Advice For Pet Owners

With the amount of animals, amphibians and fish that we have in and out of our house, I consider myself a bit of an expert when it comes to pets. I am more than willing to impart some of this hard earned knowledge, so get comfortable.

I have to start by stating the obvious, for example; make sure if you have more than one rabbit they are both the same sex - I can't stress enough, the importance of that. We made that mistake, and paid for it dearly. Once the errant offspring were named, Rob knew we'd never be allowed to get rid of them, so our only choice was to get the males fixed.  We learned the hard way - is there any other ? - that it costs more to fix a rabbit than it does a dog. I believe our vet took his family on a Hawaiian cruise on the back of that mistake.

Skunks; if there is even a hint of a skunk within a 10 mile radius, keep your dog indoors, no matter how much it has to pee. The only thing worse than having a dog sprayed by a skunk, is having two dogs sprayed by a skunk. If you should have the misfortune of experiencing a skunk attack, forget about tomato juice, it does NOT work. Neither does toothpaste, ketchup, vanilla essence, baby shampoo, or any other asinine remedy that someone helpfully suggests. Nothing works, not on the dog, not on you, and not on the furniture. The only thing that takes away the eye watering, gag inducing stench is time. About eighteen months should do it. Don't say I haven't warned you. Actually, now that I think about it, there is something worse than having two dogs sprayed by a skunk, and that is having three particularly stupid cats nailed by the vindictive little bastard.

Which leads me to my next piece of advice, never ever attempt to give a cat a bath. If your cat does require a bath for any reason, pay the money and hand him over to the professionals, trust me it is worth it. The one time we attempted it, the cat shot straight up the tiled wall of the bathroom like a rocket, taking most of the flesh from my arms with it.

If you have cats, keep the toilet lid closed, lest a cat falls in. Believe me, this has happened in our house more times than we can count, and it cannot be a co-incidence.  A cat soaked in toilet water is not happy, nor is the person (usually me) who has to trail behind and clean it up. Granted the first few times it happens, when summoned by the splash and screech of the victim, it is hilarious to watch the bedraggled and extremely irate cat, haul itself out of the toilet bowl whilst trying to maintain its dignity.  Do not attempt to go to its aid, that can only end badly. See "cat bath" above - same outcome.

We also have three African Dwarf frogs, not sure why but we do. They are actually quite cute, but before you go out and buy some, be warned they are horny little sods, and unless you want to explain to your own offspring, why one frog is constantly "hugging" the other two, get a fish instead.

What can I say about hamsters, other than to avoid them like the plague. We used to have have five hamsters (now only three), and although they are cute, they are not social animals, so we also had five cages. They are nocturnal, so do not believe the idiot in the pet store when they tell you "Don't worry, you can train them to be diurnal"  They LIE. Hamsters come out at night and cause a really loud ruckus on their wheels, this is just what hamsters do, and there is nothing you can do to change it.

The sad thing is I am probably responsible for most of the animals that have crossed our threshold, along with those that haven't, so I only have myself to blame. I heard recently that chipmunks are really easy to tame, so that is what I'm working on next.Of course if Rob has his way it will be a guinea pig or two or three. Where will it end ?