I have a pet rat and 2 ferrets. My rat’s cage is pretty near the ferret cage. We keep her very clean, but I think she has something wrong with her. She has a huge lump on her abdomen. She’s 3 years old, and I lost her sister to a tumor about a year ago so I’m pretty sure this is the same, but at the same time I’m worried she may have some kind of disease that she could pass along to my ferrets. Is that possible?
Tags: ferret cancer, ferret health problem, ferret tumors, VetLocator.com
NO… Ferrets and rats are very different animals in fact keeping the rat so close to the ferret is probably stressing the rat out enough to make it sick. Did you know that a ferret is a carnivore and the rat is a prey animal? The ferret is a domestic mammal of the type Mustela putorius furo, in the weasel family while a Rat is a rodent, a grain eater. That means that the rat is a food item for the ferret. You should probably not keep them so close together and definitely do not let the ferret eat any of the rats food. Ferrets can get major impaction’s from eating grains and vegetables. Ferrets and rats are both prone to cancerous tumors but cancer is not something contagious but probably more genetically inclined.