Graduating Pet Ownership

I am the last person to want to stop people keeping pets and graduating to more and more complex exotic creatures.
As a boy, this was the route I travelled. I remember precisely my first mouse and his distinctive and not unpleasant smell.
He was followed by a tame green budgie, who laid mountains of eggs and bit chunks out of any ear she could sidle up to.
My first hamster sired hundreds of babies and taught me all about breeding patterns and varying fertility levels.
From there I moved on to tropical newts, tortoises, terrapins, snakes, parakeets, love birds, diamond doves and so on, a pattern followed by thousands of enthusiasts.
At every stage, with every species, I read all I could lay my hands on. These days, there are books or booklets on virtually every pet subject.
The array of toys and equipment is similarly mind-boggling, as are the cages. There must now be a cage for hamster, rabbit or cage bird to suit virtually any human household.
I am now collecting old cages as they are given to us at the Zoopark, because I am sure they will turn into antiques in the future.

The trauma faced by the elderly of having to give up a beloved pet when they move into a retirement home is, sadly, very common.

A report in 1999 " Losing a Pet to Find a Home " by the Anchor Trust, revealed that 38,400 pets were destroyed each year in the UK because their owners had to move into homes.

Of the 526 veterinary practices surveyed, 76% said that they had put animals to sleep because there was no-one to care for them.

So it was against this background that I read about the " Waiting for God " kennels in Thornton, near Kirkcaldy, Fife, the country's first retirement home for old and unwanted dogs.

The kennels were created by Mrs Ina Croyon , from Dunfermline in memory of a friend, Mr George Carter , who died in November 1998.

Mr Carter had always wanted to set up such a place. He donated some land to Mrs Croyon and her husband in the hope that it would one day be used for this purpose.

Mrs Croyon raised an additional £8,000 to help make his dream become a reality.

Mr Carter used to run his own kennels with his wife Phyliss in Thornton, where the new centre is situated, and devoted much of his life to looking after and re-housing abandoned animals.

External Resources

Waltham's World of Pets
Welcome to the "WALTHAM World of Pet Care" - and everything you ever wanted to know about owning and looking after dogs, cats, fish and birds. WALTHAM (r) is the world's leading authority on pet care and nutrition and is the science behind the world's leading petcare brands such as Pedigree (r) and Whiskas (r).