What do you do with your pets when you are traveling?

When you are out of the town, or going for a long trip, what do you do with your pets?
Do you let your relatives, neighbors, friends, or maybe a paid service to take care of your pets? Or do you take them with you?

My family is taking care of my aquariums while I am away. I am not very pleased with what I see in the photos I requested. Algae is everywhere.

I have too many cats and too little money to board them anywhere, so I trade petsitting with one of my cat owning friends. I put out multiple dishes for food and water and extra litter boxes, and the friend comes over every other day or so to scoop and replenish. Every now and then I have a problem cat or two, like orphaned kittens, or cats on meds. In the past, I would go to a Christmas time street festival where there was a silent auction for charity. One of the items you could bid on was a weeks delux boarding at an all-cat vet hospital in the neighborhood. I won it several years, paying about half what it would have cost me otherwise. Then when I took my week and a half trip every August, I would trade this for a slightly longer period of standard boarding for a senior hyperthyroid cat on daily meds. More recently, I met a dog rescuer who offered to cat sit at her place if I needed for litters or problem cats. I took her up on this with a litter of kittens, and then I acquired a very sweet cat I kept who is food obsesed and over weight. I can't leave her the extra bowls of food; she would eat it all the first day. So she goes to the sitter, who can ration her food, and another sitter comes over and takes care of the rest.

It is good to have someone who know what they are doing to take care of your pets.

I didn't expect a cat would eat everything you give to her. lol ! For fish, there is "automatic feeder". Although I have never used one, but I know what they do. They would ratio food automatically, and drop only a little into the fish tank each day. Maybe you need an "automatic cat feeder".

They do make automatic pet feeders for cats and dogs. There is a large hopper on top that you stock with dry food, and a timer and portion control that you can set for when and how much the pet gets. At the set time, a four sectioned plastic wheel rotates. Each section is a quarter cup. You can set to dispense from a quarter cup up to a full cup, as often as three times a day. You'd think this would be perfect for regulating my little glutton, wouldn't you? Well, after a couple of feedings, she figured that the food dropped down this shoot into the dish, and she found that if she reached her paw up into the chute she could flex the vanes on the wheel to make more food fall down. So much for portion control!

(04-01-2012 04:06 PM)Karenskatz Wrote:  They do make automatic pet feeders for cats and dogs. There is a large hopper on top that you stock with dry food, and a timer and portion control that you can set for when and how much the pet gets. At the set time, a four sectioned plastic wheel rotates. Each section is a quarter cup. You can set to dispense from a quarter cup up to a full cup, as often as three times a day. You'd think this would be perfect for regulating my little glutton, wouldn't you? Well, after a couple of feedings, she figured that the food dropped down this shoot into the dish, and she found that if she reached her paw up into the chute she could flex the vanes on the wheel to make more food fall down. So much for portion control!

I did not know there are already automatic feeders for dogs and cats.

lol. Animals are not dumb. They really need to make the automatic feeders more complex. Maybe to install the feeder in a closed room with food coming through a hole on the wall, or something like that. So the pets won't even see the actual feeder.

As we have four pets and do not trust others to care for them with the same quality care we do my wife and I hold down the fort for each other. I stay home when she travels, she stays home when I travel. These are our last pets. Maybe one day we will get to take a trip together.

Admin, that gives me an idea I might try. I'm going to look into making a grill that will fit over the opening of the chute that will let the kibble through, but not let her reach her paw up inside. Fortunatly she can only eat very small round kibble or I'd be risking kibble jams in the chute.

Let me know how it turn out, Karen.

Karenskatz, read what your cat learned! How in the world can people think cats and dogs are not smart?!

Cats are highly intelegent (most of them, anyway. My first guy was all looks and no brains!) But they will only aply that intelegence to things that benefit them. Like manipulating an auto-feeder, or unscrewing the on the kibble jug. Some cats have learned how to open cupboards to get at food, or open refridgerators. Some have learned how to open doors if they want to get in your room to sleep on your bed. Dogs can be trained because they are eager to please the pack leader. Hunting, retrieving, herding, guarding. They can be taught to guide the blind, making judgement calls about when it was NOT safe to obey. Or how to be ears for the deaf. They taught US they could detect seizures, low blood sugar, cancer cells, and we learned how to make use of this. I think much of the underestimating of animals intelegence is due to the language barrier. When we can't make it clear to a dog what we want of them, they apear rather stupid. And cats are selfserving. I have a colection of buttons with sayings about cats, including one that says; "Cats know what you want. They don't give a damn, but they know."

You are preaching to the choir here. I know cats and dogs are smart. I go on a Q & A forum and often run across the "my dog is so stupid he can't _____" (fill in the blank) I am often saying," Your dog is not stupid. You learn how to train him/her and you will be amazed at how smart your dog really is!" I have a friend with a little mix breed dog and I swear, hand to God, I think that dog found my cancer before the doc's did!. The dog was on my lap and suddenly stuck her nose, hard, right into my stomach area and started sniffing & clawing. It was not long after that The docs found renal cell cancer on my pancreas. I had a whipple surgery and the scar is right where that dog was "alerting to"

Yes, they are amazing creatures, aren't they? All this intelegence, and love too! (I knew I didn't have to convince you; I wrote that mostly for other readers.)

One good thing about fish is that they can go on without food for 2~3 weeks. They are cold blood animals, so they do not need much energy at all. Unlike animals with body temperature have to burn a lot of energy to keep the body temperature constant. If it is a short trip, it is no problem that just leaving the fish at home. It might become a problem if the trip is longer. Sure you can ask people to come feed the fish, but often it can cause more problem than good. People who have no knowledge of fish keeping often overfeed and spoil the water. Overfeeding is one of the top reasons for fish to die.

I'm incredibly late to this, but please forgive me as I've been insanely preoccupied lately.

Well, as an agoraphobic who can just manage to make it to the vet if my dogs need assistance, I don't travel. (I do obviously take them for walks, however.) However, breaking out of that rut, I would take my dogs with me. If my dogs can't come, I won't go. I'm too cynical and picky to trust a paid service even if it IS their job, and sadly, my family is not at as attentive as I need them to be with their own animals, let alone trusting them with mine. My brother lives interstate, so having him look after Jas and Ori would be pointless...considering it's most likely the next time I go on a trip I'll only be going up to see him anyway. My neighbors however, I know care for dogs very much...but I would never have the courage to ask them. So if I was flying to see my brother...dogs either come with, or I don't go. Simple. They're like my children, and I couldn't leave them for a long length of time before I start needing them instead. Lol.

Welcome back, OriJas! It is good to see you with us once again!

So you won't go anywhere without Ori and Jas. Hey, I just noticed your forum name is the combination of your two dogs.
Is it a trust issue you have with the paid services/other people? Or do you simply won't let your "kids" out of your sight?

I wish I can take some fish with me everywhere I go too lol, but I can't.

Thank you. It's good to be back. Seems like I have a LOT to catch up on, so please bear with me. Lol.

You only just noticed? Heh. Yeah, seems to be a thing I've noticed around most pet forums I'm a member of. Screen names are usually something like "X'sMom", pet names or similar. Least chance of the name being already used I think. Not that most would name their dog something Hebrew...

It's both, really. I don't like them out of my sight for too long even at home. Jasmine is much too curious and likes to get into EVERYTHING. Plus sadly, my area really isn't the best and there's a lot of cases where bored teens or just jerks will throw poisons over people's fences. I'm very particular when it comes to how my dogs need to be cared for and live on a daily basis. Not a lot of people I know would be willing to bend to my requirements about their care, unfortunately. And paid services...despite them being paid, I still couldn't trust a stranger with the responsibility either. I'd be the same with my human kids, no stranger would be allowed to look after them. I'd have to know them and completely trust them beyond any doubt, and that goes for family members and friends too. Because sadly, you just never know these days...

If I ever had to be without them for a long period though, I'd have to do extensive research on the person or people looking after them before I even consider them. Their ability to care for them in an environment that isn't too overwhelming, which probably would rule out most with young children and obviously...they have enough on their plates among other reasons. If anything happens while I'm away, they would need to take them STRAIGHT to the vet even if it's 4am, of course I'd pay for that too, but I'd much rather them have been to the vet before I get back to find them worse.

I'm a panic-pet-parent. If my dogs are acting strange in any way, or there's even a small "hot spot" on their skin, vet gets called right away, and the appointment is made for usually the next half an hour. Same day at least. So yeah...it's usually best they do stay with me, because not many people I know would be willing to put their own life on immediate hold to rush to the vet over an itchy ear. (True story, too!)

I would agree that it is probably a bad idea to give your pets to someone with small children. Their own children will obviously come first before someone else's pets. If you have to let someone to take care of your pets temporary, it might be a better idea to have someone who live alone, or retired. Either way, someone with a lot of free time and does not have something else important to divert their attention.

That particular person will have to
1. love pets too
2. very friendly to you that is willing to follow your exact instructions
3. while being very responsible

My wife's parents will be taking care of our cat and fish while we are away. We take care of their cats when they travel.

James

According to my point of view pets are very good when it with us but sometime it creates problems when we travel because you cannot enjoy fully with pets.so mostly pet should be at home but with full of careness.


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When on holiday, our next-door neighbour looks after the cat. Since we've been neighbours for decades, we can trust him. I imagine it's a different story with dogs, but our cat's quite independent and so can take care of herself so long as she is brought food and water. Dogs of course need more human interaction.

When we usually travel we would have a family member to watch our two cats. Since most of our families have pets themselves we know that they'll take great care in making sure they're fed and given some time to play with another human. Almost like hiring a babysitter only for a bit longer than the norm.

normally i try and take my pets with me. this is hard with chameleons and their special needs though, so i try and set everything up so all my family has to do is feed them. i have an automatic timer for the lights and misters and make sure all the drainage tubs are dumped, and they will be good for a week in July i will be going to Connecticut for a week and will have to leave my chammies home, but will take my geckos with me :3

The reason I don't currently have a pet is because at this stage of my life I intend to do a lot of international travel and know it would be selfish and unfair to keep a pet.

When I was a child on occasion my family would go on holiday but only for a week at a time and my grandparents who doted on our dogs would look after them. My grandparent's spent a lot of time with our dogs on a day to day basis anyhow so our dogs had no problem being left with them. Although apparently they were a little sad when we were away.

I couldn't imagine leaving a pet with strangers although I'm sure some people in catteries ect.. do a fine job.

We trade chore duties with friends of ours; when they are away we look after their animals and vice-versa. They have many more animals than we do but it is an interesting variety so it is always fun to do their chores. We have alpacas, cats, dogs, horses and a pot belly pig. They have everything we do in addition to llamas, sheep, cows, donkeys, rabbits and a variety of birds.

I have a family member come over and check on my cat when we go on vacation. I leave food and water for him and someone comes over once a day to play with him and make sure he hasn't tipped the bowls over. I usually leave the radio on for him too so he has some noise.