Pets

As the forum title implies: This is the forum for "anything else" which doesn't fit into one of the other forums.
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lance
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Pets

Post by lance » Oct 22nd 2003, 10:02 am

Hey all,

I don't think this thread has been started yet. If you have an pet stories you wish to share, go for it. I wasn't certain if this should be in the "Evertything Else", mods please move if you feel this should be elsewhere.

I will be back later with tales of my two cats, Panzer & Poncho, and other stories.

In the meantime, NPR's All Things Considered reported yesterday that in San Mateo County in California, people bought the fire & emergency servies oxygen masks to revive unconscious dogs & cats.

Apparently they have four sizes of masks for different size pets. The masks cost all of $300.00 and so far they have saved the life of one family dog. The firefighter they interviewed said that they see 10-12 pets per year that could be saved by the new masks.

More later,

LanceMan

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starbug
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Post by starbug » Oct 22nd 2003, 10:19 am

Great thread Lance!
I've had loads of pets, so have quite a few pet stories to tell...

My first pet was a rabbit... she regularly escaped, but she always came back, and twice she came back pregnant. But they were crosses with wild rabbits so not really good for pets. My parents told me they took the babies to the pet shop when they were old enough to go to good homes... but now I can't imagine any petshop buying them so I have my suspicions they just set them free to fend for themselves... we certainly couldn't cope with 20 or so baby rabbits - no matter how cute they were.

then I had hamsters and they are the purveyors of many a fine tale. I used to have a trendy Rotastack cage for them, with a removable food bowl. Unfortunately when you removed it, it left a big hole in the bottom of the cage. Pretty soon the hammy learned how to remove it and chew a giant hole in the brand new carpet in my parents' hallway.

Hammy no. 2 escaped and chewed up the inside of the sofa-bed to make a nest. Again, that went down well.
hammy no. 2, intrepid explorer, also found his way into the wall cavity of the house (through a tiny hole between the toilet outflow pipe and the wall) and could be heard for a couple of days rattling around in there. I think my dad was almost apoplectic about the potential cable destruction... then hammy came back out of his own accord and we never discovered any damage.

Also had a bird who was completely nuts - she would simply refuse to come out of her cage, no matter what lovely treat you dangled there. And she loved watching wildlife programmes on the TV and would sing along with the birdies on the TV.

When I was a student my flatmate kept rats... eugh. They were pretty horrid. I think it is their tails.

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Post by Megs » Oct 22nd 2003, 1:50 pm

My husband and i have two cats. Conan and Tabby. When I have more time, I will tell you more. Suffice it to say, Conan is a beast, thinks he is a dog, and is my husband's cat. Tabby is a princess, scared of everyone (even us sometimes), and loves to lay on my lap (and on my butt when I'm in bed sleeping on my stomach :D ) and is my cat.

I have pictures on ofoto.com:

Conan:

http://images.ofoto.com/photos276/6/15/ ... _0_ALB.jpg

Tabby:

http://images.ofoto.com/photos465/1/70/ ... _0_ALB.jpg
"I have all these dreams where I know exactly what to say. And you tell me, you know, that you forgive me."

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lance
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Post by lance » Oct 22nd 2003, 1:56 pm

Megs wrote:My husband and i have two cats. Conan and Tabby. When I have more time, I will tell you more. Suffice it to say, Conan is a beast, thinks he is a dog, and is my husband's cat. Tabby is a princess, scared of everyone (even us sometimes), and loves to lay on my lap (and on my butt when I'm in bed sleeping on my stomach :D ) and is my cat.

I have pictures on ofoto.com:

Conan:

http://images.ofoto.com/photos276/6/15/ ... _0_ALB.jpg

Tabby:

http://images.ofoto.com/photos465/1/70/ ... _0_ALB.jpg
Megs,

Cool, I would love to hear more about them. I just tried your links and a got a "Forbidden" message. I am currently at work using Explorer, are the links bad or could it by the filtering software here?

LanceMan

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Post by Nothingman » Oct 22nd 2003, 2:24 pm

We don't have normal pets at my house. I have a leopard gecko named Mr. Jones that likes hooded sweatshirts and couch cushions. And my girlfriend has a quaker parrot named Sammy. I hate birds as pets, they are too noisy and messy for me and I would like nothing better than to take him back to the store he came from. In fact the only thing I like about him is the smile he puts on my girlfriends face. He spends a lot of time locked in the office when I'm home where I can't hear him. I prefer my gecko, he's small, makes no noise, and only needs food once every week or two, so when I'm away, he's just fine, except he's a bit grumpy when I get home because he hasn't been let out to explore. He can be really stubborn when decides there is a particular spot he wants to go to.
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Post by Megs » Oct 22nd 2003, 3:51 pm

lance wrote:
Megs wrote:My husband and i have two cats. Conan and Tabby. When I have more time, I will tell you more. Suffice it to say, Conan is a beast, thinks he is a dog, and is my husband's cat. Tabby is a princess, scared of everyone (even us sometimes), and loves to lay on my lap (and on my butt when I'm in bed sleeping on my stomach :D ) and is my cat.

I have pictures on ofoto.com:

Conan:

http://images.ofoto.com/photos276/6/15/ ... _0_ALB.jpg

Tabby:

http://images.ofoto.com/photos465/1/70/ ... _0_ALB.jpg
Megs,

Cool, I would love to hear more about them. I just tried your links and a got a "Forbidden" message. I am currently at work using Explorer, are the links bad or could it by the filtering software here?

LanceMan
I got that, too. Maybe ofoto won't let you link to pics anymore.
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Post by ducksqueak » Oct 22nd 2003, 6:58 pm

I've had only one pet in my life. She's a cat named Gizmo. I got her right after GREMLINS came out and slightly resembles the actual Gizmo. I've had Gizmo since I was 3 years old and I'm 20 now. I don't know how old she is because we got her at a shelter. She was most likely an adult cat when we got her because she hasn't grown much. She's probably about 18 or 19. She's a little neurotic. When I lived in a dorm (my first semester of college), she started pulling her fur out and biting hersef. She cries when I'm at school. This morning, she started crying when I went in the shower. She was my best friend during the scarring middle school years.
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lance
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Panzer

Post by lance » Oct 23rd 2003, 4:43 pm

Hello,

Great stories so far, please keep them going.

Okay, I have decided to tell you about my cat Panzer.

Way back in the winter of 1987, when I was a junior in high school, my sister adopted a stray cat dubbed, "Sweetcakes". Gradually my brother (the one who recently got out of the army) and I noticed that Sweetcakes was gettting larger and larger. Sweetcakes was becoming very, very pregnant.

One Spring morning I was doing my usual morning cavorting, when I noticed that Sweetcakes had suddenly lost a great deal of weight and her belly was flapping as she strode by, "Oh Crap!" said I. The family spread out on hands and knees looking for the kittens.

Deep in the corner of the living room, nestled in the nightmare orange shag carpet of 70s lore, were 5 tiny kittens. Each one could fit in the palm of your hand. Their eyes were closed and they could barely meow.

Quickly we put them into a small shoebox. As the Spring progressed they grew and their eyes opened. Chaos quickly ensued.

By the beginning of summer, and the arrival of the 17 year cicadas-who are due back this spring btw-, we were forced to build "kitten containment units". The small cage we had was not big enough, so we built all kinds of cages from scratch. Every afternoon I would come home from school, go into the den and look in the cage: no kittens.

I would remain still and cup would move across the counter by itself, a bag of catfood would suddenly tumble from a high shelf and the curtains would sway with no breeze and no fan on. One by one, I would pluck the kittens from their spots and put them back in the cage. The five were: the 'trazans (the two kittens who always led the escape from the cage were named after Alcatraz prison), panther (all black), panzer (a small grey furball with golden eyes) and hulkster (named after Hulk Hogan).

Eventually we were only able to keep 2 cats: Panzer and Hulkster. Panzer was my cat and Hulkster was my brothers. My sister being the youngest, had to share with us. Don't feel too sorry for her, she got away with a lot of other things, believe me.

Anyway Hulkster was the runt of the litter and he always took on at least 3 other kittens at a time. Both Panzer and Hulkster were incredibly, incredibly smart. My brother in one his more infinitely brillant moves, put Hulkster in a box and shook the box. The box was silent, nobody moved. Paul bent down to peer in the box...(if you had blinked at this point you would have missed it)...hulkster, using cat-like reflexes :wink: leapt straight out of the box, a foot in the air and nailed my brother across the cheek. As blood dripped down my brother's face he said, "Yeah, that was pretty stupid on my part." Hulkster also bared the distinction of being the only cat I have seen to hug a human being.

I am not exaggerating here. My brother and and just got home from school and went into the dining room. Hulkster spied Paul, issued a loud, "meow!", jumped on the table, stood on his hind paws, stretched his front paws around my brother's neck and hugged him.

:shock:

Hulkster eventually disappeared around 1991. We looked everywhere, called the SPCA, nothing. Never saw him again.

Panzer, is still with me. After some of my more major surgeries he stayed by my bedside night and day until I had recovered. In 1992 in the spring, I left my house to catch the bus to head to university. I had crossed the street and was waiting by the street when saw something truly amazing.

A cat had come right up to the edge of the street and stood, waiting patiently in front of the cross walk. He looked both ways, waited for the cars to go by and then using the crosswalk made across the street.

:shock:

"Wow!" said I, "that's pretty cool." "Hey, wait a minute I know that fluff ball, its my cat!" I wanted to be angry at him for crossing a major street, but I was so proud he used the crosswalk that I couldn't be. I missed my bus but got my cat back inside.

More later,

LanceMan

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Post by dTheater » Oct 24th 2003, 12:28 am

I got my first cat, Sybil, when I was about 2 and she was a year younger than me. She belonged to some relatives of mine that my family didn't see very often. They went away on a vacation and we took care of Sybil while they were away. Their 1 month vacation turned into 6 months, and by the time they were ready to take Sybil back, we said "no way" so they agreed and we assumed Sybil as our own.

As a kid, I nearly killed her many times. Once I locked her in a drawer and my mom found her several hours later when she heard the sound of faint meowing. I also used to toss the cat down the steps. She always landed on her feet. Mind you, I was 4 years old.

Cats don't hold grudges, though, because she learned to trust me when I learned to stop terrorizing her. She died from diabetes when she was 17. Very sad day. I still have her picture in my bedroom.

During Sybil's lifetime, I had several others cats: Lenny, who was the craziest cat, running into tables and bouncing off walls, literally. He died pretty young when he got hit by a car. The next one was Kitty. She was very anti-social. She died after a few years also. Her death is a mystery to this day. Her and Sybil were fighting/playing. Then they stopped. Sybil walked away. A few minutes later, I looked around and Kitty was dead. Couldn't figure it out.

Long after Sybil died, we got Ally, who is thankfully still with us, and she rocks. She's the most affectionate cat ever, and also quite insane.

I also had a hamster named Squish -- yes, Squish -- who used to ride around in toy cars and scare my cats and chew through his hamter house. The knawling was so loud, I had to put him in a closet in the basement. Woke up one day to find that he had chewed through the plastic cover and I never saw him again.

And there were some short-lived goldfish.
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lance
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Post by lance » Aug 21st 2004, 3:07 pm

Hey all,

Okay, with the recent passing of the last of my cats I am contemplating the future of pets here in lanceland.

I am thinking about getting two kittens and a puppy. So here is my question: Does anybody know of dog breeds that I should look for that do well with other animals like cats?

Any ideas would be appreciated.

-LanceMan

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Post by Natasha (candygirl) » Aug 21st 2004, 6:18 pm

So sorry to hear about Poncho. I don't have much advice about which dogs get along with cats, but I would imagine most breeds that are good with kids would be a good choice.
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Post by lance » Aug 22nd 2004, 4:24 pm

candygirl wrote:So sorry to hear about Poncho. I don't have much advice about which dogs get along with cats, but I would imagine most breeds that are good with kids would be a good choice.
:(

Yeah, it was definately not a fun time. Good idea though about the kid angle. I will follow up on that one. Quick, to the library!

-LanceMan

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Post by Natasha (candygirl) » Aug 22nd 2004, 8:34 pm

Do you plan to get all the animals at the same time? I'm not sure how much of a difference that makes in general, but I have heard people say that it's easier on the animals if they are raised together. My family tried to do it once. We already had a puppy and about a year later, we brought home a kitten. The puppy was curious and wanted to sniff and make friends but the kitten tried to claw the dog. After a few days, we figured out that they were not going to get along due to the kitten's aggressive behavior. The dog had seniority in the house already, so we gave away the kitten.
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Post by Nostradamus » Aug 22nd 2004, 10:09 pm

My best friend has had a female poodle for about 15 (!) years now which gets along well with just about anything, and does especially well with cats. She seems to think of anything smaller than her as a puppy and treats it as such. Of course, poodles are one those breeds that you either love or don't, and your neighbors might not appreciate the yapping.

I also concur with CG; animals that grow up together tend to get along better. Getting them "fixed" usually reduces aggression, and prevents your home being overun by cute but tiresome litters of puppies and kittens.
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Post by Nothingman » Aug 23rd 2004, 11:36 am

I'd get the puppy first and get it house trained before you get any kittens. For one you it will make the load of having three young pets in the house easier. And the other reason is the cats will adjust to the dog easily. The dog is already there and they will accept it and be fine. If you go cats first, they will think it's their house and a puppy could be a threat to that. The potential for conflict is greater. Of course there are exceptions because they all have different personalities but in general I think it's a good approach.
"To come to your senses, you must first go out of your mind." - Alan Watts

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