Posted: Fri May 12, 2006 11:49 am Post subject: Proof of rabies shots
I've been drifting in and outof here the last year and haven't really been around as much. I may have ditched during the last flame war. I've changed from celticferret to celticmink.
I'm down to 18 ferrets and up to 3 mink, adding a baby next week.
I do ferret awareness days for the local ferret club. Last month I had all my old reliable kids with me. Mushu decided to bite me on the chin. Better me, than someone petting her. Pooka decided to take a bite to the bone chomp out of a store customer who was hanging out with us. I was holding Pooka, feeding him a treat and another woman was petting him. For no good reason he turns and bites her.
The pet store manager wrote up an incident report, took our names and phone # and took Pooka's name and the number from his rabies certificate and reported us to the county board of health.
A couple of weeks later, an inspector from the county board of health came to my house. He wanted to see Pooka and see his rabies certificate. He wanted to verify that Pooka was in good health and had been quarantined for 10 days.
Nobody told me to quarantine him. I simply moved him to a biter cage and promised the store he wouldn't be brought back. Mushu has also been retired, but I left her in the Irish cage.
Scary businees. If you take your ferrets out in public, keep your rabies certificate either handy or leave it in the car. I keep saying, even the best behaved ferret can become stressed and bite.
Posted: Fri May 12, 2006 12:52 pm Post subject: Re: Proof of rabies shots
wow sounds like it was too much for him. You said you haven't had and problems before. i hope you have no more problems that is pretty scary people think the worst of ferrets and will kill them at the first sign of aggression ,but they are like that with dogs and cats it's worse for ferrets because they are considered pests in some peoples eyes. best wishes and blessed be all of your babys Suni
I do ferret awareness days for the local ferret club. Last month I had all my old reliable kids with me. Mushu decided to bite me on the chin. Better me, than someone petting her. Pooka decided to take a bite to the bone chomp out of a store customer who was hanging out with us. I was holding Pooka, feeding him a treat and another woman was petting him. For no good reason he turns and bites her.
I'd worry that something else besides rabies is going on. Maybe it was the excitement... maybe not...
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The pet store manager wrote up an incident report, took our names and phone # and took Pooka's name and the number from his rabies certificate and reported us to the county board of health.
Most states require that s/he do so.
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A couple of weeks later, an inspector from the county board of health ----snipped--- >8
Makes sense. If the ferret is still in good health 10 days "post-bite" then it probably didn't have rabies *AT THE TIME* of the bite, assuming it is quarantined afterwards. Not to sound alarmist, but health officials mark time/location/severity of bite. The quarantine is to insure the animal - in your case a ferret - wasn't exposed to rabid animals *after* the bite incident. W/ dogs it's longer, cats longer still.
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Nobody told me to quarantine him. I simply moved him to a biter cage ----snipped--- >8
You have think like a PH official. The day after the bite incident, both Mushu and Pooka might have been attacked by a rabid bats, raccoons, foxes, etc. Ridiculous, yes, but rabies is fatal if not treated promptly.
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Scary businees. If you take your ferrets out in public, keep your ----snipped--- >8
Bottom line: if your ferret bites someone and they/he/she/it/and/or PH gets wiggy about rabies, the best thing you can do is offer to quarantine the ferret for 2 weeks. If it's rabid, it'll typically present symptoms between days 7-10, and die before day 14. The longest a rabid ferret has lived in labs is 17 days (and never shed the virus). Ferrets are an extremely poor rabies vector.
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KG ----snipped--- >8
Note: any animal with teeth bites, -- NewsGuy.Com 30Gb $9.95 Carry Forward and On Demand Bandwidth
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