Small Pet Problems & Care

I am that rare person that loves cats and dogs equally, but I have yet to find a smaller pet come even close to comparison.  As a child, my sister and I had parakeets.  Their life spans were very short, and since they were our first pets, I cried every time.  They were named Chi Chi, Cookie, Coco and Candy. Cookie, a blue and white bird, was my favorite, because I was around 8 and he was a gift to me.  Next we adopted Coco and Candy, a pair of yellow and green parakeets together, and were our last pet birds. It was hard to connect with them; they were loud, messy and so mean that we could rarely pet them without getting pecked.

Then my sister adopted a white gerbil with red eyes.  He reminded me of Bunnicula, a story I read as a child.  This gerbil also broke out of the cage from time to time, and he ended up staying in our living room.  One time, he started drinking from our dog's water bowl, and one time he simply got out and sat on top of his cage.  The time he was sitting on the top of the cage, I was the last one awake in the house, and when I turned off the TV to go to bed, I simply saw red eyes staring at me.  It startled me, but I put him back in his cage.

None of the pictures on this page are of the pets in my post, but each are very similar to what they looked like.

My dad created a small pond in our old backyard and put a turtle in it.  The turtle literally walked away one day. There were rumors for years after that people saw him in the much larger development pond, and I choose to believe he is there to this day.  My sister tried getting a frog next.  It ate crickets, and the crickets would escape from the cage, so she started keeping the frog's cage in our bathroom.  As a teenager, I was not at all happy with this arrangement.

This Sulcata looks a lot like Morty.

Chris has a sulcata tortoise that's probably about a decade old now.  I have no idea as to what gender he is, but I named him Morty.  Morty is mildly entertaining.  Kita thinks he is a ton of fun and of course tries to play with him despite Morty's disinterest.  The cats stare at him, but don't get very close.  With Pearl's hunting instincts, we keep him well away from her.  On sunny days, we let him out in our fenced backyard and he strolls around for hours eating grass.  He alerts us that he wants to go out by bumping his shell into the wood side of his cage.  The sound is louder than you would think, so he typically gets his way.  Apparently, this species lives very long and gets very large, but we'll deal with that much later in life.  I wish our dogs and cats would live so long!

I have also had some experience with raising bunnies, but I will write about that soon.  Chris and I are pretty big animal lovers, and even though smaller pets aren't my favorite, I have had mostly positive experiences with them.  While I am definitely not an expert, feel free to ask me questions and I can probably point you towards more helpful information.  If you are looking for an animal that will love you back, I think cats and dogs are the way to go, but frankly, I'm quite biased, so don't take my word for it.

Snow Dogs

Kita looking pretty after getting groomed.

Kita is a purebred Siberian Husky and, true to his breed, loves Ohio winters.  The first big snowfall this year led to his obsession with going outside as often as possible after he noticed the snow while looking out the window.  Luckily Chris doesn't mind taking him out in the cold weather, because I hate being out in the cold. This is Pearl's first winter and despite being a short-haired small dog with tiny paws that can freeze, she is also enamored with the snow.  Kita was more than willing to show her just how fun the snow can be as they played and rolled around in our backyard last week, but even he grew tired as she ran around in circles without slowing down for a second.

Pearl has so much energy that it is tough
to get a still photo of her!

I'm amazed by Pearl's high energy level and wonder if she will ever calm down.  Nonetheless, she is becoming an integral part of the family and is easily Kita's favorite companion.  Pearl can be a bit rough with her big brother, but he is handling it in stride and is careful to never hurt her despite his much larger size.  They love to play tug of war with any toy that they can find, but it often leads to wrestling, so they need constant supervision during their playtime. We swap out toys from the closet and once they haven't seen a toy in a week or more it is as exciting as the first time they ever saw it, and since they have a ridiculous amount of toys, every day is like Christmas for them.

Dogs are a constant reminder to enjoy every moment of every day, and their excitement is contagious.  I look forward to spoiling them with rawhides, Kongs and stuffed animals this Holiday season with trips to Petsmart and Pet People.

Our Pets' Feeding Habits Run Our Lives

Seph begs for food at the closet door

Every morning, our cat Seph wakes me up anywhere from 1-3 hours before my intended wake-up time, usually as soon as the sun comes up.  I try to ignore it, but his persistence is unmatched, and he consistently finds new ways to force me to get out of bed. Some of his favorite tactics are scratching at the bed, standing above my head, knocking things down, meowing loudly enough to wake up the puppy, etc.

Pearl loves to eat

Pearl, our puppy is next.  After we go outside in the morning, she wants food immediately and then wants something to chew on.  She always scarfs down her meals very quickly and needs to eat anything that Kita eats or she throws a temper tantrum.  She also gets very protective over her food if she thinks any of the other pets are too close, which is a behavior that is worrisome and hope to change.

Zoey begs for food with his eyes

My cat, Zoey, doesn't bug us for food so much but he certainly can eat.  He is a little overweight so we try to limit his meals, but he has a habit of stealing all of the other pet's food if he is hungry and has access to the food.  This extends to any of our food that he can find in the garbage or on the counter, so we limit his access to the kitchen.  The only way that this is possible is his fear of the dogs and they are between him and the kitchen.

Kita as a youngster

Our Husky, Kita, is the most well-behaved pet when it comes to food.  He is allergic to chicken, so we have to be very careful that nothing we give him has any chicken in it at all, or he vomits.  Often, his food can sit out all day without him touching it sometimes, but then other days he eats it immediately.  On the rare circumstances that he wants more dry food, he will hit the empty bowl until it flips over in order to get our attention.  He is also crazy about treats, rawhides, and wet food.  Luckily, he doesn't beg for these items, but gets extremely excited about them.

The collective eating habits of the 4 pets combined can get expensive.  To combat this, we collect pet food coupons, watch for sales at the stores, and have loyalty cards for each of the pet stores that are nearby so that we can get discounted prices and coupons in the mail or by email.  We purchase rawhides, bones and toys online when we find sales on Amazon or other sites.  I also have signed up for email alerts for the pet foods we buy most often by visiting their websites, and occasionally they will email coupons and sales.  I have my family members look for coupons for our favorite pet products and they clip and send them to us or give them to me when I see them.  Regardless, their food is costly, so I'm always open to new tips on saving money without buying lower quality food.  They are valued family members and are too important to let them eat anything that could shorten their lifespan or make them sick.

Kita & Doggy Daycare

Around election time, if Chris and I are working a lot of hours, we take Kita to Petsmart's Doggy Daycare a few times a week.  We had brought him to a different daycare a few times, but they only let the dogs play about an hour a day and he wasn't all that excited to go back.  That is not the case with Petsmart.  Kita is as happy as a kid at Christmas if he even thinks that we are going to Petsmart.  He has learned the name of the store, and certain stores and signs on our drive trigger his assurance that we are, in fact, going there.

When Kita is excited, he howls.

Once we get in the store, Kita pulls us directly through all of the food and toys and into the doggy daycare attached to the store.  He has a few favorite dog-sitters there, and if he sees them before we check in, he starts jumping around excitedly and gives them kisses.  Once he is checked in and taken out of the front room, he couldn't be happier to get to the playroom immediately and doesn't give us another thought.  They let the dogs there play for 7 hours with just a 1 hour lunch break, so Kita is sufficiently worn out by the time we pick him up in the evening.  They give us a card telling us about his behavior for the day and which dogs he made friends with.  We hear that Kita is one of 

the most popular dogs there, and he tries to get all of the dogs involved in 

whatever they are playing.

This doesn't surprise us a bit, because Kita is a social butterfly that loves to meet all new people and animals.  On walks, we have to talk to everyone, because he wants to greet every person and dog he sees. This started as a puppy, because bad as he was, he was an adorable pup with soft fur and everyone would rush to meet him.  Now some of our neighbors still call him "the prettiest dog in the neighborhood", but Kita doesn't get quite the same amount of excitement out of new people.  Regardless, he gets compliments a lot and couldn't be happier about someone petting him and telling him how handsome he is and I can't help but agree.  Just know that if you adopt a Husky, you will have to talk to people a lot about your dog as people don't see them everyday and have a lot of questions about the breed.

Want to get to know Kita better?  Click here to visit his page!