This could be the year that ferrets win their freedom in California. No more sneaking into the veterinarian's office or supping surreptitiously on cat food. If state lawmakers approve, ferrets may be granted amnesty in the last place on the North American continent that still outlaws them.

And it's not just ferrets that could get new protection.

This also could be the year that California lawmakers ban the declawing of cats, prevent unweaned birds from being sold by pet stores and bar shelters from sending animals to research institutions. Another bill would make it a crime to keep calves and pregnant sows cramped in crates. And one piece of legislation would toughen the existing law against cockfighting, ratcheting up the maximum fine from $5,000 to $20,000.

Every year, the Legislature tackles a small complement of animal welfare bills. This year there have been at least 10, although some have already died in committee. And though the issues may be more quirky than weighty, they stir passions and provoke ribbing among lawmakers. Even howling, on occasion.

A couple of years ago, when Assemblyman Ken Maddox (R-Costa Mesa) presented a bill regulating dog breeding, he was greeted with bi-partisan barking on the Assembly floor. "It sounded like the inside of a kennel," he said. "Hey, as long as I got their votes." He did.

'Baseline Protection'

California is an animal-rights activist's dream. Measuring by legislation getting governors' signatures, "California is far and away the best state in the country," said Sara Amundson, deputy director and legislative director of the Doris Day Animal League, headquartered in Washington, D.C. "As far as baseline protection for animals goes, California is the best."

Last year, California became the second state to pass a bill requiring that anti-freeze contain a bitter-tasting agent to discourage pets, wildlife and children from drinking it. . A bill passed in 2000 made the state the first to bar manufacturers and testing companies from using animals for testing when a scientifically valid alternative method of testing is available.

"Very few states regulate research animals, circus animals, sanctuary animals, dealers and breeders," said Nicole Paquette, general counsel of the Animal Protection Institute, which is headquartered in Sacramento but lobbies for animal legislation across the country. Paquette said that when her group gets turned down in other states, "what we always hear is, 'Only in California.' ''

This year, if the ban on declawing passes, California will be the only state in the country with such a statewide restriction. If the bill banning confining crates for pigs and calves passes, California will be the only state to outlaw them for both kinds of animals, according to Gene Bauston, president of Farm Sanctuary, the group that brought the bill to its author, Assemblywoman Loni Hancock (D-Berkeley). New Jersey is considering a ban on 2-foot-wide crates for veal calves, and Florida recently banned gestation crates for pigs through a ballot initiative.

Usually, Democrats introduce animal bills. "Republicans are naturally regulation-averse," said Maddox, who owns a Pembroke Welsh Corgi named Millie. "I fit that category, but I have a soft spot for animals."

So do a lot of his colleagues. Animal bills cut across lines of party, gender and age to connect with the one thing that nearly every member of the Legislature is or once was: a pet owner.

"There's usually a personal connection," said Richard Katz, a former Democratic Assembly leader who spent 16 years in the Legislature and watched such bills come and go -- or, in the case of ferret legislation, never quite go.

This session, the mantle of ferret defender goes to Sen. Dede Alpert (D-San Diego), a 12-year veteran of the Legislature who previously sat in the Assembly. "I would hope I'm better known for work I've done in education than for this bill," she said.

But the animal lovers who watch her ferret bill and others affecting animals follow the process intensely and lobby hard. "They are just passionate," Alpert said. So are the people who oppose such legislation. Hunters were fervently against Assemblyman Joe Nation's bill to outlaw the hunting of mourning doves and white-winged doves. "We've gotten pretty nasty e-mails and calls," said Nation (D-San Rafael).

He hadn't seen his bill as controversial -- "You can't argue that people go out to shoot them and eat them" -- but he withdrew it before it reached the Water, Parks and Wildlife Committee. "I'm a political realist," said Nation, who estimated he didn't have the necessary committee votes.

Ellen Corbett, a Democratic Assemblywoman from San Leandro and the former mayor of that city, introduced a bill prohibiting the sale of unweaned baby birds from pet stores to the public. "I think how we treat our animals is part of how we show our humanity," she said. Even before the bill arrived in a committee, she had received 300 e-mails and letters in support of it, Corbett said.

She had introduced the measure after hearing "horror stories" of young birds mishandled by well-intentioned owners lacking the expertise to care for them. For instance, birds needing to be fed warmed food were sometimes accidentally scalded. "You're bringing home a very young bird that needs constant attention," Corbett said. Her bill is headed to the Assembly floor.

Declawing Cats

The bill this session that could have perhaps the biggest effect on pet owners -- and their furniture -- was introduced by Assemblyman Paul Koretz (D-West Hollywood). It would forbid declawing of all cats in California, from house pets to lions. The procedure, called an onychectomy, amputates each of the cat's toes at the last joint. "It's not some aggressive manicure," said Jennifer Conrad, an exotic-animal veterinarian in Santa Monica who has repaired the feet of big cats, which are particularly crippled by the procedure, and who opposes declawing.

Conrad's work inspired the West Hollywood City Council to ban declawing earlier this month. The councilman who proposed the ban sent Koretz information about declawing at a time when Koretz, a former West Hollywood mayor and councilman, had been considering the issue.

"I found out how painful it could be for small cats," said Koretz, whose Web site identifies him as an opponent of animal cruelty. "Some cats totally change their behavior. They bite more, they stop using the litter box -- and it's because of the pain."

The California Veterinary Medical Assn. opposes legislation on the procedure, saying it is an issue between cat owner and veterinarian. Many veterinarians today counsel cat owners to try alternatives to declawing, but would rather declaw a cat than see its owner get rid of the pet.

"As a general surgeon who has done numerous declaws, I don't think this is any more painful than a spay or a neuter," said William Grant II, a second-generation veterinarian in Garden Grove and past president of the Southern California Veterinary Medical Assn. "What was done in declaws 30 years ago is light years away from now. They were doing things with dog-claw trimmers that had the potential for disfigurement. We use a laser in our practice, and these cats are walking the day we do the procedure."

Los Angeles veterinarian Elyse Kent said she insists on a consultation with any cat owner who seeks a declawing. "I have to know that the cat is an indoor cat. And it has to be for a legitimate reason. It can't be because they have a new leather couch," said Kent who runs the Westside Hospital for Cats.

One of the few reasons for declawing a cat, she said, is the presence of a person in the house who might get sick from a cat scratch. Normally, Kent simply shows cat owners how to trim nails or applies Soft Paws -- vinyl nail caps that can be glued over claws.

Koretz said he has no desire to compromise on the declawing bill. "A cat is a cat. If you want to have one, your furniture isn't going to be sacrosanct. Mine certainly isn't. In fact, I have a chair I've completely given over to the cat."

Koretz's other potentially controversial bill would prohibit shelters from selling or donating animals to institutions for research. The practice already is illegal in many cities and counties, including Los Angeles County.

Some opponents say the bill would double the number of animals to be killed, because it would mean that research facilities would turn to breeders for animals, and shelters would probably euthanize most of theirs.

Donald Klingborg, an associate dean at the School of Veterinary Medicine at UC Davis, said live animals are essential for veterinary students practicing surgery, and most survive. A committee has to approve use of an animal for an operation that will result in euthanasia. "No animal death is taken lightly at this school," Klingborg said.

Koretz's third animal bill this session called for a ban on hunting bears by tracking them with hounds, which force the animals into trees so they can be shot. That bill didn't survive the Water, Parks and Wildlife Committee. "I get grief in general because I'm willing to do bills that might seem frivolous to some," said Koretz, who once introduced a successful bill to improve wages and working conditions for sheepherders. "I don't think animal cruelty is small and frivolous."

Assemblyman Mark Leno (D-San Francisco) had no trouble with the resolution animal advocates asked him to sponsor this year that proclaimed Feb. 25 to be Spay Day USA -- a day for Californians to either spay and neuter their cats and dogs or contribute to organizations that provide such services. "It is about education so pet owners can be as responsible as possible," he said of the resolution, which recurs annually.

But Leno, an Assembly freshman and the owner of three parrots, had a tougher time with a bill that would have stiffened regulations on rodeos. It was voted down in committee.

Loni Hancock's bill making it a misdemeanor to confine a calf or a pregnant pig not only faces opposition from powerful agricultural groups, but also ventures into new territory: the treatment of animals raised for food. Hancock's bill doesn't require that animals roam free, but it does provide that they get a little more room to move. For instance, veal calves hemmed into crates -- immobilization makes for tender meat -- would have to be able to turn around and lie down in a natural position.

Hancock, who was an official in President Clinton's Department of Education, gave the Assembly's Committee on Public Safety a statement saying: "This bill prevents the most egregious cruelties endured by veal calves and breeding pigs" without prescribing how the animals must be raised. Having passed that committee, the bill faces the Agriculture Committee this week.

Beleaguered Ferret

No animal is a more perennial pet in Sacramento than the beleaguered ferret, which is illegal only in Hawaii and California. Most lawmakers who have carried the ferret bill have been treated as comic relief. Former Republican Assemblyman Jan Goldsmith's last-ditch efforts on behalf of ferrets one year were famously shot down by then-Speaker Willie Brown. "That bill is deader than that thing on his head," the speaker quipped, referring to the lawmaker's hairpiece, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.

Alpert said she recalled that incident well. "My husband is having a fit that I'm carrying this ferret bill -- because he thinks it only makes you look silly," she said. In the past, she voted against ferret bills, heeding the warnings of state Department of Fish and Game officials that feral colonies of ferrets might ravage farms and wildlife.

Alpert now says that has not happened where ferrets are legal. That's why she has corralled a bi-partisan group of senators as co-authors of the bill. It would bestow amnesty upon ferrets living in California as of July 2004, provided their owners buy licenses and have the animals spayed or neutered and vaccinated against rabies. The money raised from the license fees would fund an environmental impact report on ferrets.

How many ferrets live in the state is unclear. "Some say 100,000; some say 500,000. Of course, we don't know," Alpert said, "because they're criminals."

"Ferrets, for some reason, have become the cause celebre for critter law," said Maddox.