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Hawaii has California beat, but otherwise that's exactly right. Gerbils and ferrets would be very successful in California, and threaten our native small mammal population through competition and predation, respectively.

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Thanks!
Well, you learn something new everyday....

You don't really think about it living in northern areas since most anything brought from other states or countries would not survive our winters. California has a very mild climate(definitely no -20F winter days) and most animals that either escape or are purposely turned loose by people can often not only survive but multiply.

Ferrets are illegal because if they escape they could wreak havoc on our fragile ecosystems

- Haha..i can imagine this..i dont have any ferrets/polecats yet but will be getting some soon, however someone i know has then, and they litterally "wreak havoc" wherever they go, they are the terror twins! If you show them a crate of eggs when they are in their cages, then let them out to them, that is wreaking havoc!

Thats so not true.

The ferrets that are in pet stores have been so heavily domesticated that if they were to escape they wouldn't last more than a few days, or a few weeks at most. Also, all the ferrets that are for sale in petco etc are actually descented and nutered so they wouldn't even have a chance to breed.

The whole "destroying fragile ecosystems" is baloney. Especially here in the USA. There are breeders but they are few and far between.

destroy shoes yes, destroy ecosystems no.

Some people do have ferrets in California, but I believe they are ones people bring from other places, and no breeders.

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House cats have been domesticated for over 7,000 years and dogs for over 20,000, and neither of these species have trouble establishing feral populations away from human settlements. I doubt a Mustelid that has been "domesticated" for less than 150 years would have any problem establishing feral populations in the right habitat if given the opportunity. But that issue aside, pet ferrets are also known potential carriers of epizootic catarrhal enteritis]http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?db=pubmed&cmd=Retrieve&dopt=AbstractPlus&list_uids=10953717&query_hl=8&itool=pubmed_docsum[/link] and [link=Aleutian Disease, among other illnesses.

Sure, there's a chance that ferrets could be legalized and nothing bad will come of it, but there's also a very real risk that something will go wrong as well. We already have enough problems caused by feral cats over here, and I think I side with most other environmentally-conscious Californians when I say that this is a risk I don't want to take.

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I'm not your neighbor, you Bakersfield trash.

Thats fine, but ferrets in general are solitary creatures, and although can live together (which mine do).

Combined (with once again) the majority of the ferret population in society (aside from breeders) are spayed/neutered - which prevents them from breeding anyway. the reason behind this is that once female ferrets go into heat, unless they are mated to they can develop a fatal form of anemia, and die. Male ferrets that are intact just plain stink..

My animals have no predatory instincts whatsoever. They get VERY bored very easily even with balls, toys etc. I know of some people that feed ferrets live foods, but its more of a minority than general population. They are obligate carnivores, meaning their digestive systems cannot handle vegetation on a regular basis. It goes right through them.

ECE is a controllable disease, I've had one ferret that had it, and with proper care and IV fluids she recovered and never had a bout with it again. It is nowhere near as bad as what it is made out to be.

Oh, ferrets have been domesticated for 2000 years, so the 150 years thing is a joke. They've been used in England alone since the 1200s for hunting rabbits (which, that practice is illegal here in the USA).

Quote : (from : http://www.cypresskeep.com/Ferretfiles/Domestic-FUSA.htm )

"The Greek Influence

The Greek playwright Aristophanes mentions ferrets in his comedy The Acheans, which was written about 450 B.C. Aristotle also wrote about ferrets in the Historia Animalium in about 320 B.C. However, debate about whether or not the word "ferrets" was correctly translated from the Greek make these references suspect. Later, Greek writings by Strabo (about 20 A.D.), in his book Geographica, seem to definitely describe the ferret. Strabo, a Greek historian and geographer, describes an albino, ferretlike animal that was bred in captivity and used to hunt rabbits. The people who utilized these ferrets were not Greek; they lived in the southern Mediterranean countries (which are present-day Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia and Libya)."


As I said, having ferrets, and being around alot of ferret owners (some owning 14-15), I find it a joke to read uninformed 'facts' about them. Which, there are alot. Each year there is a petition to allow them in CA, but each time it gets rejected. Why? Because of the amount of uninformed people out there that are scared.

Oh, did you know that rabies is far less common in ferrets than it is in dogs and cats? Even if an unvaccinated ferret is bitten (which is rare since 95% of the population is kept indoors) the chances of it developing rabies is rare. The only reason why mine are vaccinated is if someone said that my guys bit them (which they're lovers not biters) I can prove they've got up to date vaccinations.

I'm sensitive about the subject of ferrets. They're intelligent creatures that are sorely misunderstood.

More information : http://www.cypresskeep.com/Ferretfiles/Legal1-FM.htm

Forgetting all of the disease/inless issues, are you telling me that if i bought a ferret from petco it wouldnt eat live birds or root birds eggs out, because they have been domesticated?
I feel that if a fair few ferrets escaped (lets just say one importation box gets opened somehow and 20 ferrets escape) they could easily survive in the wild, maybe not for as long as a ferret that has not been de-scented (which i am against) but what exactly would stop these ferrets wreaking havoc in california? The only things that i can think of are Coyotoes, Racoons and foxes, if they can catch the ferret and actually take it on..
I believe they would phsyically wreak havoc on an eco-system like in california, like natalie says a lot of the species only recide in california, so once they are gone, thats pretty much it.
Would you really risk it for such a precious eco-system?
I know i wouldnt.
James

I've known ferrets to escape, but usually their curiosity gets the better of them and they go toward danger than away from it.

One of my guys would go up to BIG dogs and want to play. Survival insticts would tell them to stay away.

As I said, unless you've kept them, you can't really understand why I say that there is no risk. My friend has had a ferret escape and she found it dead a couple of days later.

Besides, what makes California different to any other state in the USA? They're all connected (aside from hawaii and alaska) so really having a ban in California is useless anyway since they're already in the state. There's animals that are endemic to other states too that need just as much protection.

The black footed ferret comes to mind there. It was thought to be extinct until a ranchers dog snagged a body. So researches pulled them all from the wild (thought to be about 40 animals) and started breeding them in captivity. This is a cousin to the ferrets, but they cannot interbreed.

As for descenting, there's reasons behind it. I've been around intact ferrets and they smell like skunks do. Seen scent glands get impacted which threatened a ferrets life so they had to get removed. Female ferrets once again can die if they go into heat and can't be mated. Hobs just stink, and they can develop diseases too.

But back to the survival instincts - there is none. My guys have been outside, they dig in the ground, but because their curiosity gets the better of them they would likely get themselves killed before they could even start to hunt (if they knew how).

As I said there are some people that feed their guys live food, solely because of the protein value and they believe that the instances of insulinoma drop because there's no sugars in the food. But, at the same time, people have watched their ferrets and most that do feed live food have to kill the food for the ferrets since they have no desire to kill the animal.

But once again, how can an animal that has been SPAYED/NEUTERED be real threat to an ecosystem. Even if 20 of them did escape and did make it to breeding age (which I highly doubt) how on earth could they breed? As for the comment about which predators could catch them if they could - ferrets are curious, they would go up to the animal to check them out - and meet their demise.

Besides, ferrets generally aren't bought on a whim, if they are it is done when they are kits, and by that point they become overwhelmed as veterinary costs are higher than that of a cat or a dog ($250 for vaccinations anyone - for one ferret?). And the animals are put into shelters that specialise in ferrets.

95% of the people out there that have ferrets keep them exclusively indoors (like mine) and love them too much to even think about releasing them.

As I said, its hard to judge ferrets and assume with them unless you've kept them. People think they're mean vicious biters, and they are not. Heck, mine sleep 20 hours a day.

Like i said i dont keep them but have experience with them and daily encounters with ferrets (and pole cats).
Well, im not sure about in america, but these were bought as babies from Pets At Home (like a uk petsmart) and now the bigger two go rabbiting frst thing in the morning with the pole cats.
As for:

But once again, how can an animal that has been SPAYED/NEUTERED be real threat to an ecosystem. Even if 20 of them did escape and did make it to breeding age (which I highly doubt) how on earth could they breed? As for the comment about which predators could catch them if they could - ferrets are curious, they would go up to the animal to check them out - and meet their demise.

- Im not saying they would breed, im saying if they did escape they could raid one bird nest for each 5 ferrets, and if the bird is an endangered species that could indeed be very harmful. of course, a birds nest is just an example.
As for the ferrets being curious, yes i know they are, but thy're not soft either!
Again, what predators would they meet their demise to apart from the common dog or the others i mentioned?

Yeah , ferrets are a huge threat to groundnesting birds, here in the Uk there have been several instances of ferrets causing complete localised extinctions in species of ground nesting birds.

Ferrets are right up there with dogs cats rats and goats as major extinction causing species. The species losses down to these five species are massive, some truly unique island environments have been lost to them. An individual ferret is capable in its lifetime of ingesting some 10,000 eggs, and whether they are spayed or not is down to owner responsibility. Id not entrust the fate of local fauna to a "trust issue" , especially not as pet owners are concerned. Its too important.

We have polecats that are native in the uk, but even then, if ferrets are introduced into areas where they do not usually occur thanks to human intervention, they can do enormous damage. We get a lot of problems with introduced mink and martens too. Our rare herpetological species suffer too.

I used to be out there dealing with this issue as part of my work. Ferrets can be, and are , devastating to environments from which they do not originate.Their impact should never be underestimated.