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What To Do about Neighbor Cats

I keep going back and forth on whether or not to let my cats outside.  Cole doesn’t have much interest, but Chrestomanci certainly does.  I know he’d be happiest as an indoor-outdoor cat, but I don’t know that I’d be happiest with him as one, and I don’t know that it’s worth the stress.  One day in the summer when we let him out with us, he wandered off.  He came back a few hours later, just as my husband said he would, but by then it was dark and I was very upset until he showed up again. Another … Continue reading →

Why Pets Do Weird Things: Licking

Why do our pets lick us? We think we know some of the reasons: affection, we have something tasty on our skin. But there are additional reasons why they might lick us. Let’s look at them. One of the first things a mother dog does for her puppies is to lick them: it helps stimulate their senses. Doing so means comfort for dogs, so when they lick you they might be trying to pass those feelings onto you. It’s basically social bonding. Licking can also symbolize submission. In the wild subordinate dogs lick their alphas, so if a dog is … Continue reading →

Service Dogs for Veterans

Training future service dogs Last month my mom sent me an interesting article from Smithsonian Magazine that she thought would make a good topic for the Pets blog (thanks Mom!) It was about the growing movement to provide service dogs to combat veterans with post-traumatic stress disorder. I’ve written before about two topics very close to this one: rescue organizations dedicated to providing dogs to veterans, and military dogs developing PTSD. Now the two are combined. The dogs provided by Pets for Patriots aren’t necessarily service dogs, though they do deliver a wonderful service for veterans. In this case, more … Continue reading →

Cat People vs. Dog People

I’ve already debunked the whole cats and dogs can never get along theory. What about whether you’re a cat person or a dog person, and what that says about your personality? I recently caught part of a NOVA documentary exploring that very thing, and I wish I’d seen more of it. The opening was full of cat people and dog people talking about the respective attributes of their favorite mammals, before examining what life is like at home for each of them. Although the concept was fascinating, I felt a little put out. What about me? I love dogs and … Continue reading →

What Your Dog Says About You

I don’t know if this is a new trend or an old one experiencing a revival, but lately I’ve seen a lot of “what does your dog’s breed say about you?” style articles. I’ve even seen a few ones related to romance: what does your boyfriend’s dog say about him, or about his sex life? While I find the latter a bit of a stretch, I think maybe there might be some truth in the former. The breed of one’s dog might say a bit more about one’s living situation than personality, so that two vastly different people might both … Continue reading →

Dog Days of Summer: Pets on Vacation

Pet owners face a unique situation when making our summer travel plans: we have to worry about our pets. Do we only go places where we can take our pets, or do we try to find care for them while we’re away? Website Pet Relocation released its third annual Summer Pet Travel Survey. They found that 70% of the people questioned plan to travel with their pets. If you want to take your animals along with you on vacation this summer, there are a few things you have to consider. Make sure you can bring your animal with you where … Continue reading →

Dog Bite Claims Cost Insurers Millions

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What happens when a dog bites a person? First, the person goes to see a doctor or heads for the emergency room. Next, the person files a claim against the dog owner’s homeowners insurance policy. Dog bite claims are costing insurance companies hundreds of millions of dollars every year. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention note that around 800,000 Americans seek medical attention for dog bites each year. About half of them are children. Every year, around 16 people die from dog bites. It can be a very serious situation. A person who has been bitten by a dog … Continue reading →

Dogs and Guilt: A Case Study

I recently read a study, I don’t remember where now, that claimed to definitively prove that dogs don’t feel any guilt. Researchers left a variety of dogs alone in a room (one dog per room) with some treats. All the dogs were scolded when the humans came back, whether or not they actually got into the treats. Each dog reacted to the admonishment, no matter what it had done. In fact the innocent dogs, the ones that had left the treats alone, acted even more ashamed of the supposed crime than the guilty ones. The researchers concluded that dogs aren’t … Continue reading →

Mommy Puts Her Foot Down

I was walking the dogs tonight and all of a sudden I see four running feet coming towards me. Yes, my two children. I just knew they didn’t tell my husband they left the house to come meet me down the street. Since they are 6 and 3 this makes me very uncomfortable. They just think they can open the door and start running wild in the street. It’s unacceptable. I was willing to look the other way on it with a stern look and warning that they will never do that again. However, the next thing they do just … Continue reading →

Kunekunes Come to the Animal Kingdom

I’m not a huge fan of zoos. I’ve been to enough in my lifetime that I’ve seen many small local ones, where a poor bored black bear ambles restlessly on a barred cement slab the size of my bedroom. If a zoo doesn’t take proper care of animals I can’t stand to visit it (as shouldn’t be surprising to anyone who reads my articles on the families.com Pets Blog), and as I make few trips into cities that narrows down my list. But when a zoo is done right, then I love it. My husband and I love nature documentaries … Continue reading →