BREEDING. 65 



removing the mother and nest box, straw should 

 be placed to a depth of two or three inches in the 

 pen. Here, the mother, as already stated, will 

 make a nice nest. Wheat straw isi the only kind 

 that should be used. 



Nature does wonders. A big litter will usu- 

 ally open their eyes in four weeks while a small 

 one may not until they are six weeks old. Why? 

 Because the mother is not able to supply the 

 large litter with nourishment and in the wild 

 condition they must hustle for themselves, which 

 is impossible until they can see. The box is 

 taken away after the young are big enough to 

 run around. Young ferrets are carried by the 

 old one in the same manner that a cat carries 

 kittens, by the nape of the neck, if she wishes to 

 remove them. 



First litters, where rightly handled, gen- 

 erally run 7, 8 and 9, whereas the second are apt 

 to be only 3, 4 and 5. Sometimes a third litter 

 has been produced within a year. 



While ferrets live to be six or eight years of 

 age and maybe longer, yet they are a short lived 

 animal. The best success in breeding is with 

 yearlings. If two-year-olds are bred the per cent 

 of deaths will be greater than with the yearlings. 

 A successful breeder said that if he kept two 

 hundred females for breeders, one hundred one 



