The polecat (Mustela putorius: smelly weasel) is the wild ancestor of the domesticated and slightly smaller (usually albino) ferret that was also used for the hunt, mainly to attack rabbits in their holes.

The female is smaller, the male measures 30 to 45 centimeters, the tail is on average 14 centimeters and he weighs 500 to 1500 grams. He has a distinctive white snout with a large dark eye mask and white ear edges. The flanks are lighter colored.
The ferret can be 4-5 years old.

Cornered he’s shooting a horrible smelly milky fluid from the pea-sized stink glands at the base of the tail. This scent gland he uses to mark his territory.

He often digs its own burrow, but also uses existing (rabbit a.o.) caves. They used to be tolerated in barns because they do not hunt in the vicinity of their nest and keep other predators away. He is solitary, but also socially. It is a typically nocturnal, but hunts sometimes during the day in his habitat of 8-1,000 ha of woods and fields.

The polecat runs a quiet graceful gallop jump lanced from the forelegs. He uses several hunting techniques: rabbits he bites the nose, frogs in the neck and mice in the head. But also chickens, birds, fish, earthworms, insects, lizards and carrion are eaten.
Frogs and toads are dug up in their hibernation.
Sometimes he puts a stock of live frogs which he paralyzes with ridges bite. Of frogs and toads he only eats the abdomen (frog legs). At toads is also striped off the skin.

If the polecat has eaten a female frog or toad, he vomits the ovaries and the gelatinous sheath of the undeveloped drill because they collect moisture and swell strongly in his digestive tract. This blubber (from mustelids and herons) is called star shot (also witch snot) (no English translation found for this beautiful description.).

An egg he baggies empty on the spot or takes it between chin and chest to a quiet spot to eat. Sometimes he buries it. Like the fox, stoat and weasel he is sometimes hiding other prey remains as food supplies.
Of larger birds the polecat leaves the wings and the shoulder joint.
A hen he bites dead and drags her off the loft. He sucks the blood out so that the prey remains good,
and then goes back for a second or third chicken. The polecat does surplus killing.

The feces of a polecat are 5-10 cm long, 5-9 mm thick, cylindrical and braided. In the vicinity of their den you 'll find some latrines.
The distance between the canines measure 10 to 11 mm.

The mating season is March- June. After a gestation period of 6 weeks follows a throw from 3 to 8 young. (A second roll is not excluded in a mast year.)

They look like mink, who have a darker coat and no white mask around the eyes.