Meet Churchill

[Corvidophile]

Here we go-

May 24, 2022 10:55:53 GMT -5 unclejoe said:

This vet guide for ferret care/exams has dosage and possible reactions.

evergreenae.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/Ferret-Etiquette-andBasic-Information.pdf

This article says 0.5-1 mL for vaccine reaction delays, but that’s a heavy duty dose I’d imagine. For run of the mill allergies I’d assume it would be lower.

I tried 0.3 mL’s today and it took about ten minutes for him to get drunk and then pass out, so still too much. I’ll try 0.15 next time, gonna give him a day in between to recover and see if it has lasting effects on itching beyond the knock out. I can’t judge his itchiness if he’s asleep, he normally doesn’t wake to scratch. He gets itchier the more wound up he gets playing. He’ll be running after me and then just suddenly curl up into a ball furiously biting his chest, belly, and butt, or scratching his neck with his back foot. Keep checking him for fleas or rashes, nothing.

[Corvidophile]

He woke up after about 15 minutes of sleep and then went about his normal activities, which unfortunately included scratching himself. So I think I’ll try 0.3 mL in 12 hour increments and see if it builds up in his system.

[unclejoe]

hopefully 0.15 will be a good maintenance dose. It's always best to start low and observe results since they can't tell us how they feel.
Just about every ferret I've ever had has scared the life out of me bolting out of a dead sleep to scratch when I was sitting near the cage. (It's always been in the living room wherever we lived.)
I'm still confused by your post where you said 3mL.  That was a typo, yes?  
I'm trying to picture getting a fert to take 3, 1 mL syringes full, lol

[Corvidophile]

I squeezed three whole syringes into a cup and mixed some heavy cream into it and he just willingly drank it. Took him a while, haha.

[Corvidophile]

0.15 mL’s twice daily didn’t seem to be doing much to stop itching, but it is making a small dent I think. I didn’t realize how much until I got home late tonight without giving it to him at the usual time and tried to play with him first, and he just kept stopping every few seconds to scratch. So it’s reduced a little. Gonna try going back up to 0.3 now that his body has gotten used to the drowsiness and this dose doesn’t knock him out anymore.

[Corvidophile]

0.3 mL’s is working well now! No more drowsiness and the itching is reduced significantly.

[unclejoe]

good news!

[Corvidophile]

I figured out what the vet must’ve meant, 3 mgs, not 3 mL’s. 3 mg’s of a 12.5mg/5 mL solution would be 1.67 mL’s. The Benadryl stopped providing itch relief slowly, so I increased by 0.1 mL’s per day until I hit 1.6 mL’s given twice a day to no effect, and stopped. No increase in itchiness after stopping. I called over the weekend and left a message explaining what I’d been doing and how I’ve now stopped the medication and asked him to research alternative antihistamines.

His skin is still perfectly clear, no dandruff, red spots, or flea dirt. Considering trying a Suprelorin implant in case it’s hormone related, but don’t want to waste all that money on such a young ferret if it isn’t that. Would oral melatonin tamp down hormones, or does it just cause fur growth? He’s got a lovely full coat already and is growing another coat underneath when you split the fur and look at the skin.

Here’s a video of him biting me and then biting himself a bit: imgur.com/gallery/DSLaWhy

[vivi]

How amazing and beautiful...love it.

[unclejoe]

I thought I was over Scamp/Booger until I watched that. If I could have ONE ferret do-over...
If you stopped benadryl with no reactions, then just leave it. Monitor for symptoms. I'm not an endocrinologist, but I know that hormones usually have more than one function. Melatonin regulates circadium rhythym (sleep cycle) and so it helps to control signs of adrenocorticalism, which is thought to be exacerbated by artificial lighting. I don't recall any studies where melatonin was used to prevent adrenal, or that specifically studied artificial lighting and adrenal, but there was at least one study by Dr Weber, et al, that strongly suggested that deslorelin acetate delays onset of adrenal disease in ferrets, given as a preventive annually after 12-18 months. Last I knew, the study was still ongoing.
This link is to a pps used by Dr Robert Wagner in his 2011 Suprelorin adrenal prevention study presentation.   Dr Weber collaborated with Dr Wagner et al in a study on the efficacy of 9.4 mg deslorelin vs 4.7 which is currently in use under the name Suprelorin.  As far as I know, that study is also still ongoing.  

www.ferretcongress.org/sym2011/phxpdf/Ferret%20GnRH%20vaccination%20ACD%20prevention-Wagner.pdf

You may want to look into ferret health group, [e-mail]  Sukie Crandal and company is a wealth of info.  

[Corvidophile]

Thanks for the heads up on the ferret health group, looks like another good resource.

[Corvidophile]

Did you know ferret pupils are horizontal? I just found out when the first frame of a video caught Churchill’s eye very brightly. I knew about mongoose pupils being horizontal, but not ferret. They only look alike superficially though, as I understand they’re pretty far apart families of animals.

[unclejoe]

yeah I have a few pics where the eye in general is triangular and the retina is reflecting thru the horizontal pupil. Also, some retinas are green and some red. 

DSCF1509 by unclejoe1158, on Flickr
DSCF3290_zps56643ce5 by unclejoe1158, on Flickr
bellaxmas by unclejoe1158, on Flickr

[Charlie]

I've caught a few glimpses of my ferret's pupils as well.

[Corvidophile]

It’s shedding season, lint rolling myself, lint rolling the ferret (he thinks I’m just massaging him), lint rolling the Lincoln couch, but that doesn’t work. I just get velvet lint. Need to bust out the handheld Dirt Devil.



He’s been losing weight slowly, but he still has a journey. Look at that nice belly. He’s much more muscular now though.