(no subject)

Lovely show last night at the Athenian Corner, with the Jewels of Jamal crazy tag team routines.  I had fun as always doing cane, and the band gave me an actual saidi and not debke or even baladi.  My drum solo went pretty well; I had momentary flashes of really working with the drummer and I have a better feel for how that all works now.  I'm still too shy, I guess would be the word, to really collaborate with the drummer, but I'll get there.  This was a good step in that development.  The whole band really is so welcoming, and we've come there often enough that they can joke around with us and we have a sense of camaraderie.  Then in the final set, two other dancers and I sat on the stage with the band and played zills as somebody else danced--that was so much fun!  We felt very old school up there, back in the day ("about a hundred years ago when I was a young man," one of the violinists said), the dancers who weren't on stage at a given moment often played zills with the band.  I suppose that's one of the reasons why the older generations of dancers in the US are so fabulous with their zills.  And it gave me some insight into the musician's side of things, how it feels to be supporting the dancer and working with her to create something bigger to give to the audience.  All in all, last night was both a good performing experience and an excellent learning experience.

Today I got myself out the door with the lure of my monthly Quebrada scone.  I am allowed one per month, except in case of dire emergencies, otherwise I would eat them all the time and then I would look like one.  My feet are killing me, but in a good way--I know, only I would say such a thing, but they hurt as though I'd been pounding the ground with them all night, not as though things are going to break and tear, which is actually very heartening.  I think I managed to resolve my left index toe/metatarsal problem on my own by concentrating on using the big toe part of the ball of my foot when I walk and by trying as hard as I can not to let my ankles bow out when I go up on pointe.  Just a few days of doing this made a huge difference.  Got to find some ankle-strengthening exercises...

adrenal glands and emotions and ferrets

Somebody posted about this article by Temple Grandin and Mark Deesing on the Ferret Health List today; although ferrets are not explicitly discussed, they are so prone to adrenal disease that the statements made here are of a lot of interest to ferret owners.  To wit:

Raising young animals in barren environments devoid of variety and sensory stimulation will have an effect on development of the nervous system. It can cause an animal to be more reactive and excitable when it becomes an adult. This is a long-lasting, environmentally induced change in how the nervous system reacts to various stimuli. Effects of deprivation during early development are also relatively permanent. Melzak and Burns (1965) found that puppies raised in barren kennels developed into hyperexcitable adults. In one experiment the deprived dogs reacted with ~diffuse excitement" and ran around a room more than control dogs raised in homes by people. Presenting novel objects to the deprived dogs also resulted in diffuse excitement." Furthermore, the EEGs of the kennel-raised dogs remained abnormal even after they were removed from the kennel (Melzak and Burns, 1965). Simons and Land (1987) showed that the somatosensory cortex in the brains of baby rats will not develop normally if sensory input was eliminated by trimming their whiskers. A lack of sensory input made the brain hypersensitive to stimulation. The effects persisted even after the whiskers had grown back.

Development of emotional reactivity of the nervous system begins during early gestation. Denenberg and Whimbey (1968) showed that handling a pregnant rat can cause her offspring to be more emotional and explore less in an Open field compared to control animals. This experiment is significant because it shows that handling the pregnant mother had the opposite effect on the behavior of the infant pups. Handling and possibly stressing the pregnant mothers changed the hormonal environment of the fetus which resulted in nervous offspring. However, handling newborn rats by briefly picking them up and setting them in a container reduced emotional reactivity when the rats became adults (Denenberg and Whimbey 1968). The handled rats developed a calmer temperament.

The adrenal glands are known to have an effect on behavior (Fuller and Thompson, 1978). The inner portions of the adrenals secrete the hormones adrenaline and noradrenaline, while the outer cortex secretes the gender hormones androgens and oestrogens (reproductive hormones), and various corticosteroids (stress hormones). Yeakel and Rhoades (1941) found that Hall's (1938) emotional rats had larger adrenals and thyroids compared to the nonemotional rats. Richter (1952, 1954) found a decrease in the size of the adrenal glands in Norway rats accompanied by domestication. Several line and strain differences have been found since these early reports. Furthermore, Levine (1968) and Levine et al. (1967) showed that brief handling of baby rats reduces the response of the adrenal gland to stress. Denenberg et al. (1967) concluded that early handling may lead to major changes in the neuroendocrine system.

It definitely makes one speculate whether the adrenal disorders ferrets are subject to later in life have anything to do with their early life history.  It's considered common wisdom in ferret circles that ferrets from private breeders are less subject to adrenal gland disease than those from big farms; there is no firm evidence or research to back this up, but it sounds like it could be the case--less handling as a kit means a more nervous ferret which means more general stress which means overactive adrenal glands which potentially leads to cancerous growth?  I don't know, I'm probably just educated enough about this stuff to be able to come up with theories but not to be able to come up with theories that actually hold water.  But it would be an interesting avenue for research.

The article also gave me insight into my ferret Cully, who passed away--gosh, more than six years ago now.  That's hard to believe.  But anyway, reading the article I could see him as an individual who was already predisposed to be flighty and nervous who then did not receive enough handling to develop much in the way of positive emotional reactions or enough environmental stimulation to be able to handle novelty well.  It is really amazing that he came as far as he did, to the point of trusting me and eventually M and not always drawing blood on strangers :-/  And I can see why he and Amelia just couldn't get along--they probably literally could not read each other's body language, except for the biting part.  He was at the limits of his brain structure, I think.  Maybe he had the ferret equivalent of autism...  I'm glad there was still enough receptivity in him that he was able to get along as well as he did in the second half of his life.  I'm very thankful that I was able to have the patience to work with him, and that M, who'd never interacted with a ferret before meeting me, is the kind of person that he is and was able to cope with what really could be a very trying ferret.

I might take a look at the rest of the book that article came from, or more of Temple Grandin's writings.  If they're written at about the pop-sci level of that article, I'd do fine with it.