Pet Monologues

In many families, a thorough search for ticks is part of any hike, camping trip or other journey into the woods. For people who live in rural areas, particularly those who work outdoors, looking for ticks is often a part of daily life. It’s easy to think of these tiny arachnids as something to watch out for in relatively wild terrain, but ticks don’t confine themselves to the wilderness. They’re adaptive and resilient, and you can find them in distinctly urban areas, like the parks of New York City.

feamle tick
Photo courtesy CDC/Dr. Amanda Loftis, Dr. William Nicholson, Dr. Will Reeves, Dr. Chris Paddock
A female lone star tick, Amblyomma americanum.

The typical response to finding a tick is often disgust. It’s partly because ticks are parasites — they feed on their hosts’ blood. Although people see them most often on themselves and their pets, ticks also attack wild animals, farm animals, birds and reptiles. On top of that, some ticks, particularly females, swell dramatically when they ingest a lot of blood. An engorged tick, or one that’s full of blood, can have a bizarre, even grotesque appearance.

In addition to their feeding behavior and appearance, ticks are disease vectors. They can carry illnesses from one animal to another. In fact, ticks are the primary disease vector in domestic animals. In terms of human illness, only one parasite spreads more illness—the mosquito. Ticks can spread a wide variety of disease-causing organisms, including bacteria, viruses and protozoa. Read the rest of this entry »

Minks freed from cages, farmers give chase.

HELSINKI (Reuters)—Farmers and other locals were chasing thousands of minks let out of their cages at a fur farm in western Finland early on Friday by suspected animal rights activists. Read the rest of this entry »

City may nix cops’ pooper scoopers.

MADISON, Wis. (AP)—The city’s pooper scooper law applies to everyone, even police officers on mounted patrol and K-9 unit duty—but a new statute may allow them to start leaving the evidence behind. Read the rest of this entry »

Dog behavior training: aggression, biting, guarding problems.

Handling an Aggressive Dog

Aggression is probably the most common reason an otherwise healthy dog is euthanized (put to sleep). Read the rest of this entry »

I met a man on Broadway today who was interested in my new puppy, Frankie, who asked me to send a pic of him to this site. Frankie is my new love. He is my first dog and we have spent the entire weekend getting to know each other. It is tiring but so much fun!! Anyway…here is a pic of my baby!

Missing pit bulls in Idaho. $5,000 reward.

Malad City, Idaho—The Humane Society of the United States is offering a $5,000 reward for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the person or people responsible for removing dogs from an alleged dogfighting kennel in Malad City, Idaho overnight Tuesday. Read the rest of this entry »

I recently found a site that was both fun and very provocative on many levels. Don’t assume I have come to any conclusions at this point but here is the link. Then read the rest of this article. Please! http://www.grumpybumpers.com/dogs

Coincidently, this past week I’ve had many dog encounters of a hybrid kind. Not the extraterrestrial kind. I don’t mean mutts or mongrels either.

The hybrids I refer to is a labradoodle, a bossi-poo, a foodle, an Irish-doodle. The poodle hybrids are endless. Well they are smart and don’t shed.

But there are others: The bug, the boxador, the dorkie (a person?), and so on. I saw a rather cool looking dog, a cross between a lab and a dalmation, but I didn’t have a camera or a pencil to record look and name. I hope I see dog and owner again this weekend. Read the rest of this entry »

Here is a thoughtful and compassionate article by Sarah Hartwell with regard to cats. Dogs, birds, elephants, horses, many animals for that matter, experience these feelings. Knowlege of the grieving process puts us in better touch with feelings, a good thing.

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When a cat dies, owners often notice behavioral changes in their remaining cats. Some of these are due to adapting to a changed hierarchy, but other behavioral changes are due to a sense of loss. Many cats grieve the loss of a close human companion and others show signs of loss when a canine companion ides or goes missing.

It is impossible to say exactly what emotions cats feel, but when a close companion goes missing they are certainly be aware of the absence. It is unlikely that they mourn in the human sense of the word, but there will be some behavioral changes as they adjust to the gap in their lives.

What is grief?

Grief is the result of abrupt or unexpected severing of attachment. Cats are aware that a familiar person or companion cat is absent and may search for that person or cat. The death or absence may change an established hierarchy as well as being the absence of a familiar companion. While this is not the ritualised grief of humans, the sudden absence of something familiar is distressing to many cats. Mother cats whose kittens were taken away and destroyed often looked for their kittens for many days, all the while pacing and crying out. As well as the physical pain of engorged mammary glands, the cats displayed mental pain. Read the rest of this entry »

Dogs beware: salmon poisoning disease.

Salmon poisoning is caused by eating infected raw fish
Fishing can be wonderful recreation, but sharing the catch with your dog can be an act of kindness that kills. Read the rest of this entry »