Ferrets Mammals 
was as big as Jill and they had a royal battle, but 
Jill came out ahead. Once I put her into a hole 
in the wall of the hotbed and three rats ran for their 
lives. I got one with my shinny stick. Another 
time I put her into the wall of the barn, and she 
found a rat’s nest, chased the old rat out, ate up the 
young ones, and curled up and went to sleep in the 
nest. When I got tired of waiting for her to come 
out I cut a hole in the wall where I had heard her 
last, and there she was. Once I took her out in the 
field and put her down a gopher hole. The gopher 
did not have her safety hole dug, so Jill caught her 
by a hind leg and backed out. She had to work 
hard but she got her out. She was a surprised 
gopher. Ferrets are always ready to go into any 
kind of a hole to investigate. 
I never saw any animal sleep so soundly as a ferret. 
The first time we found Jill asleep we thought she 
was dead; she was perfectly limp, and Karl called 
us in to view the remains; but by the time we all got 
there she woke up, stretched, and seemed to ask us 
what the trouble was, anyway. 
Ferrets are easy to feed—a little bread and milk 
twice a day, with johnnycake, oatmeal, or pancakes 
for a change, and meat when convenient. We gave 
them the mice and rats and red squirrels that we 
caught, and some of ma’s weak chicks. In the spring 
we had a few small chicks in the house and no matter 
where we put them, Jack hunted them out, and they 
soon disappeared. We were more careful after that. 
They always take hold of a chicken or sparrow just 
back of a wing, and seem to kill them instantly. 
Rats and mice they bite just back of the ear. 
In April we put Jack in a separate hutch, and in 
May we heard a curious squeaking in Jill’s sleeping 
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