Fuzzy experiment # 4
Jun. 26th, 2002 11:48 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
joflasherResults - still not good. Covered them in Bitter Apples (anti-biting spray used to train puppies) and turned them loose in the kitchen. A brief fight broke out, the aftermath of which included both of them making hilarious faces as they realized just how horrible they tasted.
Midori retreated back under her towel. Tira prowled the kitchen. Eventually Midori came out and Tira pounced her. I broke them up and scruffed Tira, who bit me but not hard enough to break skin. I plucked her and scruffed her again for the bite. She hissed, bit me again and I threw her in her cage after plucking her. The first might have been an accident but the second was not.
After making over Midori for about 10 minutes, I turned Tira back out and left them in the kitchen some more. Midori hid, Tira begged to be turned loose. I eventually opened up the main door and left them in the dining/living room area. Tira went and bugged the Boy into playing with her. Midori hid. Once again, when Midori got up the courage to come out from under the towel Tira attacked her. I broke them up and in the process of scruffing Tira, she bit me three times, drawing blood on two of them.
Note, my ferrets are not permitted to bite people hard, ever. Play biting is fine but they both know what the limit is. Tira got into a load of trouble over that and ended up in her cage for another hour or so. That's how we had to train her not to bite in the first place, nothing else worked. She's deaf, so yelling is useless. Scruffing her when she's really worked up just makes her more mad because she thinks she's the top of the heap and no one should be able to scruff her. (Scruffing is one way ferrets correct one another. A lot of the fights lately have been both of them trying to get a grip on the back of the other's neck so they can drag the looser around and shake them.) I left Midori run around while Tira was locked up. They are obviously doing the dominance fighting thing but I'll be damned if I let Tira get away with trying to pull rank on me.
They seem to go through an initial fight each night and then settle down to mostly hissing at one another. Unfortunately, whenever one gets too close to the other, the fight breaks out again. Any meetings behind the litter pan or under a towel pretty much ends in a screaming, biting mess.
Oh well, not giving up hope yet. Found a diary online by one guy who was introducing 2 new ferrets to his existing 7. It took him over a month of doing exactly what I'm doing to have all of them in one cage. There is hope.
Midori retreated back under her towel. Tira prowled the kitchen. Eventually Midori came out and Tira pounced her. I broke them up and scruffed Tira, who bit me but not hard enough to break skin. I plucked her and scruffed her again for the bite. She hissed, bit me again and I threw her in her cage after plucking her. The first might have been an accident but the second was not.
After making over Midori for about 10 minutes, I turned Tira back out and left them in the kitchen some more. Midori hid, Tira begged to be turned loose. I eventually opened up the main door and left them in the dining/living room area. Tira went and bugged the Boy into playing with her. Midori hid. Once again, when Midori got up the courage to come out from under the towel Tira attacked her. I broke them up and in the process of scruffing Tira, she bit me three times, drawing blood on two of them.
Note, my ferrets are not permitted to bite people hard, ever. Play biting is fine but they both know what the limit is. Tira got into a load of trouble over that and ended up in her cage for another hour or so. That's how we had to train her not to bite in the first place, nothing else worked. She's deaf, so yelling is useless. Scruffing her when she's really worked up just makes her more mad because she thinks she's the top of the heap and no one should be able to scruff her. (Scruffing is one way ferrets correct one another. A lot of the fights lately have been both of them trying to get a grip on the back of the other's neck so they can drag the looser around and shake them.) I left Midori run around while Tira was locked up. They are obviously doing the dominance fighting thing but I'll be damned if I let Tira get away with trying to pull rank on me.
They seem to go through an initial fight each night and then settle down to mostly hissing at one another. Unfortunately, whenever one gets too close to the other, the fight breaks out again. Any meetings behind the litter pan or under a towel pretty much ends in a screaming, biting mess.
Oh well, not giving up hope yet. Found a diary online by one guy who was introducing 2 new ferrets to his existing 7. It took him over a month of doing exactly what I'm doing to have all of them in one cage. There is hope.
