Wherever it is possible I firmly believe that wild animals should be rehabilitated to the wild, but unfortunately this can’t always be done and we should try to make their incarceration as stress free as possible. The following case history involves an animal that couldn’t be released back into the wild.
Jasmine was stolen from the wild as a kit and spent the next two years locked in a tiny three foot by two cage to be used for breeding purposes. When she came to my attention I managed to persuade the person that had her to pass her across to my care, along with her six month old daughter and the hob (male) that she had been mated with. In those two years she had never been handled and food had merely been thrown into the cage with her. The only thing that can be said in benefit of her treatment was the fact that she had been fed whole carcasses (rabbit, squirrel, birds) and therefore had good physical health, though she certainly wasn’t sound mentally.
Prior to taking in Jasmine and her family, I already had domestic ferrets that shared my home. I always like to know about the wild equivalent of an animal so that I can care for the species appropriately, I was therefore familiar with what would have been Jasmine’s diet and behaviour in the wild. Ferrets have a very low boredom threshold and Jasmine was no different. It is important to give them as much variety and stimulation as possible if you are to keep them healthy. I try to do this by alternating them between a room of their own within my house, the run of most of the house once or twice a day for a couple of hours, plus going into an outside run with shed attached for part of each day when it isn’t lashing down with rain.
The problems with Jasmine were most pronounced when it came to moving her between the different places. Obviously at first she was terrified of me as she had received very little contact in those first two years, but slowly she came round and was happy with my presence. The difficult time in dealing with her was when I wanted to move her out of her room and into the rest of the house or when transferring her to the outside run. Jasmine always had to be in charge of any situation and have her escape routes firmly mapped out. She seemed to be forever locked in that moment when she was stolen from the wild. When I entered the ferret’s room she would be up like a shot and dashing for a place where she was in control and there was no chance of me getting hold of her. She would run behind the cages and cling to them for security. I might be there for ten minutes trying to get her to leave the room and head into the living room for playtime. Eventually she would make a dash through the door and then would cling near to the furniture until she was sure that everything was safe and playtime could begin. When she went into the outside run, coming in time would be a nightmare for me as I am always extremely busy and had little time to spare; Jasmine would desperately want to come back in but would be too scared to enter the cat carrier again. She would stand at the door to the carrier, ever ready for flight and trying to pick up the courage to enter and head back to dinner and her room; sometimes it would be an hour before I managed to coax her into the carrier. She loved each aspect of her life: ferret room, main house and outside run, but the movement between them was a massive stumbling block for her. Ferrets are extremely inquisitive animals that always want to be involved in whatever you are up to and Jasmine was no different to her domestic relatives: she desperately wanted to come and investigate both me and whatever I was doing, but fear always held her back.
When I first gave her a home I didn’t have the knowledge of homeopathy to help her, but as soon as I felt capable, I worked her case and repped her symptoms using the following rubrics:
MIND - COMPANY - desire for
MIND - BITING etc... (combined rubric)
MIND - TOUCHED - aversion to be
MIND - ATTACK others, desire to
MIND - DELUSIONS - danger, impression of
MIND - CLINGING - persons or furniture; to
MIND - FEAR - door - closed; lest the door should be
MIND - FEAR - narrow place, in
MIND - FEAR - strangers, of
MIND - FEAR - attacked; fear of being
MIND - PLAYFUL
SKIN - ITCHING
I only had one physical symptom: the itching. Ferrets have the ITCH big style and Jasmine also had it but to a much lesser degree. I always find it difficult to find the best mental rubrics for animals but I felt that the above best described her interaction with me and with other ferrets that she had come into contact with.
The remedies that came up were: Stram, lach, ign, lyc, bufo, plb, tarent, calc, puls, acon.
I read up on the remedies and decided to give the Stramonium. I initially gave her a 30c potency in medicinal solution with a small amount dropped onto her nose. This did have some effect and she became a bit bolder and started to try and interact with me more, plus she became much more playful, but we still had the fear there. I tried her with more doses of the 30c but that didn’t move her forward. As all her symptoms were on a mental level, and on a physical level she seemed very fit, I decided to try a dose of Stram in 200c; this was administered again on the nose.
The transformation was wonderful, her fear disappeared and she became much easier to deal with. When I entered her room she no longer ran for cover but stayed dozing in her bed, even allowing me to pick her up and move her from her room while she was still coming round from sleep. Ferrets can sleep for England and so it seems can wild Polecats! If she was awake before I entered the room she would be waiting at the door and would trot straight out as soon as I opened it. When it came time for her to go back into her room she would trot straight back in. She would happily go into the cat carrier to be moved outside to the run and at coming in time she would be waiting at the bottom of the run watching for my arrival; as soon as she spotted me she would hurtle down the run, into the shed and into her cat carrier. Her true personality had shown through, rather than the one led by fear.
Ferrets adore anything that makes a noise and especially love carrier bags and large black plastic bin liner bags. Jasmine also adores them. If I hold open a bin liner she will run into it and let me pick the bag up and rattle it gently. She is like a child at a fun fair: in seventh heaven.
There have been some downsides to her boldness and desire for more contact. Jasmine has a very good inbuilt clock and likes to do things on time; she is also very impatient. Unfortunately I am not as good a time keeper as she is, and when I am late she hurls herself at my ankles and gives them a good savaging. It isn’t too bad in the winter when I am wearing long trousers, but come the summer and bare ankles I can frequently be heard shouting ‘Jasmine! Stop that!’ while dancing a jig!
