Big Battle And A Near Tragedy

[airy]

WEll, I am all settled into my new house and its been quite a change for my three amigos to adapt to.

First day here they had to stay in the cage all day because we were unpacking and setting up, the next day, even though there was a lot of work left to do, I felt bad for them and decided to let them out, I kept them confined to the living room by placing a gate over the entry way, I go into the kitchen to start putting dishes etc away, and then all of a sudden I hear the most horrific bloodcurdling squealing, my daughter is like "thats Nidoking!!"(our guinea pig), we both took off up the stairs and there was Airy Eris dragging him across the floor by his neck. We ripped him from Airy but he had two puncture wounds in his neck and a long scratch that I had to treat, He is doing fine now, but that came as quite a shock to me, I know rodents are a ferrets natural prey, but I still have a hard time swallowing the fact that my gentle and loving Airy Eris nearly took his life, Nido King is bigger than her and much heavier and i really never expected that. How it happened was I guess i should of checked that gate better because I she climbed up on the loveseat and jumped right over the gate and landed on the outside of the living room. And as for Nidoking, she was able to get to him so easily because his cage did not arrive by that time so he was in a box in my daughters room until it came..I am having a really hard time ferret proofing this house, the stairs is a really big challenge, although I put a gate up, they can slip through the rails and climb up there, I wedged cardboard in there but they manage to remove it and get up there anyways, I cannot have them up there because they can only see so far ahead and can easily walk off the ledge and that is quite a fall . Im gonna have to get them a play pen or something until I figure something out to make this house a lot safer for them.

As for the fighting, this is the fist time I ever witnessed this, the other day in the cage I heard a lot of hissing, squeaking and barking sounds, I went into the room to investigate and I seen Pandora giving Loki a tuning, She had him pinned down biting his neck and that is what he squeaking was, It appeared that the cause of the fight was the fact that Loki wanted to play with HER pigs ear(chew toy) and she did not want to share, I never seen that side of my Pan Pan before, this is the first time I ever seen my ferrets have fight that was not a form of play, Now I keep that pigs ear on the outside of the cage to prevent that kind of ugliness from happening again, It was really shocking for me to see that side of Pandora, I always viewed her as the motherly figure of the ferrets, Normally she will pin the ferrets down to lick and groom them, not to bite and attack them, I guess those pigs ears bring out the worst in her

[Tressie]

The move and your families' feelings of not being settled will affect all your critters, especially the ferrets.

In other words they are stressed and hence some of the aggressive behaviours. However, I would definitely keep an eye on Pandora for early signs of adrenal disease since aggression is one of the clinical symptoms.

Ferrets will also become more aggressive if in pain or unwell.

Predatory behaviour is instinctive - some ferrets have it stronger than others. It doesn't mean your ferret is mean or bad - just doing what comes naturally. For that reason FLSAC doesn't encourage ferrets and prey animals (e.g., rodents, birds, fish) to be in the same household because the other animal companions risk being killed by ferrets.

When you say 'pigs ears' - do you mean the kind that pet stores sell for dogs? Those would not be appropriate for ferrets because they can break off into pieces and cause obstructions.

I would definitely take your guinea pig to the vet to have those puncture wounds looked at - can develop into nasty infection. Was the wound on the scruff or on the throat? If on the throat area could have nicked a vital artery internally.

Can you confine the fuzzkids to one room until you get yourself better organized?

Plexi-glass panels can be put over the rails - expensive but effective. A pressure mounted baby gate with a solid panel works best at entries/base of stairs:

www.babyage.com/safety_1st/15251/safety_1st_perfect_fit_security_gate.htm

Good luck with settling into your new digs!

Tressie

[airy]

The wound was on the scruff, it is completely gone now and Nidoking seems well, but Im sure that incident will haunt him for life

As for Pandora, that was the only time she ever acted aggressively, after reading this I searched Adrenal Disease on several sites and she displays no symptoms and seems herself but I will most certainly be keeping a good eye on her. and as for that pigs ear, yes it was the kind for dogs and it is long gone now, I purchased it around the time I got Pandora because I went online looking for ideas for ferret toys and one of the things on there was chew toys for dogs, so I assumed that fell into that category, guess I was wrong

We did solve the stair rail issue though, we pin a giant board against them and it has been working like a charm, but it looks horrible, My hubby said he will craft something much nicer once he gets his woodshop up and running. I got the whole downstairs ferret proofed now and they are loving all the new space here, the only issue I had was Airy was getting into the basement, I found out why, it seemed she can fit through the crack at the bottom of the basement door. So now we block it with a big heavy box whenever they are out Haven't had a problem since..well the stealing and hoarding is even worse than before but personally I just find that cute lol