Animal Ownership - Tumblr Posts

Its actually appalling how few pet owners have safety, evacuation and rescue training and plans in place for their pets.

actually, I’ve been thinking about pet evacuation recently and this reminded me of how I’m about to start trying to get my cat to go into his crate (or at least allow me to get him in easier) because I’ve started to overthink about scenarios where we need to evacuate. Not trying to start an argument or make a snide comment, I just find the timing of your post interesting

There is no argument. Anyone who does not yet have these plans and this training in place or is preparing to is being irresponsible. Even if you don't live in an area known for natural disasters, you literally never know what could happen.

You could have a house fire. A sinkhole. A burst pipe. Gas leak.

Anything could happen that means you need to get your pet out and you need to get your pet out now. It could literally mean the difference between life and death for both you and your pet to have these things in place.

I've seen so many heartbroken stories about how people lost their pets in things like housefires because they didn't know where it was hiding or didn't have a carrier to get it outside or it wouldn't go in the carrier because it had never been in one before.

You need to practice these things. You need to have a plan in place. You need to teach your pet that in an emergency you are the safe place. No matter how sure you are that you know your pet or you'll never be one of those people who needs to do it.

All pets where it is realistic to do so should be trained in:

Not freaking out if they wind up stuck or tangled in something. Especially prey animals like horses who can severely injure themselves and anyone trying to help them by panicking this way.

Evacuating the location in an emergency/rush and in the transportation method available. Trailer, carrier, ect.

Taking medicine, being inspected and treated for injuries.

Having their faces/eyes/ears/noses covered in the instance you need to do so to prevent them from inhaling something, getting something in their eyes, ect.

Re: pet evacuation

I don't know how you'd do it with other creatures since I've never had any, but I've always trained my dogs to come find me immediately when they hear the fire alarm. Not too hard with food motivated creatures; give them a tasty treat whenever they hear a fire alarm and they'll learn to search you out real damn fast when they hear it. You start out more often so they learn what to do and what everything means, but now I just reinforce it every once in a while.

Sending this ask bc so many people are so daunted by how to approach this type of training that they just never do it; maybe it'll help take away some of the "holy shit how the fuck do I even do that" panic

Pretty much any animal can be trained via food. Animals are extremely motived by food due to the instinctual drive to eat to survive and eat what they can, when they can.

Training an animal just takes time, effort and consistency. In the future I'll probably compile a list of resources for people who are interested in training their animals with emergency protocols and desensitization.

Training your dog to come to you or go to the front door in emergencies is a good place to start