Feeding & Aggresiveness

Question
Hi, I just had  few questions about both of my ferrets, and I just stumbled upon this site and thought I should at least ask here!!

My first question is about my youngest ferret Loki, who turned 1 last december. Well, me and my mom have been trying to get her to eat hard kibble, but she refuses continuously!! we've tried everything! we did that trick of putting hard food gradually with soft food, but she just eats around it..last time, we ran out of soft food and had to give her some of our other ferret's hard food, and she refused to eat any of it for a week after one nibble!!! we can't keep buying her soft food all the time, well, we want her to have a variety at the least of soft and hard food. Do  you have any suggestions??


My second question is about my second ferret, Bear, an old albino ferret my family took in from a family who couldn't take care of him very well. His past is being moved from one family to another, and his last family never let him out of his cage because the kids were rough with him. When we got him, he was skin and bones, due to a diet of vegtables and no type of kibble with any protien or the good kind of ferret chow!!! a month or so after we recieved him, he became very ill and didn't eat for the longest time, or rather couldn't eat or drink. we took him to the vet and forced him to eat duck soup (yuck)..he got better eventually though, and for a while walked around like a drunken ferret so that was a bit funny knowing that he was okay( he was just used to stumbling and hopeing, he likes it).  He lost his all his hair last year from trauma of moving,new family, home, and his sickness, but he's finally grown more than twice his coat this last month! so he's doing fine after we switched his food and made sure he was happy and out and about. but he's never known how to play so whenever we play with him, he ends up biting us roughly, breaking the skin a few times and then scratching our arms whenever we pick him up (tho he's calmed down now)..he's very agressive towards Loki, and in our rare attempts at putting them together again (last time they were together was before he was sick and she loved to jump on him, he hated it) he lunges at her neck in a non-playful way, hissing!! Loki's frightened of him now, and flinches away when ever she's near his cage or smells him. Do you think he'll always be that way, or is there a way to reunite them in a friendly fashion again??

Answer
This may be difficult for Loki as ferrets imprint on food very young and if they are not exposed to a variety at a young age, it is challenging to change it later.  I would suggest that you keep exposing her to the new food, maybe mix various soft foods and add a few bits of kibble.  It will probably take a while, but can be done.

Generally, ferrets that are cages near each other but in separate cages can become aggressive if they are out playing.  Unless there is a reason to cage them separately then I would suggest placing them in the same cage.  They will probably fight for a while, but will figure it out.  Being friendly and hand feeding him should also help with the biting you!  Patience will help that issue the best.