my ferrets are as dosile as anything, merely used the mustard once or twice and soon got the message, im not taking away from the fact that handling is the best way to climatise ferrets to yourself, its a case of prevention rather than cure. i agree nose flicking would only make things worse and i've seen people's whos ferrets are scared to get picked up, making it time consuming and annoying when they wanted to get the ferret out, they just darted back down when they saw them.
It ends up becoming a vicious circle , the ferrets bite, the handler is reluctent to handle because of the bit