Foxglove May 20 2009

Just a few days old, they are fat and pink, silvered over with a light covering of hair. Their eyes are tightly closed, and will remain so for longer than the young of most other domestic mammals, for though they were domesticated over four thousand years ago, the ferret has a foot in each camp and retains much of its wild polecat ancestry.

I never touch baby animals until the mother is ready for me to do so, and therefore I admire these little thumb-sized creatures while they are still huddled in their nest. The mother is happy for her owner to pick up her young, but nobody else, and doing so might stress her to the point that she kills the little ones. That is a risk we would not take.

These ferrets are well-bred from good working stock, and in ten weeks or so, eyes open and bodies sturdy, will go to their new homes. All young animals bite, and a nip from these little creatures would really hurt once their milk teeth are through, though nothing like as much as a full-blown bite from an adult.

Therefore they must be taught not to bite, and that means much gentle handling right from the nesting stage. Well-handled ferrets are a must for working ferret people, because in the excitement of the hunt they might otherwise be tempted to bite the hand that feeds them.

All of my own ferrets come from this man's stock, because not only are they very good workers, they also have the best of natures: I have had generations of them and never yet one that so much as nipped.

I am not getting any new ferrets this year, though, because I have enough for my needs. This visit is pure pleasure in viewing fine stock, and countrymen such as we are never miss an opportunity to admire a good type of animal, large or small. The months will soon pass until we will be out ferreting again, as the year turns and the nights draw in.

For now, it is a time of young creatures, birds and animals repopulating themselves, long light days, and green shoots striving.

The jill ferret winds sinuously around his hands, sniffs her baby to make sure it is safe, and then stays as the hand is lowered to the floor of the brood hutch. Picking up her young one, she returns it to the nest with the others, and comes straight back to her owner, to run up his arm and sit on his cap.

Thus we drink our tea in the garden, walking around while we discuss this plant and that, followed by some hens, and with a ferret riding on top of a tweed hat.