What do Genghis Khan, scientists at the National Accelerator Laboratory, Illinois, US, and a small boy on the South Downs have in common? Lithe, inquisitive, quicksilver ferrets. That boy, James McConville, grew up to found the West Sussex Warreners, a thriving group of ferreters: ‘It’s three animals working together as a team, ferret, dog, human, to do a job. It’s magical.’

Ferrets have done that job for thousands of years, for the ruler of the Mongolian hordes on the warren-riddled steppes, in Egyptian ships and on the dusty hills of the Peloponnese (Greek references date to 450BC). Pliny the Elder writes of ferreting and the Romans may have brought the animals to British soil with their rabbits. Ferrets and ferreting were mentioned in court rolls in 1223 and as part of the Royal Househ

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