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Post by Sherry on Nov 29, 2017 12:36:48 GMT -5
I believe they can keep going til 6-9 months At least as far as appetite is concerned. There is a reason kits are referred to as "tummies with teeth" Heather would have a better idea as to when the bulk of the growing is done.
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Post by runningdog on Nov 29, 2017 14:26:27 GMT -5
I’ll just have to order more meat in! Achilles won a scuffle with Loony today - Loony started it but Achilles finished it off and chased Loony to rub in it when Loony went off to sulk, too! There’s not a lot in length between Loony and Achilles now - a couple of inches, maybe - but still quite a lot in girth and weight. Achilles also had a wrestle with Joker, which I broke up by putting an empty cardboard box on top of them both - Achilles being so young he’s still a screamer when he’s wrestling, it gets a bit noisy sometimes! By the time they’d wriggled out from under the box and explored it together, all was sweetness and light again and Achilles went off happily to be wrestled by Holly, who thinks nothing of hurling herself on a ferret twice her size and pinning him to the floor! Ajax has discovered that lying in bed having your scruff ruffled by a human finger is nice, so we had a lovely few minutes of cuddling before he got up for dinner. He was much more moderate with his nips today so the penny is slowly descending, even if not properly dropped yet. They had 50g of chopped chicken breast and a mouse each at lunchtime today, on top of the 650g of food for breakfast and dinner that they have to share with the others. Handfeeding them their chicken gives us some very nice together-time and they come when they’re called beautifully.
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Post by Heather on Nov 30, 2017 1:46:47 GMT -5
Appetites start drop off around 6 months, they will still eat more than a mature adult but not near as much as a kit. Ferrets at this point they start to consider their sexuality (unless it was robbed from them). They will continue to grow their full size to a year (if neutered early), 18 months to 2 yrs of age if allowed to mature naturally ciao
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Post by runningdog on Nov 30, 2017 7:58:17 GMT -5
They’re outside with no artificial light and we’re fairly well north - I’ve not had a ferret come into season, when kept outside, before spring and the lengthening daylight. The boys were late kits, too, they’ll only be 7 months in February when I’d expect to start seeing hobs come into rut, so they’ll get separate housing at that stage or maybe late January - it’s too young to castrate but I don’t want them sharing a cage with the two young jills after February, just in case! The jills should be coming into season in March or so - they’ll be a year old on the 20th March. I’d like to see the boys at least a year old before I do anything about neutering them one way or another.... at the moment I’m leaning towards chemical castration rather than surgical and I still haven’t made up my mind about Achilles. He’s a fine looking young hob and with such a lovely, soft nature, it’s almost a shame not to breed from him - though I don’t want to breed kits myself, there are plenty of breeders and too many kits for the available good homes already.... Still plenty of time to think about that.
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Post by runningdog on Dec 3, 2017 20:03:52 GMT -5
Fascinating discovery with Ajax today. He’s the one ferret who doesn’t dive at salmon oil when it’s in front of his nose - in fact he’ll back off from it and squirm to escape if placed too close to it - but if it’s on my finger rather than in the dish, he’ll lick it all day. He’s the nippier of the two, though improving hugely in the past few days, and licking my fingers for oil also made him markedly less bitey afterwards, too. We’re getting on top of his “omg dangerous bird noises!!” thing as well - he doesn’t panic when held firmly in both hands, tucked inside my arm against my body and preferably inside my coat as well. This could be a ferret who benefits from a very small thundershirt.
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Post by runningdog on Dec 6, 2017 15:31:56 GMT -5
I love it when neighbours give me free stuff. In this case it’s next-door-but-one, whose brother enjoys working gundogs so picks up at a local shoot, which of course means he gets to bring some of the bag home each time - traditional ‘perk’ for beaters and pickers-up at shoots. His long-suffering sister gets to pluck and gut them all. After a bit she gets tired of it and starts looking for ways to reduce the work-load, and today we were in the garden making sure there was nothing that could fly about in the storm that’s incoming at the moment (due for gusts possibly as high as 80mph tomorrow), so she called over to ask if we’d like a bird or two? As any self-respecting ferret-keeper, raw-fed dog-keeper or indeed countrywoman does, I said yes please! 4 pheasants and 3 woodcock. I’ve spent the evening plucking and drawing, checking for shotgun pellets and chopping carcasses up, and we’ve ended up with about 6 pounds of meat in the freezer for the fertles, plus breast fillets for us. We gave her some quail eggs in trade, of course. The ferrets nearly ate me when I went to hand out their offal, because my fingers of course still smell of gamebird, even after a scrub! Shouldn’t be a problem getting the golden boys to accept the new flavours - not that they’ll get pheasant and woodcock all that often, but a few times a winter seems to be enough to keep them all keen. Extra weights on the roofs of the ferret sheds tonight, make sure that storm can’t lift anything.
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Post by runningdog on Dec 7, 2017 9:43:38 GMT -5
Weigh-day! And they’ve grown again (no surprise!) Here they are: Achilles - 1.85kg (up 230g) Ajax - 1.65kg (up 160g) Another ten days on and Achilles has put on 23g a day, Ajax 16g a day. They’re aiming to be badgers when they finish growing, not ferrets! Ajax still insists on drinking salmon oil only off my fingers, not out of a saucer, but he’s getting much less nippy. He had a minor conniption in the box while being weighed and grabbed my fingers quite hard as I reached in to lift him out afterwards, but as soon as I cuddled him in close he relaxed and licked me instead. Time to order that thundershirt for him. He’s definitely got some anxiety issues going on there. The others are holding steady so they’ve reached their full winter weights now, apart from Loony who’s put on quite a bit and zoomed up to 2.2kg. I’ll keep an eye on him but he’s behaving normally; he’s always been both lazy and fond of his grub, I don’t think it’s anything more than that.
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Post by Sherry on Dec 7, 2017 10:10:02 GMT -5
Great score on the birds! And those boys sound amazing Wonderful work you're doing with Ajax. As to his anxiety- can you order Bachs Rescue Remedy? I find it really helps to take the edge off for them. A dab on nose or paw pads during the acute phase is all it takes
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Post by runningdog on Dec 7, 2017 10:38:45 GMT -5
Always have RR in the first aid kit and the medicine cupboard - it’s standard for any kind of shock or injury in our house, human or animal. Never occurred to me to use it for Ajax, though. D’oh! The trick might be getting it out of the bottle or tube one-handed with a hyper ferret dangling off the other hand..... I could try putting it on when I bring him in, so it’s there before any anxiety attacks hit him, perhaps? I’ll make a note to try that, before I forget. He’s getting much, much better - even during his OMG moment this morning he only dinted my finger, he didn’t break the skin. Considering there’s still a visible scar on my finger from his first I’m-going-to-rip-you-up episode several weeks ago, he’s coming along very well! Hopefully he’ll grow out of his nerves as he gets older and more experienced in the world.
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Post by runningdog on Dec 11, 2017 5:09:55 GMT -5
Cold here over the past few days - we’ve had about a foot of snow over three days with overnight temps dropping towards 8-9 below zero (that’s centigrade not fahrenheit, being in the UK!) and the ferrets’ waterbowls froze solid yesterday, so I’ve been out switching them for fresh bowls and bringing in the frozen ones to defrost in the sink every 4-6 hours, but the temps are rising again and the water this morning was liquid still. Even the last few mouthfuls of their meat had frozen in the dish overnight yesterday! They have nestboxes stuffed full of straw, however, and can curl up together nicely, plus coats like polar bears, so they’re all scampering about eager for grub this morning, none the worse for the winter weather.
I noticed yesterday that Ajax and Achilles have the first signs of teenagerhood - their testicles are beginning to show, though still very small. I shall have to organise that separate cage for them soon! I check the girls daily and there’s no hint of them coming into season yet, but better safe than sorry and I don’t want two sets of adolescent male hormones in fur beating up the older boys anyway. I’ll keep them close enough together to talk through wire and see each other, so they should (hopefully, fingers crossed....) go back together again without too much trouble after the boys have had whatever type of castration happens.
Does chemical castration have the same effect of interrupting growth as physical castration? If it doesn’t, it’d be easier just to get them implanted soon rather than waiting until summer when they’re a year old - save on separating them and risking fights when I put them all back together again.
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Post by Sherry on Dec 11, 2017 8:14:58 GMT -5
To the best of my understanding they don't lose the same amount of muscle mass with chemical neutering as they to with surgical.
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Post by runningdog on Dec 22, 2017 10:38:12 GMT -5
One of my dogs was due for annual booster jabs yesterday so I had a chat with my local vets about implanting the boys while I was there. You never know, when speaking to a vet, how they’ll handle odd questions about critters but last night’s vet had it at his fingertips. Yes, he’s implanted ferrets himself; they can order the implants in for me and it’ll take a few days; best to wait until the boys have definitely reached puberty (he paused to check the book on that one, just to be sure, which is always a good sign - I like a vet who’s not afraid to say ‘hang on, let me make sure I get this right’!) He also said straight off that he’d rather implant than castrate because it saves health problems in later life, so full marks! (It’s quite a big practice and I’ve always been impressed with the quality of the vets there; they’ve always been ready to go the extra mile, phone around asking for advice, get in a second opinion and double-check in the text-books. I had one who called me back in the middle of the night to say she’d thought of something, already consulted with the nearest university vet hospital by phone and could I please check if the field a pony was in contained any sycamore trees, as it was just faintly possible I had the first case of a pony poisoned by sycamore in Scotland. Alas, I did and he had to be PTS but kudos to the vet anyway, she really went above and beyond, came out at three in the morning to put him on a drip and stood by her phone round the clock. That’s what makes a really top-class vet, in my book.) That’s ok then, the boys will be implanted in the spring when they come into rut and are definitely past puberty. Co-incidentally when I checked the girls this morning, Holly’s just coming into season. I’ve never known a jill kept outdoors with no additional light come into season in the winter before, but there she is! Nine months old two days ago and all grown up. Ivy’s probably not far behind, since they’re litter-sisters and live together, so they’re booked in for the jill jab next Wednesday (first available appointment) - a week in season will be ok, though I wouldn’t like to take it any longer. They’re very strong, active little jills and I’ll be keeping a very close eye on them both until they get their jabs. This morning was also a major red-letter-day for the boys! My huge old boy Loony has been top hob all his life (he’s 5 and a half now) since he grew up with his litter-sister and then the smaller lads Joker and Bane, and he’s been keeping Achilles and Ajax in order with the occasional roughing-up, assisted by his lieutenants-in-crime, Joker and Bane. Achilles has been almost level-pegging the scuffles for a few weeks, but this morning it was a very definite and conclusive win for the golden boy. By the end of it poor old Loony was doing laps of the kitchen with Achilles chasing him and catching him every now and then to wrestle him down again, the kitchen reeked of skunky ferrets and there was poop on the floor (Loony’s). When I separated them (I thought poor ol’ Loon had had enough of a hammering) it was nearly three minutes before they each stopped panting hard and Loony speed-bumped on the floor for five minutes before he was ready to move again. Achilles was still full of running and ready for another round even before he’d got his breath back. Both have quite red scruffs but there’s no bleeding wounds; only Loony’s ego’s seriously hurt but he’s bouncing back with the others all cuddling up to him outside. I need to keep the adolescent hobs away from the in-season jills anyway, so I’d already decided to shift two ferrets into the conservatory for a bit - I had thought I’d put the girls in there as they should re-integrate with the boys more easily after a break, but now the boys are in there. I don’t want Loony and Achilles starting up again when I’m not there to watch and there’s nowhere to escape from a fight in the hutches, so the three neutered boys and the girls are all together, and the intact boys are stinking up the conservatory (another sign they’re adolescent - they’re getting a little whiffy!) They’ve got a big indoor rabbit cage with a bowl of water, they’ve got the brand-new nest I was going to give Angus for Christmas (it’s ok, he’s getting a new tunnel instead) and they seem thrilled to bits with it. The conservatory’s not heated, though it does get some heat drifting through from the lounge, so they shouldn’t lose too much of their cold adaptation, hopefully. It’ll make monitoring their food intake a bit easier, too - I’ve noticed more food getting left by the business but I suspect it’s the older ones backing off their appetites now they’ve reached their full weights. With the golden boys separate, I can confirm exactly what they’re eating for a bit and see if I’m right. They’ll also have to come in the kitchen to run around a couple of extra times a day, since the cage isn’t that big for two big young hobs! I normally use it as a spare quail cage. I’ll bring the golden boys through to join the rest of the business when they’re all in, to make sure any fights happen when I’m watching and they don’t forget each other - hopefully they’ll re-integrate ok once the girls are out of season again and the new pecking order has settled properly. At the moment there’s a whole pheasant in the hutch outside, slowly disappearing. Our next-door-but-one-neighbour’s been out picking-up at the shoot again.....
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Post by Sherry on Dec 22, 2017 10:45:41 GMT -5
Those are the type of vets everyone only dreams they could have! That is wonderful And poor Loony! He must have been so shocked to have been displaced. His ego took a huge bruising.
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Post by runningdog on Dec 23, 2017 18:11:56 GMT -5
I put the golden boys in with the rest when I brought them all in this morning for their usual play in the kitchen and there was no friction at all between Loony and the youngsters - they sniffed noses briefly in passing and moved on calmly. Since all was quiet on the Western Front, so to speak, I decided to put the boys back out and bring the girls in - they’re half the size so a cage that’s straining to contain two large and active young hobs is plenty of space for two small jills to rattle about in. All well and good, except they didn’t stay in the cage. I caught them exploring the conservatory happily, which is not acceptable - my mother uses it as a weaving/spinning studio and we don’t want ferrets in the handspun yarn! I put them back in the cage to see where they were getting out, and Holly promptly slithered between two bars and was out, almost as fast as I can type it. Ivy came straight after her, between a different set of bars. Ferrets! They’re now in the kitchen with Angus. They started by pinning him down and washing his ears, everyone dooking at high speed, while he tried to sniff them both simultaneously (and failed, but it was quite fun watching him rolling about on his back from one to the other and back) and then went behind the filing cabinet together for more non-stop dooking. They moved on to disputing ownership of the digbox and I’ve just watched Angus tow Holly across the floor by her scruff, while Ivy trotted after. Everyone’s still dooking. Nobody has a fluffy tail. There’s no screaming, hissing or scratching up the floor. I’m mildly stupified. Angus’s cage has close-set bars even a stout earthworm would have trouble squeezing through, so the girls may well be sleeping in there until they’re out of season. The question is, does Angus share it with them, or do I need to move him into the conservatory....? TBC in Angus’s thread......
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Post by runningdog on Dec 25, 2017 16:45:42 GMT -5
Weighed the boys today: Achilles 1.95kg Ajax 1.77kg 120g each in 18 days; maybe they’re slowing down a tad, but still growing on nicely! Ajax has a sock fetish and I frequently find myself with a ferret wrapped round my ankle trying to remove my sock when he’s in the house, but he’s careful not to bite me so I can live with it. It being Christmas, everyone got a mouse after playtime, not just the golden boys. It’s quite exciting carrying armfuls of ferrets all of whom are clutching a mouse in their teeth and trying to escape and go stash/eat it! Holly drove the dogs nuts by stashing her mouse next to their crates in the bedroom on her way back to bed. It’s not as if the dogs like mice themselves but they can’t cope with having one just outside the bars out of reach! (It’s odd that the dogs don’t eat mice, given I prefer to throw chicks to them on chick-breakfast days in case I end up short of fingers, but there you go.... animals! )
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