| | The Forum in the Fort logo by Sue Burda. Tshirts are available! | |
| | | Friday evening we met at the hotel bar. | |
| | | By the end of the evening, we had made new friends. | |
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| | Room setup on Saturday morning. | |
| | | We had vendors with great products! | |
| | | Paul Marinari told us about the BFF program | |
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| | The visit to the Black-footed ferret facility on Sunday was a unique experience. | |
| | | Paul and Travis Livieri let us in through the locked gate. | |
| | | The facility is far from civilization! The only sign is a small section of I25. | |
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| | Paul explained how the facility was designed. | |
| | | This is the first black-footed ferret we saw. | |
| | | Hamster snacks are raised on site. 90% of the bff diet is prairie dogs. | |
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| | Looking into the window of the ferret room. Once there were only 18 BFFs left. | |
| | | About 5100 have been bred in captivity, and 2000 released in the wild. | |
| | | Lack of funding and loss of habitat are two major impediments to BFF recovery. | |
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| | They were very curious about us. They would duck down and pop back up again. | |
| | | They just couldn't stop watching us! They need our help to survive. | |
| | | Gigi is ready to be released into the preconditioning pen. | |
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| | Linda, Paul and Gigi. We had to wear masks in the prep room. | |
| | | To get into the main breeding room, staff must shower and change clothes! | |
| | | Gigi's poop has bits of prairie dog fur. It's drier than domestic ferret poop. | |
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| | Ferret owners love to look at ferret poop! | |
| | | Gigi is ready for her first encounter with the outside. | |
| | | Linda cautiously opens the carrier. | |
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| | Gigi quickly ducks into the nearest hole. | |
| | | And pops right back out to look around! | |
| | | She moves from hole to hole, surveying her new home. | |
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| | Soon Gigi will be released into the wild! | |
| | | | A mom and her son learning to live outside. | |
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| | He was very curious about us. | |
| | | He raced to another hole. | |
| | | Soon these two will join the approximately 500 BFFs in the wild. | |
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| | BFF people call it the "ferret happy dance"; we call it a "war dance"! | |
| | | A mom and five kits. Can you count them all? | |
| | | One male in this group wanted a closer look at us. | |
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| | This is what he was so curious about. | |
| | | We were all thrilled to have this opportunity. | |
| | | Many thanks to Paul Marinari and Travis Livieri. | |
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