Ferrets are intelligent animals and can learn quite a few tricks and tasks if you are prepared to invest a little time in ferret training. You need to be persistent, affectionate and even offer some treats before you can have your little fur baby performing different types of neat tricks for you. Here are our top 5 tips and tricks to aid you with your effort.
Can Biting Ferrets Improve With Ferret Training?
Ferrets are acknowledged as nasty biters and are capable of extending this habit even to humans apart from their own ilk. Getting exasperated with the ferret is not the best method to deal with this problem. They can, however, be trained to give up this behavior by cutting out on their timeout from the cage. Another method which can be used to keep ferrets from biting is to ensure they are well fed before they are let out of the cage.
Punishment will not help to improve the behavior of the ferret but it will be easier for you to control the biting simply by lifting the animal by the scruff of the neck if it is displaying dangerous tendencies.
The timeout is perhaps the best option for these animals when they are being trained to stop biting.
Can Ferrets Be Toilet Trained?
Yes, it can certainly be done with some patience and persistence on your part. If your ferret is accustomed to relieving itself away from their designated spots or the litter box you can spray some lemon juice or apple bitter on the spot to watch the animal avoid the spot like it was a danger of some kind.
Ferrets are not the kind of animals that like to sleep in places where they have dirtied the place.
This should be an indication for you that they like to have their place clean and can, therefore, be trained appropriately for using the litter box. Here again, it will take a week or two before you finally manage to train the ferret but if you are persistent you can rest assured of success.
Teaching Ferrets To Shake Paws
This may sound as relatively easy but you must be prepared to reward the ferret for learning the trick. You can begin by putting your hand in front of your pet to ensure they are paying attention and place a treat a little further away from your hand on a flat surface.
When your ferret steps on your hand with one paw you should shake the paw and reward it with a treat.
Try this trick a few times to get your ferret to shake paws with you.
How to Teach The Ferret To Sit?
This one is slightly tricky and will take a couple of weeks to master. Just remember you need to be persistent with the training and reward the ferret for their ability.
Begin by holding a treat right above the head of the ferret and begin lowering the treat slightly when you have its attention.
Just continue with this exercise until they begin lowering their bottom before you say ‘sit’ clearly. Keep repeating this exercise until the ferret begins to learn the word sit. Reward it with a treat and continue practicing.
How to Make The Ferret Come to Me?
This trick is a little more difficult than the others and is certain to take some time before the ferret learns it. You first need to tell the ferret to stay by ensuring they are able to obey your command before asking them to come to you. Once you are certain you can hold a treat about a meter away from them.
When they begin to walk to you, you can call them by their name clearly and slowly.
You need to continue practicing for a day or two before you move ahead to the next step and begin holding the treat a couple of meters of a from the ferret before you begin repeating the entire process all over again.
The tricks we have suggested are common enough to be provided to even by ferret breeders if you have had any contact with them. The time you spend in ferret training will make your pet better to make you happy that you had made a worthy investment which provides you plenty of love and entertainment.