So he was when we reached out and begged him to be the lead photographer on our “The Ultimate Dog-Lover” and “The Ultimate Cat-Lover” (Equine photographer Sarah K. Andrew, whose RockandRacehorses blog is on the left rail, is the lead photographer on our “The Ultimate Horse-Lover.”)

The photography was just about my favorite part of the books — full-color glories that celebrate what our Dr. Becker calls “The Bond,” that special connection we have with animals.

Troy is drawn to the less fortunate of our animals. He has spent countless hours on the streets of post-Katrina New Orleans, caring for and documenting the animals struggling alongside the people there.  The warm weather and boom of rodent populations in the months following the disaster triggered geometric growth in the feral cat population, some kittens born to cats already wild, some to pets left behind when the neighborhoods were washed away.

This morning’s mail brought a note from Troy. He is again using his camera to help animals, this time with modest project: “CATS: Feral Felines by Troy Snow,” a calendar for 2010 with proceeds to benefit the work of Alley Cat Allies.

He apologizes for it being a tad expensive ($17.49), which is also so very Troy. He lives on a shoestring, and is well aware of how many others do, too.

But he needn’t apologize: Having a year of Troy Snow images to enjoy and knowing that the calendar meant a donation for a really good group, well, that’s a bargain at prices far higher than this.

Buy. Buy. Buy.

The third annual Darcy FUNDay took place on Saturday, September 26, which happens to be my husband’s birthday and is close to the actual founding date of the Darcy Fund three years ago. For the past five years I’ve had a pretty good run of scheduling special events for Jerry’s birthday–think full moon hanging over Ngorongoro Crater in Tanzania, for instance–so I’m going to have to go all out next year to top making him work like a, well, dog moving tables and hauling boxes and taking pictures in the hot sun and just generally being my errand boy. He did get presented with a painting of Darcy by artist Betty Turner, though, so I guess it was a fair exchange.

The Gang of Four–Tamela Klisura, Rima Gerendas, Petra Tiber and I–have been planning this event for six or eight weeks. Tamela, aka the blonde tornado, is the general, assigning tasks and following up to make sure everything is on track. She’s not afraid to crack the whip if she thinks we’re slacking off. I think she was Eisenhower in a previous life. Rima and Petra are her incredibly able colonels, hustling up amazing gift baskets from Three Dog Bakery, White Lotus Day Spa, Dawgy Style, California Fine Wine Tasting, Pet Junction, Crown Valley Animal Care Center, Romantic Style, Wild’s Animal Supplies and more. They planned the color scheme, shopped for all the decorations, organized the sign-in and silent auction sheets, and wrapped all the donated items. Pam and Mike Becker and Suzie Cordes couldn’t come because of previous commitments, but they showed up early to help set up. Now those are real friends! Our husbands are the muscle and transportation. We couldn’t do without them.

Me? I write the songs, I mean the checks, kept track of the registrations, rounded up speakers, and did my share of acquiring prizes. They included  books and magazines from publishers TFH and Bowtie; decorative Cavalier items from our good friend and breeder of Bella and Harper Joanne Nash; signed copies from D. Caroline Coile, Ph.D, of her book Cavaliers: A Complete Pet Owner’s Manual (if I couldn’t write this book, I’m glad Caroline did); the gorgeous Cavaliers in Fact and Fancy by Barbara Garnett-Wilson, generously donated every year by Barbara and her husband Roy; a fancy Private Quarters dog bed, donated by Oklahoma dog lover Ann Campbell (yes, I hit up my relatives, too); and a really large and excellent donation of food and treat gift baskets as well as samples for everyone from The Honest Kitchen. Besides being dehydrated and thus the perfect travel food for our many road trips, HK is cool because the company is switching over its chicken-based foods to use only sustainably farmed, free-range chicken from Petaluma Poultry. When it comes to pet foods that are natural and environmentally responsible, they do their best to walk the walk.

Approximately 60 people gathered for our games, speakers and potluck picnic. We’re not a typical breed club. We call ourselves the South Orange County Cavalier Companions, and we’re pet owners who started meeting informally at a Mission Viejo park about 10 years ago. Through word of mouth, we’ve grown to approximately 250, although not everyone comes to every meeting.People have moved or live an hour or more away, but usually you can find 20 or 30 of us at one of the regular meetings and 40 or more at a Darcy FUNDay. There are always a few who have been there since the beginning and knew the Darcinator in person, but everyone seems enthusiastic about the cause, or at least the good time that we have.

We don’t discriminate. Along with all the Cavaliers were a Boston Terrier, a Tibetan Spaniel, a Cocker Spaniel and a pretty little mix who might have been a Lhasapoo or a Cavachon. Someone with a Bernese Mountain Dog walked by our site. Tamela’s husband, Mike, laughed. “Look, a giant tricolor.” The more typically sized tricolor to the right is clearly in, uh, hunting mode. Also seen were a ladybug, a cheerleader and a firefighter.

Pet edu-tainer and my cocktail buddy Arden Moore made her second appearance at the event, sharing tips on petiquette in public. If Tamela was a general in a previous life, I think Arden was a bouncer in a biker bar. How else could she give such great advice on breaking up fights in dog parks and, even better, preventing them in the first place? “If you see dogs starting to look tense, use a happy voice to distract and divert them,” she says. “Change the mood by making yourself the object of attention or getting them to chase a ball.” Arden travels with her dogs even more than I do, so she also had good tips on hotel stays, dining at cafes (hint: don’t let your dog sit in a chair or lick your plate) and air travel.

On a more serious note, veterinary cardiologist Sarah Jane Miller addressed the basics of mitral valve disease, including signs and treatment, and new medications such as pimobendan (Vetmedin) and took questions from the audience about diet, exercise and lifespan. I can’t say enough good things about veterinarians like Dr. Miller who are willing to give up their Saturday morning to help educate pet owners or participate in health clinics so that people who might not otherwise have a chance to take their dogs to a specialist can have the opportunity to learn more or to get a baseline report on their dog’s condition. We hope she’ll come back sometime. I spent a lot of time worrying about Bella, concerned that she would be stressed by all the people, dogs and activity, not to mention the heat, even though the pen was in a shaded, breezy area, but she was a trooper and did just fine. I was still glad a cardiologist was there, though.

I always feel bad for my dogs during this event. I don’t think they’ve ever gotten to participate in any of the games or contests. No “fastest biscuit eater” or “race to owner” or “longest ears” or “oldest dog” or “cutest costume” for them. They’re stuck in the Cavalier corral, begging for attention from strangers while I make the rounds to ensure that all is going well or make announcements or answer questions. (I think they’re grateful that they’re not in the costume contest, though.)  Tamela’s dogs didn’t get to come, either. The English Toys stayed home, and Farley, a handsome ruby boy, was in the hospital with pneumonia, fighting for his life. Tamela had planned to bring him home yesterday afternoon, but when she got to the hospital he had taken a turn for the worse. We’re all pulling for him. He’s a sweet dog and a poster boy for Cavaliers: 9 years old and murmur-free. I just got the good news that Tamela is picking him up from the veterinary hospital. That makes me happy. He and Darcy were special friends, as seen in the photo above, and I’d hate to see anything happen to him.

Arden did a brief video of the event, so if these photos leave you wanting more, here is where to see it. We haven’t totaled the amount brought in yet, but it’s well over $1,600 so far.

When I started the Darcy Fund three years ago, I wasn’t really sure how exactly we would raise funds for it, but Tamela gave me the first FUNDay as a birthday present, and we’ve continued them ever since. I can’t thank her enough for coming up with the idea. These events have been more fun than I ever imagined, and I have been surrounded by wonderful people  who are really the ones who make it happen every year. My goal now is to see Darcy FUNDays spread to other Cavalier groups around the country or to inspire people in other breeds to start their own fund. Together we can make a difference in all our dogs’ lives.

That means I have to replace his ID tag, his rabies tag, his dog park permit and his city license, or potentially receive an expen$ive ticket that the local authorities hand out like candy. I’m thankful the hunky park ranger who polices our dog park knows us and knows my dogs have their tags, but I still need to get them replaced.

Because Dodger had an unpleasant habit of chewing his metal tags into illegible junk metal, which sounded like nails on a chalkboard, I put his tags on the back of the harness he wears to the dog park. When he managed to chew them from the side I put them in a neoprene tag bag for a successful cessation to chewing his own tags. Sure, he moved on to Ginger’s tags, but after she wore a collar with no tags, he seems to have stopped that and she now wears her tags on her collar again. So far as I know, he has never tried to chew Dickens’ ID tag; the hissing would be intense.

It never occurred to me that he would lose his tags by rolling on his back, but now it’s a big slap upside the head. Duh. He loves the dog park, and quivers in excitement while waiting for me to open the entrance gate. He loves everything about it: running like the wind, stalking little birdies and then chasing them, sticking his head in varmint burrows and zooming down the fenceline at setter speed. There’s a reason he’s nicknamed The Blur; I’ve been thinking I should have named him Rocket Dog. This summer he has begun exhibiting his joy (or some itchiness) by rolling on his back in the grass with all of his legs stuck up in the air. His exuberance is obvious. He’s not like any other dog at the park: all the other dogs like to socialize either with dogs or with people. He doesn’t want to socialize, he just wants to run. Thanks to co-blogger and ace trainer Liz Palika’s help, he no longer humps other dogs.

But all that rolling now means spending time replacing those lost tags. The clinic is mailing another rabies tag today. I’ll go to the pet supply store and order another Red Dingo ID tag. Here’s the really annoying part: The city charges only a whopping 25 cents to replace his license, but $10 to replace the park permit. Go figure. However, while he must wear the license, he doesn’t have to wear the park permit; I can carry it so I’ll put it on my key chain where he won’t roll it off again.  His collar is embroidered with his name and our phone number, and he’s microchipped.

So let’s see: $10 for another ID tag, $10 for the park permit, and I don’t know what the charge will be from my vet to make another rabies tag. Plus, an hour gone, and at my billable rate…well, that’s an expensive roll in the grass. So much for the good things in life being free.

In the meantime, it makes me happy to see him roll on his back in the deeply green grass and look at the sky while waving his long feathered legs. It’s what summer is all about.

It was not to be.

The interview had been teased with a mention of the pet-food recall, which NPR characterized as having “sickened” pets, which is true only if you grant that most organisms “sicken” before, you know, actually dying, which is what thousands of pets did, NPR’s glossing over aside.

New FDA Commissioner Margaret Hamburg batted away the question about the pet-food recall’s core issue — the fraudulent substitution of melamine by foreign companies in order to game the protein readings — by acknowledging the challenges the agency faces with globalization and her intent to modernize.

To be fair, Dr. Hamburg has a good reputation and she just started the job. And of course, this is just one interview. But frankly, I would have liked to have seen a little more  determination, a little more acknowledgment that the FDA as it exists today is a shadow of the consumer-protection firebrand it once was — if not an outright servant of the industries it’s supposed to regulate — and how she was going to change that.

After all, we know tobacco kills, and that shouldn’t be news to the anyone including the FDA, which just got handed the task of regulating tobacco products. What we shouldn’t have to worry about killing us or our pets is the food we buy.

Here’s the interview.

***

Dr. Marion Nestle always stresses what we have said on this blog from the first day of the pet-food recall: This isn’t about “pet food” vs. “people food”: It’s about safe food, and it all comes from the same places.

On her “Food Politics” blog, Dr. Nestle talks about the problems with multi-nutrient supplements:

It’s hard not to think of multivitamin supplements (which also include minerals) as perfectly safe, since the amounts of specific nutrients rarely exceed recommended levels.  But according to recent reports, formulation mistakes get made and these don’t always get caught by quality controls.  Here are two examples.

According to FoodProductionDaily.com, 25% of Adverse Event Reports (AERs) sent into the FDA last year concerned multivitamin supplements. This, says one supplement trade association, should not be interpreted to mean that there is anything wrong with the supplements.  Maybe not, but how about checking?

She then puts these findings in context of the recent recalls of Nutro. More here.

***

Finally and also food-related, Pet Connection BFF Dr. Patty Khuy writes about prescription pet diets on her Dolittler blog:

The concept of a “prescription only” diet has merely been a marketing success for pet food companies who label their products as such and somehow manage to have engendered a belief that a product labeled as a “Prescription Diet”… requires a prescription.

But this is NOT TRUE! There is no legal basis for requiring a prescription for a product that is NOT regulated by the FDA as a drug. Shall I repeat that or was it sufficiently clear?

Nonetheless, it IS true that any private retail establishment has the right to require a veterinarian’s say-so before you can buy ANYTHING from them. Sure, PetSmart is not about to require a written script for leashes and kitty litter, but if it wants to do business with pet food behemoths like Hills and Iams, then they’re darn well not going to tick them off by failing to follow manufacturer requirements for sale of Prescription Diets.

More here.

After recent near hysteria involving a decomposing mouse stuck to my bedroom floor, I realized that my kitchen drawers were full of mouse poop, which means they were also full of mouse pee. I don’t cook much and thus am not in the drawers often. I once again had a major mouse problem.

How can this happen with a varmint-obsessed dog and a cat in the house?

And now that the mice are back, how do I keep my pets and myself safe from diseases?

As a child, I had mice as pets. They’re sweet little guys, and cute as can be.  I cannot kill them. So starting a couple of years ago, I live-trapped. I would pack up a frightened little soul, put the trap in a box, chauffeur the mouse to more than a mile away (you have to go at least a mile away or they might return to your house), and release him in a field to become someone else’s house guest.

There’s a real problem with having wild mice in the house, other than the extensive damage they can cause to property; my humane cousins wouldn’t call an exterminator until mice ate through the wiring in both of their Mercedes, costing several thousand dollars to repair. Mice can cause some pretty nasty health issues for humans. According to the CDC, “In the United States, rodents can spread diseases like hantavirus pulmonary syndrome, rat-bite fever, leptospirosis, and lymphocytic choriomeningitis virus, a virus that poses a particular risk for pregnant women.” And if you poison them, they can cause some nasty health issues for your pets.

For a couple of years, I’ve been trying to handle my mouse problem by warding them off using the concept of integrated pest management rather than killing them.  Above and beyond live trapping, all food stuffs are kept in plastic canisters like Tupperware or  Buddeez (I like the ways Buddeez  accommodates a kibble bag); steel wool is placed in holes they can fit through;  fox urine granules in Shake-Away are sprinkled appropriately (hey, if you can fight fire with fire, you can fight mouse urine with urine of a predator that we cannot smell); no pet food is left in bowls, which isn’t a problem with my crew of inhalers; no food is left on the counter (if I did, Dodger would eat it); Bounce dryer sheets are strewn around the kitchen (I read somewhere it’s supposed to help); and the best natural pest control of all time, a varmint-obsessed dog and a cat. But at my house, the pets are total slackers in this regard. I once found Dickens half heartedly whapping a wee mousie around, and Dodger ran down the stairs and just watched him whap. Didn’t even blink.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) also recommends cleaning up right after you cook (and I do on the rare occasions I cook), keeping bird and squirrel feeders away from the house, and keeping the compost bin away from the house. I am going to have to drag the compost bin farther away.

Even with all this, over the past couple of years I have found kitchen drawers full of mouse poop about three times. I clean them out, disinfect, and start all over again.  I am now fed up enough that I can’t handle more drawers full of poop. I can’t bring myself to use traps that kill, but I can put out a contract on them: I called an exterminator. A friend said her mother had a similar approach of “being nice” until you could see the mice bouncing around in the utility room. I’m ready too, so no more Ms. Nice Guy.  The scope is now beyond me. Just in case, I tried a new live trap on Saturday, but no one has been wise enough to use it.

This morning the exterminator came out to set more traps in appropriate places. The exterminator was made keenly aware that I have pets and that no rodenticides or poisons are to be used. Not only will rodenticide kill rodents, but it can kill your pets if they get into the poison or eat a (dead or alive) animal that ingested it. Next week will be by far the most important step:  sealing off places where mice can enter the house.  The CDC says that “mice can squeeze through a hole the size of a nickel, and rats can squeeze through a hole the size of a half dollar!” By all means, I’m up for sealing. It’s best to have a professional wise in the ways of rodent pathways to search, but any holes you seal help.

The exterminator said the reason my pets aren’t getting the mice is the mice have contained themselves in order to avoid my pets – for the most part, the mice won’t leave the basement, attic, or the area behind the kitchen walls (aieee!).  And now that the exterminator has prowled the house, I have a new concern: bat guano in the attic. I don’t even want to talk about it.

If you are going to use traps that kill – and I totally understand that most folks have the stomach for it – use the humane ones. The snap traps are quickest and the most humane, like a guillotine, but don’t touch the body while you’re cleaning up. I think the glue traps are unbelievably cruel – terrified animals are stuck to the trap and then wait a long time to die of dehydration or panic.  I don’t think poison is a humane choice, although I understand why people choose to use it. If you choose to use poison, be sure to use an anticoagulant rodenticide because the veterinarian has an antidote to it if your dog or cat gets into it or eats a poisoned rodent.

There’s being kind to animals and there’s mouse poop in your house.  Find your acceptable line, draw it in the sand, and don’t let the mice cross it.

The pet-loving folks at Fox have asked Dr. Becker to show off  the top new pet products for summer. You’ll see award-winning new toys, gee-wiz solutions to old problems and innovations to make your life easier and your pet’s life better. Many of these products were award winners from Dog Fancy’s Editor’s Choice Awards, winners from the recent Global Pet Expo, or new products that were tested on Dr. Becker’s pets and patients.

The Tweeting Cat Door is a hilariously ingenious do-it-yourself contraption. I’m not sure if the cat-adoring owner is a geek, but I’m thinking that would explain a lot. The door is RFID-enabled, which is the same type of radio frequency identification technology used to track animals in the wild.  Thankfully, Gus and Penny don’t have plastic things stapled to their ears and thus never look like deer caught in the headlights. Unique tags hang from their collars. When Gus ambles over to the door, his tag signals the door to open. It must feel like Moses parting the Red Sea without opposable thumbs.

When either cat goes out or comes back in, a camera takes a photo and uploads it to Twitter with preprogrammed comments. Gus and Penny’s Twitter feed looks something like this:

Gus is in to smoke a catnip cigar.

Penny is in to poop.

Gus is in to vomit in owners shoes.

Penny is out to buy catnip from the dealer.

Gus is out to annoy the dog next door.

Penny is in to annoy Gus.

My cat wants a bit of this fame and fortune, but sadly for Dickens, the Tweeting Cat Door is not available for sale. At least not until the inventor realizes what a market there is for this thing!

Clearly, this isn’t the best of times for breaking into the multibillion-dollar pet market, especially at the high end. Were attendees concerned that the economy would severely affect their business? You bet. Many of them had just begun their businesses in the past year or two. More than once people told me that if they had known the economy was going off a cliff, they would have held off with their plans.

To counter the appearance of frivolity, sellers emphasized “green” attributes: use of organic cotton for apparel and bamboo for collars and leads, “greenroof” dog houses, organic ingredients in treats, plus “Made in America” labels. Others promoted the handcrafted nature of bejeweled wooden boxes for pet ashes, toy bins decoupaged with vintage images of various dog breeds and handknit dog sweaters or the health benefits of dog beds with infrared heating and Chinese herbal medicine formulas for various ailments. Some donate a percentage of their proceeds to animal shelters or other pet-related charities. (The trade show itself helps support therapy dog visitation by donating a portion of the proceeds of booth sales to Angel on a Leash.)

Lots of these items were beautiful or well made, and there’s nothing wrong with that. If I were in the market for new collars or other useful items, I would be happy to support one of these small-business owners. For those of us who have never lived in a McMansion and need to make good use of what little square footage we have, an ottoman or an end table that is stylish and doubles as a dog or cat bed is a good thing, as Martha Stewart might say.

Most of the items, however, were things that I probably wouldn’t buy, even in flush times. But amid the blinged-out crates, pet-size designer furniture and matching pet/people t-shirts, I found a few things that appealed to me for their utility, cleverness or the comfort they would bring my dogs.

First up is the smallest and least expensive: a key tag and wallet card that say My Dog Is Home Alone. If I Am Ill or Injured, Contact the People on the Reverse Side to Care for my Dog. Love this! I’m going to buy a couple of them so we’ll each have one. I wish they made one for cats or had a generic one for “pets.” This company also sells emergency kits and first aid kits.

The Walkie Belt is by Dog Owners Outdoor Gear. It’s a sleek utility belt that holds everything a dog and owner might need on a walk. I expect to be reviewing it for DogCars.com, but it has already received a thumbs-up from my friend Janine Adams, who blogged about it here.

Last and, sadly, not within my budget is a pet bed that emits infrared heat. The Fauna Sauna Spa Bed is supposed to reduce pain and joint stiffness (I could use that myself) and help with skin irritations and wound healing. I think it might benefit Bella, and I’m sure all three of them would enjoy the warmth it gives off. I guess I’ll have to rustle up a good book deal.

The dogs were the real stars of this show. They posed on or modeled their people’s creations with aplomb and were true representatives of canine good citizenship.

Gratuitous friend blogging: Arden Moore was at the LPP signing her book Dog Parties. Jerry and I had lunch with her and her little dog Cleo. She’s been jetting around the country going to various trade shows and other events and has such a busy schedule that it makes me tired just hearing about it.

Of course, at certain speeds and types of collisions, nothing will save any occupant. So the idea becomes:  What is the safest reasonable way for you to protect your pet?

According to the ADAC (sort of a German equivalent to AAA), the worst one is what most Americans use: a harness a dog wears that attaches to the seat belt. Unfortunately, one carabineer clip is not going to hold a dog in a 65-mph collision:

A comparative study of various pet restraint systems shows that good pet securing systems are available starting under €30.00. The decisive factor is where and how these systems are installed in the vehicle. At an impact speed of 50kph (31 mph) and using a 22kg (48.5 lb) dog dummy and a 4kg (8.5 lb) cat dummy, most of the systems failed. The only convincing and safe solution is using a pet carrier which is secured in the correct position. The test revealed that the safest place to put pet carriers is the floor behind the driver’s or front passenger’s seats or alternatively the boot.

How often do you go over 31 mph? I drive faster than that every time I drive. If you do too, their summary recommends a system with two ties rather than one.

The most flawed were dog restraint systems consisting of a harness with tie-in(s) to the vehicle belt or belt buckle. The system with only one tie-in is the weakest and cannot restrain the 22kg (48.5 lb) dog dummy. The carabineer connector breaks and the pet dummy crashes into the front seat backrest causing a deformation over 30cm (11 inches) deep.
…
Very stable harnesses can reduce the occupants’ injury risk provided they come with large belts with metal attachments and two tie-ins.

Their conclusion for the safest method:

Comparing the pet restraint systems, we found that a large dog can be safely secured and danger prevented for the occupants only by using a large carrier installed in the boot (trunk) and a stable partition grille.

Here is the ADAC report, if you want to read the whole thing.

If you use crates, the safest approach is to tether them to the car.

If you have a friend who is not convinced that their dog and cat needs to be restrained and you want to scare the crap out of them or scare some common sense into them (or you need a little convincing yourself) check out these ADAC videos:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jYms1d6oyz8&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vpA798rXSc0&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hdai01PKVYY&feature=related
(it would help if you speak German, but you can understand the intent)

“Buckle up for safety” applies to all your occupants, furry and otherwise.

Image: Loose dog in truck. Illegal in some places, dangerous and irresponsible in all.