• Covid-19: Pet pawrents, pets and social distancing

    Thinking about your pets and what you can do to help in these trying times

    After WHO described Covid-19 as a pandemic disease, a lot of countries, in order to ‘flatten the curve’ for Covid-19, asked their residents to maintain social distancing by:

     

    - Closing schools and universities and switch to online classes

    - Stay at home and work from home

    - Canceling public gathering and events

    - Maintaining 1 -2m distance from other people in the public

     

    As pet pawrent, you may possibly face two situations during Covid-19:

     

    Situation A: you will stay at home to work from home.

    Situation B: you will stay at home in case of Covid-19 sickness.

     

    What can you do in these two situations to keep your pet safe, happy and healthy? Here is some general advice on pet safety during social distancing;

     

    Situation A: Working from home

     

    1. Spend more time with your pet

    Your pet can be a wonderful provider of emotional support amid the covid-19 pandemic. Social distancing is an opportunity for you to spend more time with your pet and reduce reliance on pet boarding centers. You can play with your pet as well. Some dogs require quite a lot of exercise, and this can be difficult to do in this situation, make sure you spend enough time playing and entertaining this type of dog to help disperse some of their energy – take the time to teach it new tricks, mental energy can also contribute to wearing them out.

     

    2. Check your pets vaccination card & records

    Make sure your pets records are all up to date and complete, update vaccinations if required, make sure they have a microchip.

     

    3. Foster a pet

    Search for pet adoption centers in your living area and foster a pet while working at home to cope with loneliness and depression caused by Covid-19. This also helps relieve the workload and financial burden on shelters, and can give your current pet a playmate while they are housebound.

     

    4. No need to buy face mask for your pets

    The WHO say there’s no evidence that animals can get the Covid-19 virus and spread it to their owners. So there is no need to panic and buy face masks for your pets, save them for all the front liners that need them.

     

    5. Ensure you have enough pet food, treats, medications, ancillary items and cleaning products.

    If you want to keep your pet healthy, you need to stock some pet food and treats for a couple of weeks to make sure your pet will stay on a consistent diet. Please do not over-buy. Do not forget to buy ancillary items and cleaning products such as poop bags, kitty litter, pee pads and fake grass for your pets.

     

    6. Entertain your pets

    While working from home try to keep your pets entertained while keeping them away from your personal space. Prepare toys, treats and puzzles to keep them busy.

     

    7. Potty time

    You need to go for a walk with your pet dog for exercise and potty time but if you live in an apartment and don’t have a backyard, you need to potty-train your dog at home. First designate the area of your floor as the potty area, then cover it with newspapers, pee pads or fake grass. Then start your dogs’ potty-training.

     

    Situation B: Infected by Covid-19

    1. Quarantine yourself from your pet if you are infected by Covid-19: We are used to quarantining our pets when they become sick, and cannot imagine the day we would have to quarantine ourselves from our pets when we get sick. We do not know enough about the covid-19 virus, so it will be safer if we keep our distance from our pets in case of this sickness.

     

    Cattening the curve

    Please do stay at home in order to cattening the curve for Covid-19 virus. Here’s the cat version of flattening the curve by Anne Marie Darling:

     

     

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  • Pet Scams

    Caveat emptor /ˌkævɛɑːt ˈɛmptɔːr/ "Let the buyer beware"

    There are people running scams on just about anything;

    • Stuck in space for months with millions in the bank
    • A parcel stuck in customs which is a gift for you
    • A 'friend' on holiday and had everything stolen so needs money sending now

    There are also pet scams, pets looking for adoption, puppies for sale and many more stories. People fall for them all the time, so let this be a warning. Look for the signs;

    • You cannot see the pet
    • No picture is available, or only one or two pictures
    • They want to use their own import agent
    • You have to part with your hard earned cash, to a country that is not where the pet is coming from (usually an African country)
    • They won't give you phone numbers so you cannot call them

    We were recently contacted by a person who had fallen for such a scam, and once it was too late they realised it was a scam, having parted with some hard earned RM, they were then getting asked for more money for more paperwork, at which point they realised they had been duped.

    Now they were getting threatening emails. This can be quite scary when you are getting emails, and they already have your details.

    you need to remember that the scammers cannot do anything, they are the ones in the wrong, so threats are pointless, they just want to scare more money out of you, and will continue to do so. They probably don't even live in the same country. they cannot sue you for anything, pet abandonment in this particular case - but think about it - how can you abandon a pet you don't even own, have never set eyes on and isn't in the same country... That would be a difficult one for them to prove - even if it was possible.

     

    What can you do about it? Report them... warn your friends... but before it gets that far, if you have not seen the pet, or they will not let you travel to collect it and pay cash on arrival (ask them, even if you have no actual plans to do this, if they make excuses then you know there is no pet) question yourself, think of what you can ask;

    • Ask them who the import / export agent is
    • Make google your best friend
    • Ask to see the pet's papers
    • Even if you have got as far as Bank details, check them out - does it seem odd? It probably is!

    Once you have been scammed you can wave goodbye to your cash - the chances of getting it back are practically zero, you can and should make a police report. You can tell everyone you know (I know, I know, we don't want to admit to anyone we were duped, but if we don't admit it how can we make more people aware of what is happening?

     

    Sometimes we get so excited at the thought of a new pet that we get carried away and forget all the sensible things we should be doing. Taking on any pet is a lifetime program, so a little bit of preparation is essential.

     

    Known pet scams

    Just take the time to look at a few of these links;

     

    Uship pet scammers

     

    Scam Warners

     

    Video about scams

     

    List of known scammers