boxes, liter bottles, black drainage pipes...anything works) to make mazes, and rearrange them to make new mazes. Hide treats in the mazes for even more fun!
Stuffed animals should NOT have ANY hard plastic eyes or noses! Stuffing is important too. Ferrets can rip open the stuffies and eat the stuffing. There is a thread around here somewhere about a type of stuffing in children's stuffed toys that turns to gel in animals' stomachs and kill them. Children's Toys are often treated with a flame retardant that makes the stuffing VERY toxic. If you use stuffies try to stick with ones made for pets. These tend to be a bit sturdier anyways.
Scrivenger's Retreat makes THE best ferret stuffies. They are adorable, high quality, and a very good price!
www.etsy.com/shop/scrivenerferret?ref=seller_info
Small stashable stuffies are great toys too, like McDondalds toys and such.
Here are a few toy suggestions...
Hard plastic balls
Babble Balls
Very Well Rinsed Medicine Bottles filled with rice and beans and other rattling objects
baby rattles
McDonald's Toys (NO small parts)
Crinkle Tunnels
Crochet/Derby Eggs
I want something like this...
www.google.com/products/catalog?q....ed=0CGwQ8wIwAA#
Hard Plastic Blocks that are a good size to be carried...
www.walmart.com/ip/Fisher-Price-B....&ci_sku=6006715
www.ferret.com/Search.aspx?PageNo....sort=descending
www.amazon.com/Fisher-Price-H5703-Activity-Tunnel/dp/B0007WWZKO
www.ferret.com/item/marshall-pet-octo-play-ferret-interactive-toy/650847/
www.kmart.com/shc/s/p_10151_10104....90000066660511P
Foraging Toys:
www.petco.com/product/109703/Supe....at=FerretHPToys
www.petsmart.com/product/index.js....r:referralID=NA
www.drsfostersmith.com/product/pr....LAID=525384 414
Foraging Toys
These are a great way to keep only ferrets out of trouble when you are busy or not at home. Have several types of foraging toys. Put treats in some of them, and hide them in different places. The next day, put treats in different ones, and hide them all in new places. That way they have to check every toy every day because they never know which one will have a treat in it! and they have to figure it out to get to it!
Dig Boxes
Get dig boxes and lots of them. They are easy to make - get a cardboard box, or a plastic rubbermaid container. Cut a hole, or holes, on or near the top (be sure the ferret can reach it to get in) (you can even attach a tunnel!) and fill the box with stuff to dig in:
long grain rice (NOT the Instant kind - if your ferret eats instant rice it can expand in their stomachs and kill them and/or cause a blockage!)
balled up paper/newspaper
shredded paper
plastic Easter eggs (do a double dig-box/foraging toy by hiding treats in some of the eggs!)
ping pong balls
dried beans
Starch peanuts (NOT the Styrofoam ones, Starch only!)
in the fall, dead leaves work well
organic soil (bake in the oven at 400 degrees F for an hour to kill any residual germs/parasites))
blankets/fabric scraps
water
anything you can think of!
If you can, attach a tunnel to a dig box to the cage. Have multiple dig boxes around the room with different materials in each. Move them around and swap them out periodically. If your ferret is getting bored with them, take them away for a week or two and then put them back out - it is like a whole new toy!
If they are digging in the cage, make sure they have fresh toys, get more time out of the cage to play and burn off destructive energy.
