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biting


Guest houndblair

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I have the answer to this problem, it involved the boot of a car, a sack, a bat, and a lonely counrty lane, first you take sack from boot, then proceed to ...............

 

Only joking, as the lads have said, handle as often as poss, are they in the same cage, if so try two different cages, they may be competeing for food, and it sounds like they want the food from the hand, try feeding them from different cgaes and see what happenings.

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  • 2 weeks later...

i've got 2 jills, both given to me as strays. one nipped like hell when i first got her, but it was the whole "wardance" thing, she'd just bounce around & launch herself at my calves! the other was a stray i got from the girl who found her. she was fine when she was found, then promptly had babies & went nutty. the girl was spooked, and didn't want to handle her anymore. put the 2 jills together, and i've had nothing past the occasional nip when putting their food dish in (and it's the same thing every time, so it didn't take too long to figure out how to stop her!).

when i had a bit more spare time, i used to take in biters for re-training. and i do mean biters. proper, hardcore, to-the-bone biters. i've used a few tricks, and i've not had a failure yet.

one of the most effective methods i've found so far on persistant "nippers" is spit, smack & reward. spit on your hand. if they lick it, reward them with a little bit of a treat (nothing that'll make your hands smell too much. no fresh meat! i use dry rat treats). if they bite, a good smack on the side. not to hurt them, just to make a noise & surprise them. to a ferret, that's a pretty serious warning. it's not a quick fix, it takes time & patience, but it works.

i've had a few nasty bites, but nothing to write home about, no trips to A&E! i've never had to resort to gloves with a ferret. next step is to re-train the spooked owner! that's a lot harder... with real nasty biters, a lot of the time it's the owners nervousness that causes the ferret to bite more. you have to be confident with them, or you're just asking to be bitten. no good waving your hand about trying to get hold of them, you just have to get the best grip you can first time.

i've got a few more tricks up my sleeve for real nasty buggers... but you gotta keep some secrets!

Edited by Ossie
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I had a hob kit who was fine but when he stated getting bigger he used to leap for your hand out of the door, i put a glove on and slapped him twice for it and he was fine after that.

My present hob is ok but when i was putting a collar on him once he went nuts, dropped his stink sack and sceamed like a dog had hold of him (yes unfortunately ive heard that :( ) whilst trying to get a good hold of my hand. He's not done it since but i'm wary of him coz hes a big b*****d too :o

Gnipper

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When I first got my ferrets I had a big pair of heavy working gloves and it only encouraged and taught then to bite because you couldn't feel what you were doing with the gloves on and tended to squeeze and hurt them unintentionally.

 

One day I turned up at a warren and forgot my gloves and discovered that if your gentle and don't make any sudden movements they never even try to bite you.

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