A ferret friend sent me a link to an article in Pet Wiki about new advances in dog cancer, pointing me to the paragraph written by Dr Ananya Mandal in June 2010, which said …

“Queensland, Australia scientists have discovered a drug to cure cancer that has effectively worked in animals and is to be tried on humans in the next phase of trials. This drug is plant-derived and is called EBC-46 for trial purposes. The plant from which it is obtained is found in the Australian tropical rainforest. The drug has shown to reduce inoperable tumors in 150 dogs, cats and horses and a ferret to a significant extent. The drug was developed over the past six years from the seed of a rainforest plant found in the Atherton Tablelands. Scientists had cultivated their own plantation of the plant since forming the company QBiotics Limited in 2004.

Dr. Gordon hoped that EBC-46 would be available for veterinary markets in Australia and New Zealand next year. Thereafter initial trials on very small number of healthy adult humans would commence.”

As you can imagine, my eyes lit up when I saw the statement that EBC-46 reduced an inoperable tumour in a FERRET!

The company which produced this drug is called QBiotics and I’ll be writing to them to see if they can let me know what cancer the ferret had. The website says that the drug treats “solid tumours”.

I need to check with my vet if I have it right but I googled the question “Is insulinoma a “solid tumor” in the pancreas+ferret” and from the links which pop up, it would seem that it is. Lymphoma also came up as being a solid tumour but I couldn’t confirm what the tumours on the adrenal glands are called.

However, if this EBC-46 is available to vets now, and if they really do shrink tumours, then it can only be a great thing for our ferrets, don’t you think?

Imagine not having a feeling of dread flow over you when you see your ferret staring blankly into space or if it’s diagnosed with lymphoma if you know that there might just be something to help your ferret beat those awful cancers and live to a ripe old age.

I need to find out more and will share whatever news I come across so please watch this space

I get a lot of emails from new and old-time ferret owners at my site asking me various questions about their ferrets, mainly asking for advice on what to do when their ferret is sick or asking questions about breeding.

Then a couple of years ago I read about Ferret Health Advancement at MSU.  Dr Matti Kiupel was doing a lot of research in a number of ferret illnesses, like coronaviruses, rotaviruses & coccidiosis. He’s also working with David Wilson researching the prognostication and carcinogenesis of adrenal cortical neoplasms. But, of course, with all things, money is necessary to further the research for these diseases so the department also has a page for donations.

It was soon after the ’08 financial crash happened and we had been hit quite badly by it. How on earth could I help them when we weren’t flush with money.

I posed the question to Webgrampy (aka my husband Philip) and after a think, he thought of a win win solution.

Ferret owners constantly write to me asking for advice about various medical problems and other things. Why don’t we find out what they wanted to hear from vets and get a recording of the vets’ advice so that they can hear the information straight from the horse’s mouth, so to speak

WG put a survey up and asked the ferret owners out there to let us know what specific questions they had for the vets.  There was a great response, so then WG hunted out the vets and asked them if they’d be happy to be interviewed and give their answers to what people wanted to know.

Most of the vets contacted were happy to help out so WG picked out three and arranged times to call them.  Since we were down under and the vets were in the States, he had to get up around 2-3am to speak to them when they were off work but it was well worth the effort.

Then he had a long interview with Dianne Rohowicz, a long time friend and president of WAFFS, asking all the questions people wanted to know about how to breed ferrets.

All the interviews were put on paper by yours truly and we’re offering the set for sale so that we can donate a good portion of the money to the Ferret Health Advancement people.  We also gave the interviews to Dianne so that WAFFS members could get them and for the money to help the society.

The interviews go through a lot of information …

• Feeding ferrets (what they need, and what will kill them!)
• Breeding ferrets
• The major ailments – Insulinoma, Adrenal Disease, other cancers (what to look for and how to treat them)
• Parasites – inside and outside (that’s the ferret, not your house…)
• Keeping ferrets with other pets
• Keeping your ferrets safe in your house (there’s a heap of dangerous things you may not have
thought about)
• And, protecting your house from your ferrets!
• Basic physiology of the domestic ferret
• Ferret poop – colours and textures

And, if you don’t have a ferret savvy vet nearby, there’s also information from one of the vets to give to your vet to help him with ferret stuff.

There’s over 2 ½ hours of information there. It only costs $37 and you’ll know that a considerable percentage of that will go to FHA@MSU to help with their research into ferret diseases.

Win Win!

You can even listen to some excerpts, just so that you can hear just how good this material is.

So, go NOW to www.FerretExperts.com and listen for yourself. You won’t be disappointed!

I am extremely pleased to say that the report came back and gave him a clean bill of health!

His pancreas has a couple of benign growths on it — not the beginning of insulinoma as I had feared — and there’s nothing malignant lurking in any other areas so I am happy, very happy

I just don’t understand why he is losing his hair at the base of his tail – the classic adrenal starting point – and why my vet found that his fur on the inner sides of his back legs was looking thin too. Could it just be an odd looking rat’s tail and normal spring shedding which had both of us fooled?

It was a very expensive way to find out that he’s in perfect health and I’m just very glad that I could afford to have those tests done. I know I would have been stressing about what was going on inside of him had I not taken him for his ultrasound and biopsy.

So … I will keep an eye on the little man and hopefully the fur will grow back and he’ll be back to looking like a healthy ferret soon

I was watching this video and I found it so cute the way the ferret was so deeply asleep. It reminded me of Mash, our first ferret, who used to sleep so soundly that I could dangle her upside down and she wouldn’t wake up. But that was before we had our first insulinoma experience!

CJ was the first to get the disease and that made me realise how woefully unprepared we would have been with Mash had she been going through an insulinoma coma, and then I started thinking about how to identify between the two.

Muis had the worst case of insulinoma coma and it was sheer luck that I twigged what was going on with her. She never had that “glazed, far off” expression that CJ had but I felt that she wasn’t quite right because there was a flash of odd behaviour the month before.

She seemed to have a far away look when she was looking out of the chest of drawers but the minute I brought their smoothy into the bedroom, she shot out of the drawer and licked up the smoothy with pure gusto.

I was a little concerned by that flash so took her to my vet who checked her out. She thought that since Muis was fine BEFORE she had her smoothy, rather than afterwards, it couldn’t have been due to insulinoma.

A few weeks later I had looked in the drawer to check on her – it was really early in the morning, around 3am – and saw her sleeping peacefully. When I checked on her again when I got up at 6, I saw that her position was just the same as it had been 3 hours earlier and that made warning signals go off in my brain.

I took her out of the drawer and she was like a limp rag and despite my stroking her and kissing her, she didn’t wake up at all and I knew she was in a coma.

We got the honey and smeared some on her gums and it seemed to take forever for her to wake up, but wake up she did and she came out of the cat carrier and toddled down the corridor to our bedroom as if nothing had happened.

I don’t even want to think what might have happened had I not checked on her earlier and realised she hadn’t moved all that time. Imagine if I’d just seen her at 6, then got ready and left the house for the whole day. I reckon she would have just slipped away in her coma and I would have come home to find a dead ferret in the drawer

So – to all you new ferret owners out there, I would urge you to make sure that your ferret really IS having a deep sleep and isn’t in a coma. How you check is to see if your ferret will open its eyes by itself and yes, even look a little annoyed that you woke him up. If that doesn’t happen, despite all your prodding, then grab some honey and rub it on its gums. Once your ferret wakes up, get him down to the vet pronto!

My brave little old lady lost her fight and died on Friday morning

I honestly thought she was going to be with us for longer, as she was so active when she was up. She used to power walk around the house, so fast that I had to scurry to keep up with her if I was trying to give her her medication or smoothy.

However I do think she had more going on inside than just insulinoma. She had a bump over her left eye — I’d asked my vet about it and she agreed it could be a tumour there but, without X-rays, it was impossible to confirm or deny. We thought that the stress of putting her under for X-rays would be too much for her so decided to leave it and hope it wasn’t anything awful.

She used to like cuddling us at night so I’d bring her up to lie next to me while I was reading but, before going to sleep, I’d put her down on her sheepskin as I was worried about her jumping off the bed and hurting herself.

On Thursday night she was sleeping next to me then I heard her breathing start to get rapid so I lifted the cover and suddenly she had a very strong spasm, where her little body shook and trembled and her legs and arms were sticking out.

I knew this was not a good sign so I put her on her sheepskin and covered her to keep her warm. I woke up around 1:30am and checked on her. I saw she hadn’t moved since I put her there so I put a drop of smoothy on my finger and put that against her lips, to see if she’d react.

She didn’t.

I tried to go back to sleep but by 3am I couldn’t, so I picked her up and held her. She was pretty much in a coma by this stage and occasionally she’d start jerking for a while, then stop, was quiet for a while before jerking again. I just stoked her and told her that Muis was waiting to play with her at the Rainbow Bridge so she shouldn’t fight it and just go.

She didn’t want to. She stayed with us for another 4 hours until finally it was time for her to let go and leave us.

So that is the end of the “old guard”.

The trio, Seamus, Angus and Mojo, are all naughty youngsters and their silliness does make me laugh; however I don’t have anyone left who wants to cuddle or who is happy to just lie on my lap and sleep while I watch TV.

I suppose they might want to do that as they get longer in the tooth but I’m in no hurry for that to happen so I guess I will just be content with having them weasel wardance around my feet

RIP Kahlua, and say hi to Muis and the others for me. I shall miss you terribly and look forward to cuddling you again one day.

On Friday, I came across an article about the cancer-fighting properties of papaya leaf extract which had been confirmed by researchers. The thing that pricked up my ears was the fact that this supplement was good for shrinking tumours in the pancreas and liver, amongst other organs.

So, first thing on Saturday I went galloping to the health food store and got a bottle of papaya (or paw paw, as it’s called here) leaf extract to give to Kahlua.

I’ve always enjoyed eating papaya and thought the liquid would taste something like the fruit … HAH! Was I wrong! Took a capful to taste and almost spat it out as it tasted like cider vinegar. Gah!

Okay, so I realised I couldn’t squirt that down Kahlua’s throat. The instructions said that it could be added to water so I got a small empty jar, put a capful of the extract in and added about 2 capfuls of water.

It has to be chilled before serving so into the fridge it went.

That evening, I put about 0.5ml into a syringe and gave it to Kahlua. To my surprise, she didn’t gag or look upset about having to drink it so obviously the diluted version was more palatable that the straight one

Sunday I gave it to her morning, noon and night, and I swear she looked like she had a spring in her step when she was walking around.

I am still giving her the TFPlus every day, and I also got a bottle of zeolite, which was recommended by the people who supply the Poly MVA and TFPlus. That goes into the ferrets’ smoothie with all the other supplements, so she get that as well.

So … let’s see if it really does help to reduce her tumour/s and keep her going in good shape for a lot longer. It’s early days yet and I really hope I won’t have to eat my optimistic words!

Another ferret owner asked me that question and rather than just reply to her, I thought I’d put the answer up as a post.

To be honest it’s difficult for me to say categorically that yes, it does work.  I got it when Muis was diagnosed with insulinoma and I gave it to her every day.  One thing I can say with certainty is that it seemed to help her because she used to wander around the house quite happily, she’d come and see me in the study when I was working and always wanted to be lifted up onto my lap, and if we went out, she’d be at the front door to welcome us home when we came back.

She kept that up even when she developed adrenal disease and started to lose the hair on her back.  She slowed down, that was obvious, but she still liked wandering about and checking up on me.

Her behaviour was quite different to CJ, when he had insulinoma.  He was diagnosed with it back in 2001 and in those days I couldn’t get any supplements for my ferrets. The only thing I could get was Colloidal Silver and I used to put some into their water bowls, hoping it would help.  I don’t think it did anything at all.

CJ was on pred and although he was with us for about 7-8 months before his final visit to the vet, I remember he spent his whole time sleeping and not doing anything else much.

I can’t tell you how it broke my heart to see him like that because he was the John Travolta of the weasel world.  His wardancing was magnificent and he was always so full of life and happiness before he got sick.

So, I am able to compare Muis & CJ when they were both ill with the same disease.  I would say without hesitation that I’m sure the TFPlus helped Muis keep her quality of life and made her feel more herself during the 12 months from time of diagnosis to when she passed over to the Rainbow Bridge.

Has anyone tried this supplement on their ferret?

Why I ask is because I ordered another bottle of Transfer Factor Plus from my supplier and I mentioned Kahlua’s strange symptoms.

When I got the TFPlus, I found a sheet of  Legalon milk thistle capsules which they’d very kindly put in for Kahlua to try, to see if that would help her condition.

They even googled if ferrets could have it and told me they’d seen several websites which talked about ferrets having this supplement.  What wonderful people!

I opened one capsule and spooned the powder into my daily pill box, which I’d bought for Kaos’s TCM years ago.  I then put a small portion of powder into some pet milk, stirred it and gave it to Kahlua.

It was quite amazing to see her walking around the house a couple of hours later looking quite perky.  Then a few hours after that I found her sleeping on her back in her hammock looking very relaxed. I think any owner of a sick ferret will know how unusual that is, as sick ferrets tend to just curl up when they sleep.

It seems that any ferret with problems with its liver would benefit by taking milk thistle and it doesn’t seem to have any awful side effects. However I did find a holistic ferret forum with a post about milk thistle and pred.  It was thought that the milk thistle MIGHT block the pred but this wasn’t said to be a fact.

I found a good site with information for dogs and cats so would recommend it to any ferret owner looking to find out more about this supplement.  There they recommend you giving it to your pet for 5 days, then stopping for 2, and continuing that for 6 weeks.

I’ll give it a go and see if Kahlua continues to walk with a spring in her step as the days go by.  God knows I hope she will!

Kahlua’s initial dose of Pred was for 0.5ml once a day but after she continued to get her low blood sugar drop (LBSD) sessions while on it, I decided I should increase it to 0.5ml twice a day, like Muis had.

I took her to see my vet just to make sure she agreed with my decision and, would you believe, Kahlua had another LBSD episode while we were there.  My vet gave her a couple of smears of Nutrigel and within minutes Kahlua came good.

Then, about a week later, I noticed that there was a bump over Kahlua’s left eye.  Of course I started thinking “brain tumour” and was stressing about some of the strange symptoms Kahlua had.

I had found her lying on her hammock looking out of it and although I didn’t think it was a LBSD episode, I still rubbed Nutrigel on her gums as a precaution.  She didn’t react for a while but when she did, her back feet had a claw-like appearance and she had a lot of “snot” coming out of her nose.

After she came out of her episode, I gave her her smoothy and she was very wobbly on her feet. As you can see from the photo, her left foot was still scrunched up like a claw and it took a while before she straightened it out.

She seemed to have a good appetite and ate her smoothy happily; when she decided it was time to go, she walked without any wobbles and her back feet straightened out.  It was like nothing odd had happened at all.

Anyway, I took her to my vet about her eye and apparently she has a cataract in her left eye and there was inflammation around it.  She had antibiotics prescribed for her and the vet said that the medication should help to reduce the lump over her eye and also stop the “snot” from coming out of her nose as the inflammation was blocking her nasal passage.

Since being on the antibiotics, she hasn’t had another LBSD episode but she did have one where she was lying with her gums drawn back over her teeth and doing the rapid shallow breathing bit.  That went on for a couple of hours, then she seemed to wake up and act as if nothing had happened.

It really is so odd and so stressful for me as I don’t know what to think and I honestly don’t know what to do. Those odd episodes come very infrequently (thank God) and she seems to be fine afterwards.  The thing is, she never has those episodes when I can grab her and rush her down to the vet.

I guess as long as she acts like she’s not in pain and still has quality of life, I shouldn’t be too worried.  She eats well, she poops and piddles normally, and if it weren’t for those odd occasions, I really wouldn’t be stressing.

Ahh the joys of ferret ownership ….!

It was a week ago today and I really thought I was going to lose Kahlua!

I was taking her to see the vet in the afternoon so around mid-morning, I went to get her as I’d prepared the smoothy for her to drink. She was lying under the cover of the hammock and when I pulled it back, I saw her doing the same as she did on Christmas Eve. She had her lips back in a grimace and was breathing rapidly and it was very shallow.

My heart sank! I picked her up and thought I’d better rub some Nutrigel on her gums just in case it was some weird blood sugar drop symptom. I did that but she didn’t snap out of it, so I kept her lying on my lap, breathing hard.

It took about 1/2 hour before she seemed to come out of it and her breathing calmed down. I picked up the smoothy dish and put it on my lap near her and she just rested her head on the rim and started to lick tiredly – it was almost like it was too much effort for her to lift her head. I looked at her little face and her eyes seemed almost cloudy and unfocused and I really thought she was about to check out on me.

Slowly, very slowly, she seemed to regain her strength and I helped her stand so that she could lick more easily. She must have been very hungry because she almost finished all the smoothy, and there was about 1/2 cup of pet milk in the dish, together with the rest of the goodies I had added. Normally all 4 ferrets drink from the dish but here it was only Kahlua.

I put her down when she’d had enough and the poor thing could hardly walk. She seemed to go a few paces then stop, like she was exhausted. I was watching her so carefully and couldn’t understand why she had so little strength. Then I remembered Kaos and how she was when she had cardiomyopathy so I was certain that, on top of her insulinoma, Kahlua was suffering from a heart complaint!!

That made sense to me – the rapid shallow breathing; the time she lay like road kill, splat against the floor with her arms and legs sticking out; the way she could hardly walk now without resting every few seconds.

I felt really depressed seeing her like this and was so worried that when I took her to see our vet, Fiona would say that it really was time for Kahlua to have her final injection.

However … by the time I had to pick her up and take her to the vet, Kahlua seemed fine! All my hand wringing and heart pain that I had watching her look so ill faded into the distance – my little silvermitt looked like she was 100% normal!

What on earth would I show the vet – a seemingly healthy ferret with pink gums and clear eyes, and no symptoms of what affected her earlier. And, to make matters more frustrating, my digital camera wasn’t working so I couldn’t even take photos of what she looked like when she had these weird episodes! Isn’t that always the way – grrrrrr!

So, we went to Fiona and I told her my worries about heart problems and so Fiona listened to her heart, to her lungs and to her abdomen. All 3 sounded clear and free of any fluid build up, so Fiona thought it was very unlikely that Kahlua had heart problems, but she did say that if there was another episode of that shallow breathing, then we’d have to X-ray her to see what was going on inside.

Kahlua got her prednisone and after having been on it for a week, I must say she seems a lot better. Not quite weasel wardancing but certainly walking around the house more often and seemingly happy.

I’ve also started giving her some pet milk with the contents of a Transfer Factor Plus capsule added to it, with 1/2ml of Poly-MVA and 1/2ml Marine Phyto Plankton added to it on alternate days. She laps it up happily so I have fingers crossed that it’s doing some good and might even shrink that wretched tumour inside of her.

We shall see how she goes. I hope I’ll keep her for longer than Muis had with us but only time will tell.

Oh phoo – double phoo! I really didn’t think that my sweet old silvermitt would get insulinoma so soon after Muis but she has. Cr@p!

Before Christmas she had some funny “turns” – she’d walk around and suddenly look like she was lost. Nothing like the dazed look I’ve come to know with insulinoma. Oh no. I honestly thought she had Alzheimers! She’d stand there and look left then right as if to say “Which way I am supposed to go!”

Then on Christmas Eve I had a scare when she had some totally weird breathing problems. She was lying in our bed after having one of her “Alzheimers” confusion sessions earlier and she seemed okay until I heard a really strange noise coming from her.

Her breathing started off slow then got progressively faster then went back to normal and it kept on going like that for a while.

I had her on my chest and was stroking her and when I moved her back onto the bed, my nightie was wet where her mouth had been. Her mouth was open, her lips drawn back and I thought I was looking at her death mask, I really did. I got out of bed, grabbed a towel, put it on the bed between us and put Kahlua on it and I honestly thought that she wasn’t going to be with us for much longer.

The rapid burst of breathing went on for about an hour, then she started making an odd clicking sound. You know you can get those tin clickers out of Christmas crackers or whatever – that was the sound she was making when she was breathing. There’d be 3 or 4 clicks then silence, then 3 or 4 clicks again.

By this time it was close to midnight and she suddenly went all quiet. I felt her stomach and couldn’t feel her breathing so felt her paws and her nose. I turned on the light and saw that her neck was arched, although nothing like Muis’ or Kaos’ necks when they were in their death throes, so despite seeing that and feeling her body and finding it still warm, I had convinced myself she was on death’s door.

At this stage Philip woke up and asked why I was snottering, so I explained that I thought Kahlua was dead. He felt her and said, “No, she’s fine.”

I scowled at him and said, “No way! She’s dying, or dead now!” and he said “Feel her!”

I did and she felt warm and was breathing perfectly normally. Next thing I know she wakes up and wants to get off the bed, so I put her on the floor and she toodled around before climbing into the drawer (of the chest of drawers) and going to sleep.

I was exhausted, I can tell you, and count that night as the worst Christmas Eve I have ever had!

Then on January 2, we were walking out of the kitchen to head for the bedroom and I saw Kahlua lying splat on the floor near the linen cupboard. I spoke to other ferret owners and they all thought it was a heat thing but, although it was warm at the time, I still had my doubts.

Took Kahlua to the vet and she checked her out and said there was nothing she could find and, since I had no definite symptoms, there was basically nothing I could tell her apart from her “odd behaviour”.

THEN it happened.

On Sunday morning (the 10th) I walked into the sitting room and found her lying on Zac’s bed, completely floppy and totally out of it, even though her eyes were open.

I took her into our bedroom and got some Nutrigel, rubbed it on her gums and got a syringe full of smoothy to give her. Well, within a few seconds she was licking the smoothy from the end of the syringe and seemed perfectly fine. I put her down on the bed with the smoothy bowl and although I had to hold her upright, she was licking the liquid up with great gusto.

* sigh *

I called my vet first thing on the Monday morning but she was away till Wednesday and obviously the staff there wouldn’t give Kahlua any prednisone without the vet’s say so.

So there we go … I was totally fooled by Kahlua’s confusion as it was nowhere like CJ’s or Muis’ dazed look. Then the strange breathing session and the way she lay “splat” on the floor – I reckon now that that was a mini-blood sugar drop.

I have a new sig file …”The more I know ferrets, the more I know I don’t know!” and I can’t tell you how true that is.

It’s my 16th year of ferret ownership and I’m still scratching my head wondering if I have it right and am doing the right thing by my babies!

Muis, my lovely old lady died last night at around 9pm and I don’t know why it happened.

She was absolutely normal on Sunday … she happily ate her chicken in the morning, she lapped up her smoothy with the others, she had all her supplements without a hitch and she wanted to be picked up and cuddled when I went to bed.

I did notice that her body felt quite warm when I had her next to me in bed, but she didn’t appear to be unhappy or distressed so I didn’t think anything more about it.

I know my subconscious registered the fact that she didn’t do her usual 3am nose dive into the food dish and it was the silence which kinda niggled in my mind. Then around 4am I heard a strange noise so I turned on the light and found her lying flat on the floor near the chest of drawers.

This was not a good sign, so I picked her up and brought her to bed with me but she didn’t want to stay so I gently put her down and she scurried around and then pooped. It was a very small, black blob and that got all the alarm bells ringing. I then followed her as she staggered all the way to the kitchen and did a small piddle, moaning as she relieved herself.

I knew it was bad so I picked her up and took her back to the bedroom, crying, and this woke Philip up. He saw Muis looking floppy and thought maybe it was a blood sugar crash but the fact that she was moving around meant that I knew it wasn’t.

Anyway, she went downhill from there. I was going to take her to the vet for her final injection but by 7am her little body was cool to the touch and her paws were icy, so I knew it was just a matter of time before she passed over to the Bridge.

Remembering how it was a similar thing to when Kaos crashed, I decided not to take her to the vet and just make her comfortable in the drawer so she would slip away quietly.

That was a very stupid move on my part.

She was lying with her neck arched, eyes closed, lips and nose white from anemia, and she was obviously in a coma but didn’t seem to be in any pain. I kept willing her to go and play at the Bridge with the others but she didn’t.

I finished my work at midday and she was still breathing, so I put her on a pillow and sat down with her on my lap and just stroked her gently, telling her it was okay to go and see Kaos and the others who were waiting for her.

She was still with us when Philip got home from work and I was really fretting about how much longer she would resist letting herself go. I was tempted to ring the vet and take her down there but if I moved her pillow, she’d groan and I didn’t want to add any further stress to the whole ordeal so I thought I’d just keep her with me and surely she’d go soon.

By the time I was ready for bed, Philip and I thought the best thing was to put her on the bed on her pillow and for me to just keep doing what I was doing, talking to her, stroking her head and just urging her to leave.

About an hour after I got into bed, she suddenly screamed a long, loud, almost primordial scream. Kahlua, Angus and Seamus rushed onto the bed, all in a very distressed state at the sound, so I had to get Philip to take them and shut them in the bathroom.

It was a terrifying sound and both Philip and I felt sick not knowing why she was doing this. Was she in agony? What could have happened? Did her tumour suddenly burst and that was the reason she was screaming?

She kept on screaming and I held onto her and was trying to calm her down, with no success. Philip threw his clothes on over his PJs and said he was going to ring the 24 hour vet and take her down there as we had no idea how much longer this would go on for and if she was in pain, we had to do something.

Just as he went to get the phone, she suddenly stopped screaming and died in my arms.

I was practically hysterical by this stage and felt absolutely awful that I hadn’t taken her to the vet early in the morning. Had I known that she would do this, of course I would have taken her hours ago for her final injection, but she looked so much like Kaos did and it was only a couple of hours before Kaos passed away peacefully that I never expected Muis’s passing would be different.

After we wrapped her up and put her in the cat carrier in the spare room, I started wringing my hands and fretting about what could have caused this sudden collapse and long, drawn-out death.

I know I didn’t miss any vital signs telling me she wasn’t herself but I was so worried that maybe I had given her too many supplements to keep her well and it made things worse instead of better. But logic told me that if the supplements weren’t agreeing with her, surely I would have noticed a change in her condition.

Oh it was an awful, really, really, awful experience and one I wouldn’t wish any other ferret owner would ever have to go through.

I know a 1cm tumour is pretty big to have on the pancreas of a small ferret and perhaps if I hadn’t put her on the various supplements during the year we might have lost her sooner. But I still find myself hoping that I didn’t do anything to hurt her and make her suffer like she appeared to at the end.

I shall miss the old girl so much. She was such a sweetheart and so affectionate and even when she was sick, she’d always come into the study when I was working and stretch up my leg, saying she wanted to be picked up. When I got her in my hands, she’d shower my face with kisses – it was almost as if to tell me she was happy.

I am picturing her playing at the Bridge with Bonnie her all-time favourite pooch, Kaos, Snoopy and all the others who’ve gone ahead, happy and pain-free.

I am so looking forward to seeing her again and having her chewing on my earlobes and pulling the hair out of my head, like she loved doing when she’d come onto the bed at night.

Philip buried her in the garden this morning and I will get a special flowering plant so that every time I see and smell the blooms of that particular plant, I’ll know that Muis is smiling down at me from the Bridge.

RIP my lovely little girl
Muis 2002 – 2009

When Muis was first diagnosed with insulinoma, I put a tray with a bowl of dry food and water next to the chest of drawers where the gang sleep at night. I thought it would make life easier for her not to have to schlep all the way to the laundry to get her food if she was hungry.

Of course the other ferrets eat the food there, no problem about that, but just recently Muis has developed a most unusual habit and it’s ALWAYS around 3am when she does it!

She comes crashing out of the drawers, goes off to spend her penny or whatever, then she goes to the tray and I hear her crashing and banging as if she’s diving into the bowl of food. It’s really noisy and wakes me up so last night I turned on the light to see what she was doing and saw her flinging the food out of the bowl before she started eating the kibble off the tray!

Go figure!!

Why does she do that? Beats me. Why does she do that only at night? No idea!

Thank goodness Philip sleeps through the disturbance otherwise I think he’d be (rightfully) very underwhelmed by Muis’s actions

Well, looking on the bright side, I am extremely happy to know for a fact that she hasn’t lost her appetite and is chuffing her way through her kibble!!

It was soon after the Transfer Factor Plus capsules arrived and I had been giving it to the quartet when I noticed Kahlua’s head bobbing. It was like she was licking her mouth, or had something stuck in her mouth – just moving her head up and down for a second so nothing too dramatic but still odd.

I thought that perhaps it was a reaction to the TFPlus so kept my beady eye on her. She didn’t bob her head often but I told Philip about it and a couple of days later, he saw her doing that too.

What on earth causes a ferret to bob its head?! I checked her throat and head for lumps and bumps but everything was normal to my touch. I tried to look inside her mouth to see if there was anything there but that was not too successful. However, as she didn’t bob her head all the time, I assumed there was nothing dramatic happening inside her mouth to warrant a trip to the vet.

The bobbing happened for about a week and not often – once a day at the most – so what caused it?

No idea!

I made sure Kahlua had her smoothy with the TFPlus and marine phytoplankton added to it, and also made sure she had a small saucer of pet milk and the phytoplankton every morning with Muis.

So far, so good. No more bobbing. Is that because she had the supplements or did it just stop by itself, I wonder.

And my reference to naked bodies …. well, that’s Muis. Her coat is getting incredibly thin and while she’s not totally bald, the melatonin doesn’t seem to be kicking in.

Tomorrow will be the 8th week anniversary of her being on melatonin and I would have thought that she should start to show SOME regrowth by now.

Poor little old lady.

But all things considered, her quality of life seems to be good at present and she is bright and alert when awake so I’m grateful for that.

Well it has arrived!

I read the instructions (which were for humans) and they said that first time users should take 1/8th of a teaspoon in some liquid and then build up to a higher dose.

I tasted the liquid and it was like seaweed – a bit salty but nothing too gross – but I was worried that Muis would spit it out when I gave it to her mixed in her pet milk.

As I said in a previous post, the boys will not take their smoothy with the Transfer Factor Plus in it – absolutely not – but the girls lick it up happily. I’ve still been putting 1/2 cup of pet milk in the bowl, together with the egg yolk and TFPlus, but two ferrets can’t finish that much so today I reserved what was left and added the Marine Phytoplankton liquid to that.

I gave Muis her evening dose of pred and then put the liquid in a saucer and got Kahlua to help drink it all up. Absolutely no problems, thank goodness.

After they finished, I made up a bit of pet milk with Poly-MVA and gave it to the boys, who lapped it up eagerly! Since they don’t have anything wrong with them (touch wood), I’m happy for them not to have the TFPlus or Phytoplankton added to their pet milk.

I was looking at Muis this afternoon while she was wandering around the sitting room and, you know what? I think she is looking really well!

She seems to have lost that ‘teardrop’ shape and her collar doesn’t look like it’s way too big around her neck. When she lost her fur, the collar was really rattling around but now, somehow, she’s filled out across the shoulders and her neck size seems to have increased … and, as I said, she is looking good.

When Philip got home from work I asked him to look at her, just to see if maybe I was imagining an improvement but even he said that she was looking better than before!

For the first time since she was diagnosed with her insulinoma, I honestly think she might just exceed the vet’s timeline of 18 months!

If she does, I reckon it was due to the TFPlus. If she doesn’t …. well … I’ll be devastated … but I guess we’ll know by May 2010.

I hadn’t realised that the bottle contained capsules – I thought they were pills which I’d have to crush but this was easier.

According to that site I found with the dosage instructions, Muis needs to have 1/4 capsule per day

Transfer Factor Advanced Formula Plus — Small Animals 1-40 lb. One quarter to one capsule daily

but I was also mindful of the instruction on the same site

Note: Some veterinarians start animals on a small amount of Transfer Factor Plus for 3 consecutive days to make sure to not overwhelm the immune system, and increase the dose gradually.

I certainly didn’t want to overdose her with a whole lot of supplements, which might have overloaded her system, so I opened up the capsule and divided the contents into 3.

Silly me, I got confused with the statement that I should start her on a small amount for 3 days so made 3 piles out of one capsule instead of 4. Doh!

I decided to put the TF Plus into their smoothy and give it to all the ferrets initially and then slowly increase Muis’s dose by adding it to her morning milk instead of the Poly-MVA.

I’ve also ordered a bottle of Marine Phytoplankton from a company over east so when that comes, I’ll add that to her special mixture.

I have no idea how long it will take to see an improvement in her condition but will definitely be posting updates here as and when they occur.

I was pottering around the internet, looking to see what else would be good for Muis to boost her system and came across a product called Transfer Factor Plus.

It sounds like it’s a wonder supplement and there are all sorts of glowing testimonials about how this product helped all kinds of dogs and cats to recover from serious conditions.

There was also a testimonial from a lady who used Transfer Factor Plus on her ferret and it helped her ferret to recover from serious illness…

“My name is Karen and I have a small 4 year old female, 3lb ferret named (Moxy) in the summer of 2008 she had all the symptoms of renal cancer. Moxy began losing hair on her tail.I am so pleased. My ferret had a growth under skin sitting above rib cage and kept growing a common Adrenal issues with ferrets but, the Transfer Factor Plus seemed to be helping. I also added Marine PhytoPlankton and gradually increasing the amount – WOW these two products together had amazing impact on my ferret’s health. Moxy has much more energy now and her tumor is shrinking quickly. The rescue lady we got our ferrets from deals with alot of sick ferrets. I gave her a bottle of Marine Phyto Plankton. She has been using it for a ferret with bladder issues and has been very pleased with it. I told her the story behind the Marine Phyto Product, how it came about. She may begin trying it with her cancer ferrets. She currently uses Melatonin for the adrenal ferrets.” Karen Callahan Illinois

I emailed George & Sue, the people who supply me with my Poly-MVA, to ask if they’ve ever heard of this product and, as they’ve got a lot of products to help dogs with cancer, if they’ve ever used it.

What do you know! They stock Transfer Factor Plus for humans and a doggy version as well!

So, I’ve ordered a bottle of TF PLus and will be giving it to all the ferrets as a daily supplement. George wasn’t sure about what dose to give a ferret but, thanks to Google, I found a site which gives a list of doses for different sized animals.

From what I understand, giving Muis TF Plus on top of all her other natural supplements will not hurt her so I’ll let you know after a few weeks if the product seems to help or if it was just a waste of money!

not yet gone but it’s getting there …!

My poor little lady

As you can see from the photos, she’s losing more and more hair.

Can anyone tell me how long it’ll take before the melatonin kicks in and restores her hair?  

I mean, I certainly don’t care if she is totally bald, as long as she’s in as good shape as possible, but I do worry about her feeling chilly or uncomfortable without her coat.

Apart from going bald, she seems in pretty good spirits.

She wanders around the house and comes to say hello when I’m working in our study. She goes up to Zac and licks him on his nose before continuing on her way. She likes coming under the doona and night and cuddling us.

She acts like she did before getting this wretched cancer and all things considered, I am grateful that whatever I’m giving her seems to help improve her quality of life.

I was trying to find out how long it’d take for the melatonin to work on Muis and for her hair to grow back.  I didn’t come up with anything definite but found some videos and articles which I thought would be of interest to any ferret owner whose ferret has insulinoma &/or adrenal problems.  I don’t endorse any of the content on this post – I’ve just added them for interesting reading/watching

Emergency Ferret Care : Treating Pet Ferret Illness with Melatonin

What are the melatonin side effects?

reason for asking is that a friends vet doesn’t want to give the melatonin implant to the ferret because there is also has insulinoma along with adrenal disease. the vet said that the melatonin would lower the bg and to a point that …

Melatonin Treatment Update for Ferret Adrenal Disease

If you remember, I have a ferret that was diagnosed with adrenal disease. I started melatonin treatment right after his diagnosis and we’ve already seen improvement. He gets 1mg of liquid melatonin between 1 and 2 pm about 3 times a …

Emergency Ferret Care : Treating Pet Ferret Illness with Duck Soup

It came on Friday and I started her on it immediately.

The instructions said to give it to her twice a day, which I did, but after a couple of days I heard her retching and trying to throw up so I thought I’d stop the evening dose.

I emailed Kamila and asked her advice and she agreed with what I did, saying that the formula was fairly strong and if I was also giving Muis her melatonin tablet every day, it would be fine to just give her the TCM once a day.

As you can see from these photos, the poor old lady is losing her hair quite comprehensively

These are the ingredients of the formula…

1]  Xi Yang Shen (American Ginseng) – Panax quinquefolius – (herb for Yin Deficiency (Yin Tonic)`; Tonifies Yin, generates Fluids, reduces Heat from Deficiency. Western properties - Rejuvenative, anti-fatigue effect, stomachic, liver restorative, pituitary/adrenal restorative, calming, anti-pyretic, immune system stimulant, estrogenic)

2]   Chai Hu – Bupleurum chinense - (herb for Exterior Wind Heat/Cooling Sudorific and for Qi Stagnation. Western properties – Tranquilizing, analgesic, anti-inflammatory, mildly hypotensive, anti-allergic hepatoprotective, pituitary/adrenocortical stimulant)

3]   Gan Cao – Glycyrrhiza glabra (herb for Qi Defficiency (Qi Tonic). Tonifies Spleen and Qi. Western properties – Anti-inflammatory, expectorant, hyperglycemic, estrogenic, anti-viral, anti-bacterial, anti-tumor, interferon inducent, hepatoprotective, detoxifying action, adrenocortical hormonal action, immune suppressing action, anti-allergic, hypertensive)

4]   Fu Ling – Poria cocos (herb to Clear Wetness/Phlegm Patterns. Strengthens Spleen and harmonizes Middle Burner. Western properties – Diuretic, sedative, tonic, hypoglycemic, anti-diarrhea, reduces stomach acid secretions, anti-tumor, immune stimulant, stimulates phagocytes)

5]   Bai Zhu – Atractylodes macrocephala (herb for Qi Defficiency (Qi Tonic). Tonifies Spleen and Qi. Western properties – Tonic, diuretic, carminative, stomachic, anti-diarrhea, hypoglycemic, anti-tumor, immune stimulant)

6]  Dang Gui – Angelica sinensis (herb for Blood Deficiency (Blood Tonic). Regulates Blood; used in Blood Stagnation conditions such as traumatic injuries, abdominal pain, chest pain. Western properties - Sedative, diuretic, anti-bacterial, hypotensive, immune stimulant, lowers blood lipids, anti-tumor)

7]  Bai Shao -Paeonia lactiflora (herb for Blood Deficiency (Blood Tonic). Pacifies Liver and alleviates pain; used for constrained Liver Qi and for Liver Spleen disharmony. Western properties – Blood tonic, anti-spasmodic, analgesic, sedative, anti-bacterial, anti-ulcer (reduces gastric acid secretion), immune stimulant)

8]  Mu Dan Pi – Paeonia moutan (Cooling/Detoxifying Herb for Heat Patterns. Used in conditions such as firm masses/tumors and in bruises from traumatic injuries & Clears rising Liver Yang. Western properties – anti-bacterial, anti-inflammatory, hypotensive, hemostatic, calming, analgesic, anti-allergic)

9]  Zhi Zi – Gardenia jasminoides (Zhi Zi can significantly improve blood flow in the pancreas, liver, stomach and small intestine. In particular, it can maintain the normal blood flow in the pancreas, and thereby minimizing injuries to the pancreas, improving the prognosis, and lowering the death rate).

Well I have all my digits crossed and hope that this will help Muis to fight her tumour and live a longer life than expected.  I can say that she’s really pretty perky these days since being on the melatonin and TCM – so I do hope all the stuff I’m giving her will help her to live a long and happy life which is … and this part is really important … one of good quality!

She’s such a sweet little old lady and I want her twilight years to be happy ones, not full of pain and discomfort.

Fingers crossed this all works out and we can keep the old chook  around for a longer time than the vet reckoned she had

Great timing too … it was delivered yesterday afternoon so I managed to give it to Muis before the 9 hour from sunrise deadline. Phew

I put the tablet in a small mortar and pulverised it with the pestle, then mixed it with the Whiskas pet milk and gave it to her ladyship. She drank up the liquid, no problem. That was about 4pm, which is around about the time I normally give her her prednisone and also a small saucer filled with the pet milk mixed with Poly-MVA, which she shares with Angus.

I didn’t want to overload her stomach so waited a couple of hours before giving her the other stuff and I was relieved to find that she drank her share of the liquid without batting an eyelash.

As you can see from this photo, her coat is really looking scruffy, so I do hope the melatonin will help to get her fur to grow back.

I personally don’t care if she looks scruffy or is bald but I think the old girl is feeling the cold these days, as she tends to shiver a lot more than she used to. Poor little baby

Both she and I would like to thank all of you who’ve sent her lots of “get better” vibes. They are definitely working, as she’s been bustling around the place today and acting like her old self!

It’s been a joy to see her like this and I really, really appreciate all your good wishes for her recovery

It’s like living with a yo-yo!  One day Muis is up, the next day she’s down.  Gah!

At this precise moment in time, so far so good, thank goodness.

She was really odd at the beginning of the week  …  I watched her walking around the house and she seemed confused and a bit bewildered about where she was.  She’d stand outside a closed door to a room (which she never used to go into) and seemed to wonder why she wasn’t able to go inside – or she’d stand in the middle of the sitting room and look like she didn’t know where she was.

It really was awful to see her like that and I was stressing out about what was happening, thinking that maybe the cancer on her pancreas had travelled up to her brain.

But, thankfully,  by midweek, she seemed a lot better.  I’m pretty sure it’s because of the fact that she was back on her regular dose of prednisone.   She looked so much better, she didn’t have “bags” under her eyes (has anyone noticed how albino ferrets get yellow “bags” under their eyes when they’re ill?!?) and she certainly seemed like she knew where she was going when she was walking around the house. I can’t tell you how relieved I felt seeing her improve but I’m sure any ferret owner who’s had a sick ferret knows what I’m saying!

I hope the melatonin will come soon otherwise I might need to think of getting an Explorer sock and making it into a ferret coat to keep her warm in this chilly weather.  Heh heh – can you just see a ferret in a sock?  That would be something to take a photo of : )

I wish I were a crafty person so that I could knit Muis a coat but I’m seriously not! All thumbs, no fingers

I’ve also ordered more Traditional Chinese Medicine from OnlinePetHerbs but with this order I’ve asked Kamila if she could add some herbs which will help to stimulate Muis’s hair growth.  I don’t ask much, do I (LOL),  but fingers crossed the new TCM will help

Despite all the setbacks, I hope I’ll be able to keep Muis going in good health for longer than the original prognosis from my vet – she really is such an adorably sweet old lady and I’m not about to give up on her yet!

She was fine last week but I couldn’t get to see our vet on Wednesday as the vet was ill so had to reschedule my appointment to Saturday.  It didn’t worry me because Muis wasn’t showing any other signs of adrenal other than hair loss.

However … on Thursday morning I picked her up and although her eyes were open, she was as floppy as a rag doll.  Another low blood sugar crash!  God!  I thought the medicine was supposed to stop that from happening!

Out came the honey and we rubbed it on her gums and put her back in her drawer to sleep it off.  I gave her her fresh chicken meat about an hour later and was relieved to see that she ate it all up.  She also took her medication and her Poly-MVA without any resistance, but she wasn’t keen to have much smoothy when I served it up about 2 hours later.

She was pretty zonked out for the day but on Friday she seemed better so I felt less stressed.  As any ferret owner with a sick ferret knows, the emotional strain is awful, it really is … and even after 15 years and a whole lot of sick ferrets under my belt, it doesn’t get easier

Took her to the vet on Saturday and Fiona checked her out. She said that Muis was in pretty good condition, all things considered, and the hair loss was not so much due to a tumour on her adrenal gland but due to the cortisone in the medication.  She suggested I give Muis 0.4ml of prednisone instead of 0.5ml to see if that would stall the hair loss and thought it’d be a good idea to order the Melatonin pills and see if that helps to regrow her hair.

I reduced the medication but on Sunday Muis was acting rather wobbly so I decided to put her back on her previous dose and try and deal with the hair loss with the Melatonin.

She’s not herself, that’s obvious, but she certainly isn’t so bad that I feel I should take her for her final visit to the vet.  That is where the stress comes in … I don’t want her to be in pain with no quality of life, but I’m also not keen to give up on her just yet.

So I need help, please!  Can anyone advise me how to give Muis her melatonin?! I read on the Internet that I should give her 1 milligram orally 7-9 hours after sunrise and if that doesn’t help, to up the dose to 3 milligrams.

My question is … how do I do that with a 3 mg pill?  Do I smash the pill the pill up and put it with, say, fresh chicken or in milk or what?  

I would appreciate any help with this that I can get – thank you

It looks like Muis now has adrenal problems on top of everything else!

I know that ferrets with insulinoma can get adrenal problems as well but I had been so optimistic about the Poly-MVA helping her, and she seems so bright and active, that I thought that I had everything under control for her.

Her coat was looking a bit scruffy a couple of weeks ago then towards the end of last week, I noticed that, just when the light hit her back at a certain angle, her fur looked very thin just between her shoulder blades and that’s when all the warning bells went off. And now, just yesterday, I saw that the hair at the base of her tail is beginning to thin out.

AAARRRGHHH!

I’ve had ferrets for 15 years and never, ever, not once, had one with adrenal problems until now. I know I’ve been lucky and I was hoping that the trend would continue but obviously that’s not to be.You can see from this photo how she’s losing fur on her back

I’ve had a number of people emailing me asking if there was any more news on HR-669 so I did some snooping around and … unfortunately … cannot find anything specific to report.

Well the old girl is still doing remarkably well – she is pottering around the house and seems bright and full of beans.

Her stomach is still bald, as you can see from the photo, and even her foot, which was shaved for the operation she had, is still hairless. Incredible!

I’ve upped her dose of Poly-MVA – I used to just give her the 0.5mls in the smoothy, which all the ferrets shared, but now I give her a really small saucerful of Whiskas Pet Milk mixed with 0.5mls of Poly-MVA morning and night when I give her her Prednisone.

Of course there is no way of knowing if this is doing her any good and helping to slow down the cancer unless I get the vet to give her another ultrasound. If that showed the tumour had decreased, then I would know definitely that all the extra stuff I’m giving her is actually working but I somehow doubt that Philip would be very happy with me if I forked out $400+ to have that done.

The vet gave her 12-18 months from the time she was diagnosed with Insulinoma so if I can keep her going for longer than that and her quality of life stays good, then I guess that should prove the Poly-MVA and TCM worked. Fingers crossed!!

New granddaughter

Nothing to do with ferrets but I must boast about the new addition to the family

Little Grace Lila Dawson was born at 6am on Saturday morning and she’s just the the most adorable little thing.

Of course all babies are gorgeous and I admit I am very biased, but she does seem to be a very placid and non-demanding little soul — must take after her maternal grandmother! LOL!!

It’s fantastic! I now have another child I can convert into a ferret lover

I am so worried about Cass, the lady in Bendigo who has all those ferrets – waking up this morning and reading about the horrors in Victoria and NSW was bad enough, but to know someone who lives in that particular area was awful.

Apparently 50 homes were lost in Bendigo. I have never been there so have no concept what the town is like, nor do I have any idea of where exactly Cass and her family live.

I am just hoping and praying that her house was out of the line of fire and that, despite the storms raging around them, they are okay, as are all their animals. I think she still had about 35 ferrets on her property when we last talked by email, and I have no idea if she was on a farm or in the town itself.

I just can not imagine the horrors of being in a bushfire, of seeing your house go up in flames and worrying about whether your animals are okay or if they were burned. It gives me the absolute jimjams thinking about it.

And then there are all the animals living in the bush … how do they escape the flames and if they get burned, can they be helped so that they don’t die an agonising death? God – it’s so depressing to think about.

I have never been happy living in the bush, being more of a coastal person. Give me a view of the sea and I find it a salve on the soul … so relaxing and very therapeutic.

Here we live about 10 minutes from the Indian Ocean and while we can’t see it from our house, you can almost smell it when the sea breeze blows

Years ago we used to take the ferrets down to the beach early on a Sunday morning and it always amused me to see them digging deep tunnels in the sand! I’d worry about them going too far in and finding the sand collapsing behind them so always had their harnesses on so we could pull them out if that happened! Thankfully it never did.

Speaking of ferrets, Muis is looking terrific these days. She’s still 1.1kg and her fur is fabulously soft, plus her tail – which looked pretty ratty – has filled out too and is also looking good.

She always had coarse fur, ever since she was young, and since being on the Poly-MVA, it’s turned lovely and silky, as have the others. Seamus also had coarse fur and now his is soft, so it must be the stuff I’m giving them.

I was “talking”to another ferret lady who also got Poly-MVA for her gang and she agreed that their poop smelled awful but thought it was because their systems were expelling all the grot. Hopefully once they’ve been cleansed through, their poop will go back to normal.

Now to melatonin …. has anyone put their ferret on melatonin and if they have, could you please let me know how your ferret went on that drug? The ferret lady above thinks one of her girls has adrenal problems and she doesn’t have a ferret knowledgeable vet nearby, so has to “teach” her vet things.

If you could give me any advice to pass on to her, I would be most grateful as she is dreadfully worried about her ferret and only wants to do the best for it.

I’ve given her links to various sites which talk about melatonin but it’s always good to have firsthand information from someone who’s actually given it to their ferret and who can give good advice about that.

My vet removed the stitch from Muis’s foot last week and she was a very brave little girl when it was being done – hardly caused a ruckus.

Well, she couldn’t have, since I had her pinned to my chest so that she wouldn’t jerk her foot while Fiona picked the stitch to remove it

It was all done within seconds and we were home in record time, which was good as I had woken her up to take her to the vet and you know ferrets … they usually use the litter tray when they wake up (except when you want them to use the litter tray) and I didn’t want Muis soiling Fiona’s bench top

I wonder how long it’ll be before the hair on her foot grows back because she’s still bald as a coot on her stomach!

So, I have all the ferrets on their daily dose of Poly-MVA and, quite honestly, can’t say that it’s doing anything apart from making their poop STINK!

The smell is absolutely awful and if they accidentally poop on the floor and I don’t pick it up immediately, it sets like concrete and then I have a devil of a time trying to remove it. Yuck!

I do hope that the supplement is helping them all and now that I’ve started them all on it, I’m too frightened to not use it in case it really is helping Muis with her tumour!

When I first got the Poly-MVA, I thought I would put the exactly amount into a syringe and give it to each of them that way. Silly idea – very silly. They all thrashed about like demented worms when I held them and I was terrified that I would accidentally squirt the liquid into their lungs.

So I decided to put 0.5ml of Poly-MVA into their daily smoothy and I give Muis a small saucer full of Whiskas pet milk with her other 0.5ml added to it at night. She seems to love it so she gets her full dose, as do the others.

As I mentioned earlier, Fiona gave Muis 12-18 months when she diagnosed her insulinoma so IF she lasts longer than that and her quality of life is good, then I reckon I could put that down to the Poly-MVA and TCM.

When CJ developed insulinoma all those years ago, it was roughly a year from the time he was diagnosed to the time I had to take him on his final journey to the vet and his quality of life was rotten. He didn’t do anything but sleep all day and he went from being my gorgeous weasel wardancer to a very sad, sleepy little fellow. It was heartbreaking to watch

But in those days the only thing I could find to help him was colloidal silver so we used to drive down to Fremantle, about an hour away, to get a bottle and I used to put it in the water dish for the ferrets. That’s all there was in the way of natural remedies in those days!

I am so grateful that, with the help of the internet, we have a chance of improving our sick ferrets’ lives … or at least FEEL like we’re improving their lives. Who knows if what I’m doing will work or not.

While on the subject of past ferrets, I can’t believe that today is the first anniversary of Kaos’s passing. How time flies. I still miss the old girl, as she was such a character and so much fun.

I think I need to get another DEW to add to the family, as well as a sable, so must practice my eyelash batting at Philip to see if he’ll allow me to increase my ferret numbers.

I was reading the latest WAFFS magazine and apparently for the first time in ages, they have quite a few ferrets looking to be rehomed and no one on their list wanting ferrets, all thanks to this global meltdown.

There was a story (thankfully with a happy ending) about someone who’d moved out of a rental property and left his dog and ferret in the house – just like that! And it’s not just here – I’ve read some really sad stories about that sort of thing happening in the States and also in the UK.

People who have such little regard about their responsibilities should not be allowed to have pets in the first place but that’s something which is impossible to police, isn’t it.

Hrumph!

How exciting! It was delivered yesterday and I gave Muis and Kahlua their first squirt of the liquid last night.

So far so good … and, apart from Kahlua’s burst of disapproval when I pressed the syringe into her mouth and she sprayed me with the most of the contents, all is well

In fact, Philip actually remarked to me this evening that Muis is looking so good that he’s finding it hard to differentiate between her and Angus! She’s just about the same size as him and he was so happy to see how she’s filled out and improved since that episode when she fell into a coma a couple of months ago.

I know Philip thought that I was spending a lot of money on natural remedies and I think he was very sceptical about the results, so I am really very pleased that he sees such a change in Muis these days.

I guess it was harder with Kaos, last year because she was never at death’s door like Muis was so there wasn’t an obvious comparison of “before and after”.

This time is different, and I hope that he’ll continue to be impressed with how the natural remedies are working for both Muis and our German Shepherd, Bonnie (I bought Syn-Flex for her arthritis from the same distributor).

I think I’ll also give the boys a small daily squirt of the Poly-MVA just to make sure they have some added goodness to their diet! They’re both just over 2 years old and in good health so perhaps really don’t need it, but I want to see if the supplement helps to keep them in excellent health for many years to come and the only way to check if it does, is to start now

Poor little Muis, she really has been in the wars recently! You can just about see the stitch she has in her left foot from her operation in the above picture …

I was worried about Kahlua because she seemed to be very lethargic and floppy recently and although I thought it could be because of the continued hot weather we’ve been having (2 weeks of 32C plus every day), the other ferrets didn’t seem to be lethargic so I thought I should take her to our vet for a check-up.

I made the appointment for Thursday morning but when I was getting Kahlua out of the drawer to put in the carrier, I saw Muis had what looked like a black mole on her left foot. I touched it and found it was quite a bump so she went into the carrier with Kahlua.

Fiona, my vet, checked Kahlua out and said she was fine. She had put on weight since her last visit so her chubby stomach was due to her being a little piggy and eating too much rather than anything awful going on inside her stomach. Good!

I then got Muis out of the carrier and showed Fiona her foot. When Fiona examined it, it started to bleed so we talked about what to do. It was quite large, 4 x 5mm, and really looked rather nasty.

Fiona thought I should keep an eye on it and if it got any bigger in a week’s time, to bring her back so that she could remove it. She told me to make up a weak solution of Betadine and put that on the lump so it didn’t get infected.

I asked if the lump was something to fret about or not and she said that she’d be able to see if this “hemorrhagic skin mass” was malignant or benign once she opened it up. And she didn’t want me to wait longer than a week because she said it would be more difficult to sew up the hole the lump would leave if it got much bigger.

I thought about it and really didn’t want to wait a week so asked if Fiona could do the operation the same day. She said she could, so I left Muis with her and took Kahlua home.

I must say I was a bit concerned about Muis going under in her present condition so was very relieved when Fiona called me around 2:30 to say Muis was fine and was itching to get home.
Apparently the operation had gone well and she only needed one stitch in her foot, so I flew down to the vet, picked the old lady up and when we got home, gave her a bowl of chopped fresh chicken meat.

Muis wolfed her meal down and then headed to the chest of drawers to join the rest of the gang. Her foot didn’t seem to be troubling her at all and she seemed to be 100% after the operation, which was good to see.

It’s now 48 hours since her operation and she’s shown no interest in pulling out the stitch so I’m happy about that. I don’t think she would have been particularly impressed if she had to wander around the house with a cone around her head — imagine how the others would giggle if she tried to get into the drawers with a cone around her head. In fact, I think I’d giggle too

…. who still has a hairless stomach, as you can see in this photo

She is doing so well so far (touch wood) and it’s so encouraging to see her waddle contentedly around the house and climb up onto our bed to cuddle us at night.

Just recently, someone sent me a story about his ferret, Figgy, which was riddled with cancer, for my Natural Remedies section and mentioned that a holistic vet in New Jersey gave Figgy something called Poly-MVA.

I hadn’t heard of this before so of course, once I read Figgy’s story, I had to find out more about Poly-MVA to see if it was something I could give to Muis to help.

I found a site about Poly-MVA for Pets and it makes for interesting reading. Apparently this particular supplement provides a “powerful antioxidant and cellular energy-promoting effects of Palladium Lipoic Complex combined with a special combination of vitamins, minerals and amino acids crucial to the health and longevity of your pet” and helps to provide a healthy boost to animals who are facing difficult health challenges.

Hmmmm, I thought. Sounds good but can we get it in Australia – because there are a lot of health supplements which are freely available in the US & UK which are not allowed here.

I googled the question and to my surprise, I found a company supplying Poly-MVA here in Western Australia!

They talk about large and small bottles of Poly-MVA and, if they are the same as the ones on the US site, they will be 118ml (4oz) & 236ml (8oz), and it isn’t cheap — A$127.50 for the small and A$255 for the large — but IF it gives Muis another year or two …. ?

So I emailed them and will see what comes back. If I decide to go down that track and put Muis on it, I will find a holistic vet here in Perth and get advice about my choices and how it will interact with her prednisone and whether I stop her TCM or what.

I got my tubs of MSM the other day so have been putting a small scoop into the water dish every day as well as taking it myself. I haven’t seen any improvement in any animals or in myself so far but will keep taking it & giving it to the ferrets and our dog and see how we go

If anyone has any personal information about giving Poly-MVA to ferrets, I would be very grateful if you could share your thoughts and impressions about that supplement.

Not a very good photo, I’m sorry, but I hope you can see how filled out she is.

When Muis had her ultrasound, she was only 900g but when I weighed her yesterday, she’d gained over 100g to be over 1kg. I am stoked

Just a few weeks ago she was very hollow around her flanks and her hair was a bit scruffy and sticky-uppy — you know that look which sick ferrets have? — but now she looks so healthy, and not only does she look good, she’s very active and perky when she trots around the house. It’s great to see

Now, is it because of her “Western” medication or because of the Traditional Chinese Medicine? I have no way of saying for certain, but one thing I can say is that I believe it’s the TCM which is helping her.

If you read my entries about Kaos, when she was on her TCM, you’ll know that even the vet was amazed at how long she lasted. I was given a TWO MONTH life expectancy but she carried on happily for 7 months! I think that speaks for itself.

We shall see how Muis goes over the months – my vet said 12-18 months so if she carries on having a good quality of life for longer, then I reckon we can credit the Chinese herbs. Poor old CJ only went for 12 months when he was diagnosed with insulinoma and he slept for most of his final months.

I feel so optimistic about her progress … I hope I don’t end up having to eat my words!

Stay tuned ….!

Muis’s bottle of TCM arrived yesterday and according to what Kamila wrote, the herbs are “yin and spleen tonics”, which will help regulate her blood sugar levels. Kamila also included some mild strengthening herbs to help with the tumour on her pancreas.

Here’s the make up of the medicine (the information in the brackets are descriptions I found on the Internet, not from Kamila) …

1. Tai Zhi Shen – Radix Pseudostellariae (strengthens spleen and stomach Qi, generates fluids, tonifies lung Qi)

2. Shi Hu – Dendrobium Stem (nourishes the stomach; promotes generation of body fluids; nourishes Yin; clears heat)

3. Fu Ling – Sclerotium Poriae Cocos (eliminates water; strengthens the spleen; calms the mind)

4. Shan Zha – Fructus Crataegi (promotes digestion; transforms food retention; invigorates blood; eliminates accumulations)

5. Chen Pi – Pericarpium Citri Reticulatae (regulates the Qi; regulates the middle; dries dampness; transforms phlegm)

6. Mai Dong – Ophiopogon japonicus (moistens the lungs; nourishes lung-Yin; benefits the stomach; promotes generation of body fluids; clears the heart; calms restlessness and anxiety)

7. Pu Gong Ying – Herba Taraxaci Mongolici cum Rd (clears heat; expels toxins; drains dampness)

8. Sheng Di  – Radix Rehamanniae Glutinosae (clears heat; cools blood; nourishes Yin; promotes generation of body fluids)

9. Shan Yao – Radix Dioscoreae Oppositae (tonifies Qi; nourishes Yin; tonifies the spleen; tonifies the lungs; tonifies the kidneys)

10. San Qi - Notoginseng (Notoginseng is one of the most powerful blood tonics known. It is used to make the body stronger and can aid healing)

11. Wu Wei Zi – Fructus Schisandrae Chinensis (strengthens the lungs (to cure chronic cough); nourishes the kidneys (to cure chronic cough); promotes generation of body fluids; stops sweating; preserves the essence; stops diarrhea; calms the heart; calms the mind)

12. Dan Shen – Radix Salviae Miltiorrhizae (to remove blood stasis and relieve pain, to promote the flow of blood and stimulate menstrual discharge, and to ease the mind)

13. Jiao Gu Lan – Herba Gynostemma pentaphyllum (tonifies the liver, tonifies the kidneys, benefits the liver, benefits the kidneys, strengthens, restrains)

14. Ling Zhi – Fructificatio Ganodermatus (tonifies Qi; nourishes Yin and blood; strengthens the spleen to tonify Qi and body fluids; calms the mind; strengthens the stomach).

The instructions said that I should give Muis 1/8th of a teaspoon sprinkled on food so Philip & I went to the supermarket and I bought some fresh chicken legs.  When we got home, I cut some meat off, sprinkled the herbs on the chicken and put Muis in the bathroom with the bowl. 

It didn’t take long for her to polish off all the food and there was no sign of herbs in the bowl, so she must have licked the bowl clean! Now we wait and see her progress.

Muis doesn’t have a swollen stomach like Kaos did, so it probably won’t be as obvious but as long as I see her pottering contentedly around the house and as long as she comes up onto the bed at night and pulls out my hair, I will be happy ☺

I also heard about a natural product called methyl sulfonyl methane (MSM), which is supposed to be fantastic for people with osteoarthritis.  On checking, I found an Australian site which advertised a product called “Arthrix”, which is MSM for dogs; however it couldn’t sell the product in Australia until it was approved by the appropriate Government department.

When I researched MSM further, I saw it also was said to boost the immune system so I went to the Australian site and ordered 1kg of MSM in powder form (for humans) and I’ll be putting 1 teaspoon of the powder in the water dish for the dog and the ferrets, as well as taking the powder myself.

Apparently if one is on medication, it’s said that you can safely take MSM and it won’t interact with your drugs.  So … I’m thinking that if it’ll do what they say it will, then my dog will feel better, as she’s very arthritic, and it can only be beneficial to all the ferrets.

Yes, I know that Quack Watch have pooh-poohed all the claims made about MSM but as long as it won’t HARM my animals, I reckon I will give it a go and see how they fare.

Way back in the late 90s, when both CJ and Fidget got ill (CJ with insulinoma and Fidget with lymphosarcoma), I ordered colloidal silver to add to their water dish.  I honestly have no idea if it helped or not but at least I felt like I was doing everything I could to help improve the quality of their life.

I’ll keep you informed on how they all go once the MSM arrives

So far, so good!

Anyway, since having her medication, she gets up at night and proceeds to “wash” my face every night (usually right on 1.00am – what is it with a ferret’s unfailing built-in clock ) – lick lick lick one side, then she climbs over my face and it’s lick lick lick the other side; then a quick snuffle through my hair before yanking out a couple of follicles and finally she goes inside the doona (quilt) cover and falls asleep.

I had to share the pictures of Muis snoring away on Philip’s pillow the other morning!  He had bent the top pillow in half so he could sit up against it in the morning and when I went to make the bed, I removed that pillow and found Muis sleeping happily on the bottom pillow.  You can just make out her shaved belly from the ultrasound

The vet came with her mobile ultrasound gear and checked out Muis’s stomach yesterday afternoon and we got her back shortly afterwards.

As our vet was off duty, I spoke to one of the other vets and she said Muis has a 1 cm tumour on her pancreas … ONE CENTIMETER!!  My God, that seems a HUGE tumour
but there weren’t any other signs that the cancer had metastised so I guess that’s good news. Her right adrenal looked a little larger than the left one but no sign of trouble there …. yet!

My fingers are crossed that she has at least 18 good months with us … but who knows, maybe her cancer is not as aggressive as Dave thinks and maybe we’ll be able to have her with us for longer. I live in hope.

On a lighter note – Angus is obsessed with Monty and keeps stealing him off my bed to take him to his hidey hole for the moment!! Here are some pictures of where we’ve found Monty a couple of times this week … you just gotta wonder what’s in Angus’s mind sometimes

Never mind “Where’s Wally”, or is it Waldo? … I think I should start a children’s book called “Where’s Monty”!

Ahhhh ferrets … gotta love ‘em! )

My goodness, we had an absolutely HORRIBLE morning this morning.

You might recall I said that I thought Muis might have insulinoma after she had that weird spell last month?

I tell you, sometimes I think being a ferret owner really SUCKS!    

Am just back from seeing Fiona, my vet, and she doesn’t know what’s wrong with Muis

This really is the part of ferret ownership which I hate!  The ominous feeling that your ferret is sick and there’s really nothing you can do to help make it better.  Bah humbug