Animals grieve too.  I really feel for all of you.  I hope it gets better very soon.

Hi,

I'm new to this discussion. I can certainly relate to the expense of owning pets. We have a dog and a cat. Some of the things we buy for our pets everyday needs can be bought at a dollar store. When my son and his wife recently added a cat to their household, I got them two metal feeding dishes, a plastic food mat, a collar, a litter scoop and brand name cat treats for a dollar each. You can also get dog and cat toys, rawhide treats and dog biscuits. Our cat also has a smaller version of those food/water dispensers that I found at the dollar store for a buck. 

 I have gotten lots of great pet items at the DS in the past.  I'm going to stop this week for a new pet brush. 

Michelle I feel for you and your dh. At 830 this morning we had to put our 11 yo dalmatian to sleep. She died peacefully with her head in my arms and ds holding  part of her. Dh could not bear to be in the room with us as she was his baby. She was blind and delveloped severe anxiety the last few weeks along with other problems. We had to be with her 24/7 in order to quiet her. We will miss her deeply.

 There seems to be a run of issues with pets lately. My sympathies to all of you with ill pets or those who have recently lost.

 Oh Joyce I am so very sorry...my heart hurts for you and your hubby.

 Some of the  cheaper rawhide treats are made in China and they are said to be preserved  with arsenic. You might want to make sure they are not manufactured there.

Have two cats and a dog, all in good health but all, also, 'mature'. Both cats were rescues - one as a tiny kitten, the other as a year old 'street cat'. One got good food and proper care from the start, the other didn't - and it makes a HUGE difference. The older one, 14 now, got as a tiny kitten, is in excellent health. Had her first teeth cleaning at 13! The other guy, around 12 now, only has 5 teeth left. My brat of a dog has managed to break two teeth from chewing bones too aggressively. After struggling to pay for vet bills with previous pets, for the past five years I've kept a strong savings account just for that purpose. Nothing is worse than not having the funds to pay for treatment, because you will get absolutely NO compassion or mercy from vets.

I'll probably take heat for this, but imo vets are among the worst excuses for human(?) beings I've ever encountered. Greed is their first, middle and last name. It may be there are some 'old time' vets left, but they are few and far between.

The situation where I live has gotten worse recently. There are only 3 vet offices in the area - and two are now owned by some huge corporation. The vet we've used for the 5 years we've been here sold out and moved out of state (big surprise - NOT!). The only vet left in that office is an incompetent who could be the poster child for 'politcal correctness/affirmative action gone mad'. She is a dwarf, and simply not *physically capable* of doing the work - not in handling/controlling larger breeds, and lacking the manual dexterity to do surgeries. I found it interesting that since my vet left, they have a vet in who *only does surgeries*. Not her. Just him. Hmmmm... Have heard nothing but complaints about her, and my own experience has been such 'she'll touch my pet over my dead body!' Up til now, I've been able to avoid her, but now she's the only one left, I'll have to use the other vet office not owned by the corporation. He has a great rep, but it's still very hard switching abruptly like this:(

Re frugality, and I apolize for getting ot, I no longer do shots on my two cats. They received yearly innoculations the first five or so years, a booster about 5 years ago, and nothing since. They simply don't need them - they are indoor only kitties. Same situation with my dog. He gets the required rabies shot to protect *him*, gets quality food (I use Dawgfood.com, which delivers free to many Western states), is mostly an inside dog, and his last 'regular' innoculations were 5 years ago. Vets here, in their greed, push the yearly innoculations - unlike the UK, where they've realized for years now they simply aren't necessary or necessarily *good* for the pet.

I'll add my voice to whoever warned about buying ANY pet products made in China! Please, please, please don't!:(

One of the things that we do is NEVER feed human food to our dog/cats.  Their systems are not set up for people food.  Our previous dog, adopted from the humane society, ( hit by a car a little over a  year ago) was probably about 11 years old and had perfect teeth, according to the vet.  She never had people food, and other than an occasional stolen dirty diaper (LOL, TMI I know), or tin can out of someone elses garbage, never had anything other than a good quality dog food.  She was picky about her food and only liked one particular brand.  This brand is the same one we are raising our pup on. There again, that doesn't count what she licks off the floor, and sometimes DH will give her a bite of apple when he is eating one.  Some inoculations can be purchased without a prescription from a regular pharmacy with instructions.  We inoculated one of our cats this way.  DH just held the cat, and I grabbed the cat's ruff and shot away.  No problem.
We don't buy toys for the dog or the cats.  The cats entertain themselves with catching mice and bugs, and the dog has a couple of jean legs tied in knots that she chases and kills with much growling.  We tried socks tied in knots but she quickly had shredded socks all over the house, LOL.  The denim seems much stronger and takes a lot of effort to destroy.  She is not quite 10 months old, and is a perfect joy, keeps us laughing, and hardly ever gets into trouble.  She has never, and I do mean never, destroyed anything that did not belong to her.  How she differentiates between what is hers and what is ours is a mystery to us.
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