Sixx, Creature and Dark: Ferrets Determined to Stay. Sixx,
Creature and Dark came to me shortly before I admitted to myself that I was a ferret shelter. At the time, I saw myself as a ferret lover who was willing to "help out" the local humane society by fostering "their"
ferrets and helping to find them new homes. Sixx, Creature and Dark where ferrets who had been brought to the humane society by a person who said he had "rescued" them from a home where they had not received
enough attention. He explained that during the warm weather, he had kept them on his porch, but with winter coming he could no longer do that, and he had not intended to keep them in any case. The humane
association asked if I "had room". All three ferrets were healthy, although Sixx and Dark were underweight. Dark is just that, an incredibly dark chocolate male. He his face is nearly solid dark
brown, with just the smallest touch of white on the cheeks. Creature is huge and dark with a beautiful golden undercoat and wonderful spots on his nose. Sixx was one of the largest males I have ever had, a
soft medium sable. Although I wasn't thrilled with the "theme" running through their names, they knew and responded to them, so I didn't think it was right of me to change them, although Creature slowly became
known as "Creech" and responds to that as well as his "full" name. By the time the three of them had been with me a few months, I was forced to admit that I was actually a shelter, and that if someone wanted to
adopt these guys, hard as that would be, it was for the best as my numbers continued to rise. Sixx and Creature were adopted a few months later, and I had to admit I missed them more than I have missed any other
ferrets I have ever placed. They must have missed me too, because not more than two months later the new owners, who said that they were just too naughty, brought them back. I have to confess, I was
happy to have them back. Dark seemed happy to have them back too, although even before they left he had worked his way into another social group, bonding with the older ferrets who slept more and didn't play as hard
as Creature and Sixx. Life went back to "normal", such as that is at a ferret shelter. I started using Sixx as an education ferret, partially because his size was so impressive, and partially because of his
willingness to give "weasel kisses" to almost anyone who asked. Sixx took to this new role as if he had been born to it, slowly replacing my original education ferrets, who were getting old. This took Sixx
off my "adoptables" list-he now had a "legitimate" reason for staying at the shelter. Dark also became non-adoptable, due to insulimona. Creature, however, remained on the adoptables list and was again placed
into a household to be a friend to another male ferret, approximately the same age and size. Once again, Creature was gone for awhile and reports from his new home were positive. Then, I got a call that
Creature was loosing the hair on his tail, loosing weight, and did not seem happy. The new owner apologized, but felt that it would be best to bring Creature back and see if a different ferret would be a better
match. I agreed, and although none of the adoptables I had at the time was a good match, a ferret who arrived a bit later provided the perfect friend for that family's ferret. In the meantime, Creature
re-grew the hair on his tail, put his weight back on, and became the huge beautiful fluff ball he was before he left. The message was clear-he wanted to stay here too. Creature and Dark are still
with me and although Dark is winding down, Creature is going strong. Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for Sixx. One day in Sept of 2001, I noticed that Sixx was
dragging his hind legs. Knowing Sixx and his fearless cage climbing, my immediate fear was that he had fallen from the top of one of the cages and broken his back. A trip to the vet and x-rays showed that
this was not the case, instead, a tumor was putting pressure on his spine. In the x-ray, it looked as if the tumor should be fairly easy to remove, but once he was opened, it was found to be inoperable.
Because the vet had been unable to reach me by phone for permission to euthanize on the table, Sixx came home to recover as much as possible and live out his remaining days. Sixx did not seem particularly
bothered by the fact that he could not use his hind legs, in fact, he still saw himself as one of the dominant boys-and the other ferrets continued to treat him that way. However, Sixx did not appreciate the fact
that I had to manually express his bladder for him every few hours. About a month after his surgery, Sixx stopped giving kisses. He seemed to be telling me that life had just become too hard this way.
By that time, it was also obvious that he was not going to regain any meaningful function in his hind legs, and I had come to terms with the fact that there was nothing more I could do for him. He was euthanized
on November 5, 2001.
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