Post-Crescent
By Susan Squires • Post-Crescent staff •
April
7, 2008
A visitor has arrived at the Fox Valley Ferret Shelter and the curious
inhabitants leave their nesting boxes and hammocks to investigate.
They line up shoulder to shoulder on hind legs, waiting to receive
their guest. It is their guest because all a ferret surveys is its.
The woman who shares their old town hall in rural Outagamie County
explains.
"The ferret's motto is M-I-N-E," Nanette Thurber says. "If I want
it, it's mine. If I think it's mine, it's mine. If I break it into
pieces, the pieces are mine."
They have laid claim to her, too. Some people rescue dogs. Thurber
rescues ferrets.
Today, the headcount is about 25, though that will go up as spring
and summer arrive and people grow weary of coping with creatures that
live to outsmart them. That hide shoes behind the toilet and keys under
the TV. That can move an object several times their weight and vanish
into any opening large enough to accommodate its head.
These rejects of Thurber's are a diverse group. Some are young, with
plush sable coats. They'll find homes. Others are old and tattered
and, Thurber knows, will never leave the shelter. Shia, one of her
favorites, lost the use of her back legs in an accident at a pet store.
The store delivered the unmarketable ferret to the shelter.
Last fall, Thurber was desperately ill and hospitalized. Dozens of
friends offered help, but she only trusted the shelter to ferret-savvy
tenders. Holly Larson and her husband Dale qualified. They've had up
to 11.
"Ferret savvy? Let me tell you about Tootsie," Holly begins. "We bought
a metal tin of cookies at Christmastime, the air-tight kind with the
hinged lid. We put it on the coffee table for company. One day I noticed
the lid was flopping up and down on its own. Tootsie had figured out
how to open it and was inside having a snack."
Thurber isn't 100 percent herself yet, but managing. Despite her friends'
willingness to help, she couldn't stay away from her ferrets. She walks
around the old concrete block hall in stocking feet, cleaning and picking
up, limping from her own malady and with the weight of the little animal
that's attached itself to her toe. ("They all," she says, "have foot
fetishes.")
Do they collaborate the visitor wonders?
"Oh, sure," Thurber says. "They're very social. They often go into
a depression when their cage mate dies."
No, do they work together as a unit, like a pack?
Thurber reacts in half-feigned horror.
"THAT. WOULD. NOT. BE. GOOD."
Susan Squires: 920-993-1000, ext. 368,
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