Air travel can be incredibly uncomfortable for us humans, imagine how our pets can feel! If you are thinking of flying with your pet, there are many things you need to take into consideration. There are things you may not have thought about, and things the airline may not inform you of ahead of time. This article will guide you through flying with your pet and will serve as a handy reference for anyone.

First, you need to decide which airline you want to fly on. This does make a difference in rules, costs, and other areas. Some airlines will not allow your pet to travel in the cabin with you, instead, they will need to be checked in as cargo. Other airlines have certain restrictions and the best advice is to call the airline and speak with a representative. Make sure you are 100% clear on their rules and what you will need ahead of time. It is important to call the airline as soon as possible because some are only able to take a certain number of animals per flight. If you make travel arrangements early, you and your pet will be on the same flight.

There are certain things you need to do to prepare your pet for air travel. You need to take your pet to the veterinarian for a complete check-up. Make sure your pet is current on all all her vaccinations and is healthy enough for travel. Be sure to obtain a written, signed document from your vet stating your pet is in good health. This document will also need to be dated and should be done 10 days before your flight (check with your airline for a specific date). If you are traveling outside the United States, additional documents may be required, check with the foreign office of the country you are traveling to and make sure you have all the necessary paperwork completed beforehand.

Proper identification is an absolute must when traveling with your pet. You should consider having your pet microchipped before your trip. At the very least, you should make sure she has a collar with an ID tag. The ID tag should have your home information as well as contact information once you arrive at your destination. If possible, include your cell phone number (most people always travel with theirs) so you can be reached at any time.

When planning your trip, you should book a direct flight whenever possible. Flights with layovers increase the risk of your pet being misplaced by the airline. Direct flights will also be more comfortable for your pet because they will be spending as little time as possible on the plane.

You will also need to purchase a USDA-approved shipping crate for your pet. This needs to be large enough for her to stand up, sit down, and turn around in. These can be purchased from many pet supply stores. In large letters (at least one inch tall) write “LIVE ANIMAL” on the top of the crate. This will alert airline personnel of the contents, and an arrow should be placed on the crate indicating the upright position. Also, write the name, address, and telephone number of your pet’s destination on the side of the crate and if you are accompanying your pet or if someone else is picking her up. The door of the crate should be closed but not locked. It needs to be left unlocked in case of an emergency, and you should line the bottom of the crate with blankets, old towels, or newspapers in case of accidents and to ensure your pet is comfortable.

Tape a photograph of your pet to the outside of the crate. If she gets lost, this will make identifying (and locating) her easy. You should also carry a photograph of her in your wallet. This may seem silly, but you should travel prepared with your pet and be ready for anything.

Tell every airline personnel you see (both on the ground and in the air) that you are traveling with your pet in the cargo hold. If any extra considerations are necessary for your pet, someone will know to talk to you. If at any time during the flight you become concerned for the safety of your pet, you can ask the airline personnel to check on the welfare of your animal. They should have no problems doing this when feasible.

Traveling with your pet can be a great experience for both of you. You have the comfort of having your best friend with you, and your pet gets to see a whole different world. If you do your homework beforehand and travel prepared, the whole process will be smooth and safe. If you are unsure about anything do not hesitate to contact your airline and get the answers you need. Following the tips outlined above will ensure your trip is a great one!

Thanks for reading!  As always your participation in comments and discussions are encouraged and greatly appreciated!!

This story was found on CNN.com.

An animal rescue group on Sunday picked up a U.S. soldier’s adopted dog from Iraq, ending the soldier’s weeks-long struggle to send the animal to her Minnesota home.

Operation Baghdad Pups, which said the U.S. military prevented its first attempt to take Ratchet the dog on October 1, picked up the animal in Baghdad with military clearance and flew it to Kuwait on Sunday.

The dog is expected to be flown to Washington on Monday, and if a veterinarian determines it is healthy, sent to Sgt. Gwen Beberg’s home state on Wednesday, Baghdad Pups publicist Larry Garrison said.

Beberg, who adopted the dog after soldiers rescued it from a burning trash pile in May, tried to have the group fly Ratchet to the United States on October 1 as her deployment neared an end.

But the military, which prohibits soldiers from adopting pets abroad and bringing them to the United States, confiscated the animal after Beberg put it on a convoy bound for Baghdad Airport, according to the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, which runs OBP.

Ratchet and Beberg, 28, drew the attention of thousands of people who signed two online petitions — linked through the SPCA’s Web site — urging the military to let Ratchet go to the United States.

The military cleared OBP to take Ratchet on Wednesday, but not in time for the group’s flight from Baghdad that day, the SPCA said.

On Sunday, private security contractors took Ratchet from a base to the airport, where OBP — which works with soldiers to help them bring adopted animals home — put Ratchet on the charter flight to Kuwait, Garrison said.

Northwest Airlines will donate the flights from Kuwait to Minnesota, Garrison said.

The SPCA said Ratchet helped Beberg deal with her Iraq deployment, which started in September 2007 and is scheduled to end in November.

“She was absolutely miserable in the war and was really struggling to keep going every day. Ratchet turned it around for her,” SPCA spokeswoman Stephanie Scroggs said last week.

Beberg’s mother, Patricia Beberg, in a statement released by the SPCA, said Ratchet “was the savior of her [daughter’s] sanity” in Iraq.

SPCA representatives said the military euthanizes some animals that it confiscates, and that Gwen Beberg worried that Ratchet would be killed.

Beberg was thrilled to hear last week that the military would let OBP take Ratchet, the SPCA said.

“Your persistence and amazing work has astonished me throughout this whole thing,” Gwen Beberg said in an e-mail to the SPCA, according to the society.

Scroggs said one of Beberg’s friends helped spread the news about Ratchet through blogs. One of the petitions, which had more than 65,000 signatures as of Sunday night, was started by a blogger, Scroggs said.

The SPCA says although active-duty soldiers aren’t allowed to adopt animals in the Middle East, many soldiers befriend animals in the course of their service there.

Garrison said the program relies on donations, saying it generally costs $3,000 to $4,000 to bring a service member’s animal to the United States.

“This isn’t a one-time story This is a program making a difference for our soldiers,” Garrison said.

Thanks for reading! As always your participation in comments and discussions are encouraged and greatly appreciated!!

Could your dog have a Mac memory? Check out this recent article I found, it may surprise you:

The intelligence of the dog is among the highest of all the animals, maybe higher than we give him credit for. Although his brain is proportionately only half as large as ours, he is certainly the most intelligent of domestic animals.

As with humans, individual intelligence varies greatly according to inherited genes. While no one breed can be said to be more intelligent that another, some breeds that have been selectively bred for work ability are often brighter and more receptive than those bred primarily for purely physical attributes.

Whether a dog is a mixed breed for purebred, studies have shown that neither is much more intelligent than the other. However, dogs that have been exposed to a more varied lifestyle, both indoors and out, and with both human and animal interaction, does show more intelligent behavior.

Simply put, giving your dog an opportunity to investigate and manipulate all sorts of objects, to explore all sorts of places, to share all sorts of experiences with you will stimulate his or her intelligence. Aside from getting a lot more out of life, your dog will be eager to learn more and he will learn with increasing ease and rapidity. Nothing is sadder and more wasteful than an intelligent dog that is confined in a kennel and deprived of mental stimulation.

Despite opinions to the contrary, dogs are endowed with an elementary reasoning power. Anyone who has ever owned a dog has often seen him size up a situation and then taken some logical action. Guide dogs for the blind, as well as working and hunting dogs of many breeds constantly have to use their judgment and make decisions.

Memory is an important component of intelligence. The dog’s memory for scents is extraordinary. His visual memory is only fair, but his memory for sounds is very good, since he can remember and identify familiar voices even after an absence of many years. While he builds up a large store of identifiable sounds without the slightest effort, remembering different words requires more concentration.

The dog’s capacity for learning is more a matter of memory than of true understanding. He will remember the sequence of cause and effect in his actions, but he is unable to draw broad conclusions from his experience. The greater the variety of experiences and contact with others they have, the quicker they learn, and the more they retain.

Dogs are bound by nature to remain intellectually inferior to man, but we owe them a chance to develop their native intelligence by training, teaching, and working with them as much and as often as we can.

This article can be found here.

Thanks for reading!  As always your participation in comments and discussions are encouraged and greatly appreciated!! 

I’ve always had big dogs my whole life, and it was always amazing to me how much they hated having a bath. My last dog in particular (part black lab and part newfoundland) really disliked them. She would run at the mention of the “b” word but when her bath was all over, she would take off running into the yard rolling around in the grass. I never understood that at all. In the winter time, we used to give her a bath in our shower - and believe me, she hated that just as much.

If you have a small dog, you have many more options as far as places to bathe your pet yourself. If they are small enough, you could consider washing them in your kitchen sink. I think that would work out really well - you have a tremendous amount of control and the sink is a perfect fit for their little bodies. Another reason this would be helpful is because you would be able to control the temperature of the water. You would have the ability to make sure your pet is comfortable.

You need to make sure that your sink has enough room for your dog and that the bar faucets are high enough that they will not get in the way of the process.  It is important to bathe your dog, this prevents infestation of fleas and ticks, and it also helps keep your dog smelling great!

Thanks for reading!  As always your participation in comments and discussions are encouraged and greatly appreciated!! 

Let’s face the facts, we are living in an over-medicated society.  There is a pill we can take for just about everything that is supposed to make it all better.  The pet medication industry is growing, and I suppose it was just a matter of time before prescription drugs became more common for your pets.  I realize that there are some diseases and disorders that require medication in order for our pets to get better, but I think society is taking it a step too far.

Within the past month, a pill has been approved to help our dogs lose weight and I think this is just the beginning of the problem.  Are we really looking for the best diet pill for our dogs? Is this really happening? Sadly, the answer is yes.  The pet pharmaceutical business rakes in about $4 billion dollars a year.  That figure in itself should show how over-medicated we are and how quick we are to shell out money for pills rather than getting to the real problem.

I, like many other people have tried diet pills for humans, and I quickly realized that they are not the solution.  If you do not exercise and eat right, the diet pills are no good.  The same thing is true for our pets.  If people think that giving your dog a simple pill will help her lose weight, they are wrong.  Diet and exercise is 100% more effective than any pill.  Your dog should be getting exercise regularly, and with a healthy diet, they will lose weight.

We have become almost completely dependent on pharmaceutical companies to produce medications so we ourselves do not have to change our habits.  I think we need to break away from those companies and try doing things the logical way first.  While I am not completely sure of the side effects of the diet pill for dogs, or any other medication, I know that doing things the way nature intended is better than giving our pets man made medication.

Thanks for reading!  As always your participation in comments and discussions is encouraged and greatly appreciated!!