70 days!!! That’s all it was, 70 very short days.
You arrived here from the rescue, full of teeth, and very bad mannered. You decided everyone was your enemy, shouting and poofing at anyone who came near regardless of whether human or ferret, and if the shouting and poofing did not work, you had a fair set of lungs, and a very sharp painful bite which you were not afraid to use.
Sherbet decided you were the worst, and set out to wind you up mercilessly. Bourneville, just ignored you. Topic decided you might be handy as someone to keep him warm when in bed, and poor Humbug could not believe his nose… he remembered that when young girls came along smelling like you, he had a duty to perform… only he was no longer sure what that was, since he had been neutered. He did try to get you alone a few times, but you made a point of telling him very loudly that you were not that sort of girl. We were all very weary of you, and decided to give you plenty of space and time. Trying to catch you to put you in a cage was a very hazardous past time.
We were struggling to find you a name, and I must admit, we did start to wonder if taking you on had been a mistake and perhaps we should give up, and return you to the rescue. The thing was, we could see you seemed to be trying, and somehow, your headstrong personality had started to worm it’s way in.
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Over the next week or so, the boys all worked their magic on you, deciding you were quite cuddly in bed. Even Bourneville, decided you were OK, and would sleep between you and Sherbet, to stop you fighting, and ruining his sleep. We would look for you, and find you curled up between two other ferrets, looking like a little pea in a pod. But while you looked cute, we knew you were as hard as a nut… so a name was born… Peanut.
You took your time learning the house, it was like you set yourself little goals, leaning one room at a time, before moving on to the next. Then you found the garden and run and could not believe your luck. I think that was the point you decided we were not so bad and started to curtail the biting a bit. Once in the garden, you started to learn how to play with the other ferrets, and even got Humbug to dance and play with you, like he was a kit again. You loved the tubes in the run, and started sleeping in the ones right up in the roof. I had to get my laser thermometer, and shine it along the outside of the tube, until I could find the warm spot where you were sleeping, just so we could keep an eye on where you were over the course of the day.
You learnt so fast… you were coming to your name from very early on, even when you were right at the bottom of the garden, or sound asleep in the airing cupboard upstairs, I would call your name, and make a kissy sound, and you would come running. The routines were a piece of cake to you, never one to miss out on a treat when ever we walked past where they were kept, and you would sit there and stuff yourself to bursting point when you had your soup at night. You also discovered the morning ritual of giving Snicker and Topic their medicine, and would demand a bit of the convalescent food for yourself. I think that was when Sherbet decided you might be a good ally, as she would be there with you each morning so she could share a bowl with you. You also learnt amazingly quickly that first thing in the morning, I grabbed a handful of treats, and put them in my pocket, to dish out and distract all of you from our breakfast. You would think nothing of diving into my pocket, head first, and pinching them a mouthful at a time.
We took you out for walks on the lead with Sherbet, and the first time you just sat in my arms, checking out the world, you demanded to get down at one point, went to the loo, and then shot back up me. The next time, you were a happier to explore, but still enjoyed a cuddle as well.
The only thing we were a bit concerned about was you seemed like something was wrong when your harness slipped down your body a bit. It was like you were bruised a bit and did not like us touching you there, but as you were running around fine, and it did not seem to worry you in any way, we let it ride. We got you a new harness, and I made it a better fit, so it would not slide down you again, and this seemed to resolve the problem.
We were making progress on the biting as well, you were still up for a nip, and were still drawing blood, but most of the cuts in my hands had healed, and now they only tended to be when you got over excited and were trying to get me to play. We had a great game of you hiding behind the bathroom door, and I would put my fingers under the door, making you do somersaults to try and catch my fingers. You would get so wound up, you would start wagging your tail really fast at me drumming the door. You would also do this when I played with you in the tubes.
You were always on the go, and would wake us up at night, running down the stairs, wearing Steel tow cap boots, and then climbing back up the tube at the edge of the staircase making as much noise as possible. Often the noise would get one of the other guys up to play chase with you, and between you, you would make sure we were wide awake by the time you were tired of that game, ready to climb into the blanket box under the bed, and start snoring.
In those 70 very short days, you won all your cage mates over, and you were such a part of our lives, we were smitten with you. You would even sit in our arms for a cuddle without feeling the need to use those razor sharp teeth.
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We do not really know what happened, Yesterday afternoon, you ran under Suz’s foot as she was coming down the stairs, but she felt you, and tried to step over you, falling down the stairs herself, so as not to hurt you. You ran and hid, which we assumed was because the noise had scared you. We were pretty convinced she had not actually stood on you, but just to be safe, we quickly found you, and checked you all over. The rest is a mystery. You seemed to go into shock, stopped eating, and became all lethargic. We watched you, and decided something was very wrong, rushing you to the emergency vets. They could not find anything wrong with you either, all your vitals were normal, and the scan they did, did not show anything internal either. They decided to keep you in, put you on pain killers and watch you over night. We called at 7am, and the nurse was saying how you had started to eat and drink, and while still not moving a lot, were a lot more alert. 25mins later, they called us, to tell us, you had just passed away.
I am not sure why you decided to leave us, I thought we were having so much fun and finally getting to understand each others rules. I have a huge regret that I did not get to take more pictures of you, but I knew you were only young, and Spring was just about here, so I could get some lovely shots of you outside in the sun, really enjoying your new life.
In 70 very short days, you made us fall in love with you, and become a very important part of our lives, even with your toothy flaws.
Sweet Dreams little girl, I hope your last 70 days were enough to make you love us and want to wait for us at the rainbow bridge.
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