Cities and Pets

Pets living in cities lead very different lives than their country cousins.  In this era, city dogs are likely to have some access to nearby green areas, but that’s not necessarily the case.  City cats seem much less likely to spend time outside in their relatively harsh environs than cats in more rural areas.

Regardless of whether your pets are getting all the time in nature that they might like, to frolic about like their primordial selves (at least, when their primordial selves weren’t hungry or hunting or grazing), make sure their lives are still good:

• Give your pet a territory that they can feel is all theirs, a place where their bed is that’s out of the way, for instance.Pets need their own home bases as much as their humans do.
• Make sure pets have access to natural light all day.
• Provide pets with something to do. A view to outside is fun for pets—if windows are too high for them to see out of or climb to (many a tubbier dog can’t get to a window sill where a cat can spend hours), build some sort of ramp up to that window view (with furniture or maybe even a real ramp).  Cats can spend hours in climbing structures, particularly if they are more elaborate.  Pets will find something to occupy their time and if you don’t provide them with options, by, for example, helping them see out the window, they will come up with something to do on their own, which may be eating the sofa.
• Keep your pets from being annoyed, when you can. If, for example, your dog finds the mail person’s presence offensive, make it unlikely that they can see the mail person—the window with the view mentioned above, shouldn’t supply your dog with a sightline to the mailbox or the mail carrier’s route to it.
• “Pet proof” your home as you would baby proof it.
• Add whatever sound proofing you can if you live in a communal spot so your dogs don’t annoy others nearby.
• Wonder how your pet sees the spaces you’ve created for them?Take a look at “Details That Look Sharp to People May Be Blurry to Their Pets.” 2018.  Press release, Duke University, https://today.duke.edu/2018/05/details-look-sharp-people-may-be-blurry-…