should i let my ferret run wild in the house?

by Nikki Smiz
(NJ)

SNUGGLE PUFF

SNUGGLE PUFF

OK, so I just got a new ferret, and I’ve blocked most of the room with cardboard so he doesn’t get stuck in couches or wires, but I feel bad because the only room that he can go in right now is my bedroom and his little room. Am I allowed to let him roam the house? Won’t he get stuck?


Comments for should i let my ferret run wild in the house?
Jan 19, 2015 How do I ferret proof my apt?
by: Patuky  

I live in a one bed apt and I recently got Juan, my ferret. He’s amazing and I want him to be happily roaming the apt while I’m at work. However, I’m scared to dead to come back home only to find out he’s escaped. Any advice on how to ferret proof my apt? It will be greatly appreciated!

Feb 25, 2014 Yes your pet can run around the house
by: Anonymous  

I have a two year old her name is Penny! She is the coolest thing ever! I do let her run around the house. She is litter trained in the bathroom in a corner that she seemed to pick her self. I keep her cage open all day, she goes in there when she want something to eat or drink or even if she is ready to climb in her hammock and sleep. All you have to do is take time to work with her! They are amazing pets!
Feb 18, 2012 bertie
by: Bex  

Bertie our male ferret runs loose all the time it can be amazing or heart stopping as he wants to spend night time playing with my feet and toes which does bug me a little, well OK, a lot. I do wish he would learn to sleep at night same as we do.
I mean to say I can handle the kisses but when she starts to attack my feet to tell me it’s play time, well what can I say !!!!!!!
Dec 14, 2011 Snuggle Puff
by: Anonymous  

Oh your boy is one handsome fellow! Such a cutie pie 🙂

Nikki – my 5 are free roam around the house and nothing has happened to them. My husband made sure that he ferret proofed our home really way. They can’t get behind the fridge (we have 3 bricks stacked up which they can’t push down), there’s no way behind the stove and nothing dangerous in the laundry. We’ve made sure they can’t get up onto the window ledges to scratch at the flywire to get out. And, like the person before me said, all our guys have collars and bells so that if they are sleeping somewhere weird, I just squeak the squeaky toy and then I hear the bell as they wake up to come to me.

The only time our ferrets went walkabout is when our kids lived at home, as they weren’t very aware of what was down by their feet when they &/or their friends came in and out of the house. Now that they’ve all moved out, no more missing ferrets! Phew! Oh, BTW, we got all our ferrets back, thank goodness 🙂

I much prefer to have free roam ferrets rather than putting them in a cage. They wander around whenever they want to and come and see me to say hi. Just love it when they do that 😀

If you’re sharing your place then it might not be as easy to have Snuggle Puff roaming around the place because your roomy/ies might be as careless going in and out as our kids were.

However if you’re living on your own, make sure your house is ferret proofed (imagine the unimaginable and then check and recheck again ;)), get him a collar and a bell, a squeaky toy, and enjoy having Snuggle Puff as part of the family!
Dec 12, 2011 Let him roam (:
by: Anonymous  

You can definitely let him roam the house. Make sure you get a collar with a bell on it before you let him roam free (MUST HAVE), and make sure you still follow him around too. Not intensively, but just so if he goes somewhere not-so-good or gets stuck, you can help him. If there are any rooms that he shouldn’t be in (ex: bathroom, laundry room, or some room with delicate things), just keep those doors shut. He’ll be fine otherwise 🙂
Dec 11, 2011 Ferret’s domain
by: Anonymous  

You may lose him if you do that. My first ferret was allowed to run the house. He had too much room, and spend all his time gathering things. The front door was not totally shut and he opened it and ran away. It was a terrible time for us, looking for him.

I have two ferrets now, they stay in one room. They are happy with that most of the time. Of course they want to run throughout the house. Wanting is not getting though. I love them too much to lose them.

12 thoughts on “should i let my ferret run wild in the house?”

  1. i just got two girl ferrets and I want to make sure it’s ok I let them roam around at night

  2. Hey Tiffany
    I would suggest you not letting your girls roam around at night until they are used to your place, and you are used to them 🙂
    Have you completely ferret proofed your place? Ferrets can get into teensy tiny holes, drains or pipes, plus they might think it fun to come and wake you at 2am by running over your head!
    I would suggest you watch them while they’re roaming around your place to make sure they don’t find any tiny holes, etc, to get into and after a week or two, when they both feel totally at home, then you can think about letting them roam 24/7.
    If you don’t want to have them in a cage all night, then maybe you could just keep them shut in the bathroom? Make sure they don’t fall into the toilet or remove the drain grid in the shower or bath!
    Hope that’s been of some help 🙂
    Hugs to your girls from their new buddies down under.
    Cheers
    ~Nona

  3. I once had a ferret who stayed in my room and I played with her very often because she was alone. Just recently I got two ferrets, actually brother (Yoshi) and sister (Nala), and I made a empty room into a ferret play room with toys, tubes, litter, etc. I was wondering if during the day when I’m gone, I could just leave the cage door open. Thanks

  4. Hi Mary
    I would suggest you make sure your room is absolutely ferret proofed – check there are no little holes or openings where Yoshi and Nala could squeeze through and get out – and then you’d feel confident that when you’re gone, your babies are safe playing in the room!
    I think they’d have a ball playing in the room rather than being shut in their cage 😛
    Hugs to your dynamic duo from my duo down under!
    Cheers
    ~Nona

  5. I have 2 ferrets names Mj and Bear and i let them run around whenever i am home to watch them! But bear always bites my shoes and anything else she sees! I want them to roam free but i don’t know how to get her to stop chewing on everything in sight!! What are some tips to let them run free without eating something wood, fabric or rubber lol! I thought about getting like a fence I can make a little play pen circle so they can run even when I’m not home but itd prob be so small they probably won’t have any fun!

  6. Hi Selene
    It is difficult when a ferret is obsessed about chewing everything in sight!
    I can only suggest that if you do want them to run around your place and stay safe, put everything which might cause danger to Bear out of reach 😀
    Certainly when I got my first group of ferrets 23 years ago, I didn’t have any house plants in any rooms as I knew the mess they would make. They also loved digging out my husband’s insoles so his shoes were put up high.
    I also made sure our teenagers’ kept their doors shut as they had desks in their rooms as I was worried that a couple of my pen-crazy ferrets would be happy to steal and chew the rubber off some of those pens 😮
    For the most part, despite having inattentive teenagers wandering in and out of the house, we had no dramas with our ferrets – thank goodness! 😀
    Do you think you can do that with your babies? Make sure that anything you see Bear chewing on, which could cause a problem, is put out of reach? Or, I suppose you could try putting Bitter Lemon on thing items Bear loves to chew to see if that would deter her from chewing?
    If she likes chewing on wires, you can get an idea on how to fix that on this site …

    http://www.instructables.com/id/How-To-Stop-Rabbitsanimals-Chewing-Cords/

    And there are more ideas and products on keeping your ferret from chewing on power cords in Amazon …

    https://www.amazon.com/Cord-Protector-CritterCord-Protect-Hazardous/dp/B000EH2I5O

    I hope I’ve given you some ideas on how to keep Bear as safe as possible, as well as MJ, of course 😀
    Wishing you good luck and I hope everything goes well – just be hyper-vigilant and paranoid. That should help keep your babies safe! LOL!
    Hugs to both Bear and MJ from their new buddies down under!
    Cheers
    ~Nona

  7. Hey.

    I would like to know if you can let your ferret be free 24/7. So like having a cat or a dog, it has its bed it has its food and water bowl and it has its litter box. I do understand that it would be a lot of ferret proving , but I would just like to know if it is possible to have a ferret without having ti own a cage.

  8. Hi Tanita
    My ferrets have always been free-roam (25 years and counting ?) but confess that we would always seem to be missing a ferret when our kids lived at home as teenagers. They wouldn’t look down when leaving the house so it was easy for a ferret to sneak out with them. Then there would be days of total stress when I had to do all the things to find them again! That was not fun!
    However since the kids grew up and moved out, I haven’t had a lost ferret – thank God!
    That is something for you to think of if you have free-roam ferrets! Are you the only one in the house or do you share it with family or friends. If you do then you’d have to make sure everyone looks down when they go out the front or back doors, and don’t leave windows open, etc.
    Another thing to think about is ferret proofing. You MUST make sure there is no little hole which a ferret could squeeze into and give you heart attacks!! ?
    You’ll have to be super alert when stacking the dishwasher and washing machine that your ferret is nowhere around for an accident to happen! This is especially true if you’re sharing your house/flat. Other people would have to make sure they don’t accidentally leave the dishwasher door open so that your ferret can sneak in and not come out alive! HORRIBLE thought! ?
    Please read my page on ferret proofing to acquaint yourself with all the dangers around the house …

    https://www.all-about-ferrets.com/ferret-proofing.html

    … and also check out some of the awful stories about people who lost their ferret in dishwashers ?

    https://www.all-about-ferrets.com/please-be-careful-of-your-ferret-with-the-dishwasher.html
    https://www.all-about-ferrets.com/killed-my-ferret-in-the-dishwasher.html
    https://www.all-about-ferrets.com/beware-of-the-dishwasher.html

    Horrible stories, aren’t they ?‍♀️
    And also take a look at the Lost Ferret page, just to see how easy it is for some ferrets to go walkabout!

    https://www.all-about-ferrets.com/lost-ferret.html

    I think free-roam ferrets are great and I love having my guys wandering around and coming up to say hi when they wake up (they sleep either in our bed, my chest of drawers or in the sofa) but do be paranoid about the fact that they can get into all kinds of mischief and make sure that doesn’t happen!
    Cheers
    ~Nona

  9. I have a ferret named Rosie and i am terrified to let her run loose but she is so adventurous it is so hard not to maybe she wont keep me up at night and also i have a question what do you do when your ferret is scratching at their cage to get them to stop so you can sleep haha!!!!

  10. Hi there
    If you want your ferret to free roam in your place, it’d be a good idea to put a collar with a bell on Rosie so that you know where she is! The thing is you mustn’t get complacent as ferrets can slip out of collars and get into trouble! Of course if you do that, she might keep you up all night with the tinkling of the bell while she scratches to get out of the cage ?
    Since my guys were all free roam, I’m not sure what you can do about stopping the scratching. Perhaps putting a cover over the cage? Sorry I can’t be of more help ?
    Hugs to Rosie from her two new fur friends down under ❤️
    Cheers
    ~Nona

  11. Hi! I recently got my little guy ted and I’m looking for ways to extend free roam time for him. Currently I live with others and we already have a cat so access to the whole house is just not possible. I would however like to give him access to my bedroom (where his cage is) throughout the day with one of the cage doors open so he can go in and out as he pleases. Do I need to supervise him or (with sufficient ferret proofing!) is he okay to be left without me being in the room? I work from home so I will be in the study only next door – I would love to give him access to this but there are just too many hazards! Thanks in advance 🙂

  12. Hi there!
    As long as you put your paranoid hat on and make sure that your bedroom is 110% ferret-proofed, then I think it’d be fine to let your little guy roam around there! But please be aware of things like open windows as ferrets can jump and shimmy up curtains to fling themselves out of windows! Never think, “Oh he’d never be able to get up there!” as you can bet your last dollar that he’d find a way ?
    Do you have carpet in your bedroom? I’ve found that ferrets will scratch at a closed door and could tear the carpet to get down to the concrete floor so you’d have to think about protecting that area. There are some super strong plastic floor protectors which would be good to put down in front of your door, as long as you could open your door without a problem, so do think about that to protect the carpet.
    Don’t forget to put down puppy pads or free newspapers in the corners so that there won’t be any little “accidents” to soil the floor ?
    Hope that’s been of some help!
    Hugs to your little guy from his new buddy down under ❤
    Cheers
    ~Nona

Leave a Comment