Hershey the Kid
by Todd Leuthold
Hershey really isn’t a kid. He’s most-likely about 3 to 31⁄2 years old. However, he still acts like a kid.
Hershey is a light-brown sable. He is a rescue from the streets of Philadelphia. A nice lady from that area told me that her daughter found him hiding under a van, looking scared. The people in the van offered a crinkle sack to put him in, once she had gotten him to come out from under the van. It was obvious that someone had decided to dump him there, probably because he was quite boisterous and a bit nippy (as baby ferrets tend to be).
When he was offered on the FML as needing a home, the Fuzzbutt Rodeo Clowns decided that he needed to come stay with us. I met the nice lady and took possession of one of the most intelligent, cute and funny little ferrets!
Hershey is a nut-case. When let out to play, he waits for me to pick him up from his cage (from which he’s perfectly capable of climbing down from) and get set on the floor. He then races off at high speed, just because he’s happy to be free from his cage. After a few seconds, he’s back, jumping up and grabbing one of my legs, then flying backwards and immediately going into a raucous war dance!
Of course, he does this while I’m trying to clean out his cage, so I have to stop, get down on the floor and wrestle with him for a few minutes. Since he gets out with Fuzzer and Add-A-Kiss, there’s always the danger that Fuzzer will use this distraction to jump over to Hershey’s cage and do the “scratch ‘n sniff” test on the waste litter bucket. If I don’t get him fast enough, the bucket gets tipped over and I’ve got another mess to clean up! I don’t have any proof, but I think this is part of Hershey’s plan!
After playing with him for a few minutes, I get back to cleaning out his
cage. During this process, he eventually jumps back up to his cage, races
inside and checks out the clean newspaper, scooped litter and refilled water
bottle. He then races at full speed back out of the cage, onto the chair,
onto the floor and off into a mad search for Add-A-Kiss, who is madly searching
for a hiding place before Hershey finds her!
Hershey is the Omega ferret in his play group, though he is easily strong
enough to take over the Alpha position. He is the last to come up and beg
for a snack, waiting patiently for Fuzzer and Add-A-Kiss to get theirs.
He is a sneak-thief, though, and will think nothing of racing by and stealing
a snack out of the mouth of one of his playmates!
Hershey plays at being shy, but when he’s wound up, anything is fair game, especially the cat! He is famous for waiting on the luv seat for the cat to wander by, then jumping on his back and riding him like a rodeo stallion. The cat screams in agony and fear, yet he’s been walking past the couch the exact same way since Hershey has lived here. I can only assume that the cat is cooperating in this game!
There are often times when I’m handing out snacks and Hershey is just having too much fun playing. He’ll race over for a snack, but he is so wound up that he just can’t take the time to get his snack. He races off, dashes under furniture, slides out into the kitchen, races over to the playground, flies through a mailing tube, accelerates up the stairs to smack into the Plexiglas barrier up there. He then tumble-runs down the stairs, across the back of the luv seat, leaps over to the recliner and shoots halfway up the side of the kid’s cage. He then hangs there, looking at me as though asking, “Hey! Why isn’t anyone else playing?” I just shake my head and go back to what I was doing.
Hershey is also one of the smartest ferrets I’ve ever seen. He can figure out barriers better than any other animal I’ve known, he knows the difference between me giving him a snack because I’m just giving it to him, or if I’m trying to lure him out from hiding so I can put him to bed! I have a sneaky suspicion that he can read clocks, but I need further scientific testing to determine if this is true. Anyone got a scientific test kit I can borrow?
I can also use Hershey for another job, which he seems to understand and which he performs very well. If one of the youngsters from the kid’s bunch (the play group just before Hershey’s play group) is hiding somewhere and I can’t find them, I let just Hershey out. He seems to know just what I need him to do and immediately scoots off, sniffing and checking all of the hidey holes throughout the house. Within just a few minutes, he will find any wayward ferts and convince them to either break cover, or slink off to a hidey hole where I can find them. I just sit down and wait, and sooner or later, I either see a half-asleep fert, or I see Hershey come out and stare are me, meaning that the offending flumpy has been successfully chased into one of the standard hidey holes.
All I have to do at that point, is go get the fuzzy-bunch and put them in their cage, then I can let out the rest of the fur-kids to play their little hearts out. Hershey always gets a special reward for his work, too. He comes over and stands on my foot until I pick him up and give him either some Toob Snax, or some FerretVite. He then squirms until I let him down and he goes about his normal routine of ricocheting off furniture and skidding across the kitchen floor.
Hershey and Fuzzer also like to play-fight, with Hershey always being respectful during the whole thing. If Hershey starts getting the best of Fuzzer, he stops fighting so hard and let’s Fuzzer get the upper hand. He does this more often with Add-A-Kiss, though, since she’s just a tiny little thing. Add-A-Kiss and probably smack the look of the cat’s face, if she has a mind to, but Hershey is about twice her size and can maneuver just as well as she can. Therefore, he “accidentally” gets the upper-paw on her and has to ease up so she can start winning again.
Hershey also has one of the best “hit rates” off all of the ferrets that have lived here, as far as the litter box is concerned. He will even back into his litter box in his cage if I open it and he isn’t sure if he has to go or not before he starts playing! In fact, its because of this tendency to use the litter box every time he has to go, that allows me to catch him at bedtime occasionally! I just wait by his favorite litter box for him to show up and grab him when he’s done. Just like catching ferts in a box!
Hershey is also the one that learned that he can open the magnetically-sealed
doors to the VCR, by pushing on them in a certain way! He watched me open
the doors, tried it himself when I walked away, and has always remembered
that!
He also knows that I occasionally forget to close the side door into the
kid’s cage. It is one of his “checkpoints” when he first
gets out. Every so often, I’ll hear him squealing as he is suddenly
attacked by three young fuzz-buttons that he woke up as he snuck into their
cage. Both Bump and Chewy are almost as large as Hershey, and Rhun thinks
she’s China O’Brien (or whoever that wrestling woman is) and
can take on just about anything. Of course that doesn’t stop Hershey
from continuing to go back there every chance he gets!
I’m very glad that I decided to give Hershey a home here. He has been very sensitive to my feelings when another fluffy-fuzz has passed on and I’m feeling very sad and depressed. He seems to make it a point to come up and give me kisses (he never does that unless I’m holding him and he wants down) and plays very gently with me.
He shares a cage with Stuffy, my old geezer who seems to be on his last legs. When Stuffy cools down too much, Hershey goes over and lays on him to warm him back up. When he is out playing, if Stuffy decides to stay in the cage and sleep, Hershey will go back in every once in a while and check up on him, laying down nose-to-nose with Stuffy just to let the guy know that he’s thinking about him.
Hershey must have some extra brain capacity in him somewhere. He knows how to make others (human and fuzzy-nose) feel better. He figures out obstacles faster than a toddler and plays his heart out just to show how happy he is. If a three-year-old ferret is considered to be geriatric, then Hershey has found the fountain of ferret youth! What a wonderful addition he has been to the Fuzzbutt Rodeo Clowns!
Todd and the Fuzzbutt Rodeo Clowns