Beta Mum's Blog Beta Mum on 03 May 2007 08:23 am
Pets don’t always win prizes
I don’t know if it’s a case of “once you’re pregnant, you see a pregnant woman on every corner” but since we got the guinea pigs I’ve had lots of conversations about pets.
And, if truth be told, many of the smaller ones don’t seem to survive for very long once they leave the pet shop.
For instance..
1) A friend’s cat got hold of their new hamster one night (just a week or so after getting all the pink gear for it) and left its entrails all over the children’s bedroom
2) Another friend has got through two rabbits in quick succession.
One was savaged by a fox which managed to jump into its enclosure, the other escaped only to be killed by the dog next door.
The remaining rabbit seems to have learned nothing from the fates of her former bunny friends and does her best to escape from her run and tries to avoid being locked in her hutch at night.
She hurls herself at the chicken wire that keeps her safe from predators, prompting my friend to complain,
“I don’t like that rabbit’s attitude.”
3) A neighbour bought a guinea pig, was told it was cruel to keep it alone so got another one. He neglected to check its gender, and soon had thirteen of the little beasts turning his lawn into a mini-Somme.
So he took them to an animal rescue centre and left them there after it closed up for the night.
4) When I asked the same neighbour how his mouse was doing, he replied,
“It died. You know what kids are like, they probably forgot to feed it.”
5) A couple I met at a dinner party said they’d succumbed to endless pet-pleas from their daughters and plumped for goldfish, having found they’re easy to look after and don’t live for long.
Unfortunately though, every time they went away on holiday they left them with friends. And every time they returned there seemed to be one or other of the fish looking slightly different from the one they’d left.
So the fish lived on, through their annual replacements, forever.
6) One of my partner’s brothers looked physically ill at the same dinner party when he discovered how long some rabbits can live.
“Thirteen years?” he kept muttering to himself.
He’d only agreed to buy a rabbit for his daughter because he’d heard the average was eight years.
I’ve since discovered that the longest a rabbit has ever lived is 23 years, but I won’t tell him that.
7) A friend’s nine year old son cheerfully told me that his Dad used to keep mice when he was a child.
“He bred lots of them and tried to sell them at school, but no-one wanted any so Granny drowned them all.”
When I made a face at this, he added, nonchalantly, “it’s a quick death.”
on 03 May 2007 at 7:20 pm 1.Omega Mummy said …
I’m enjoying your blog no end and reckoned you had to a writer…..so was pleased to be proved right.
One of my friends works in a vet’s surgery. If you think bad things happen to pets at home, she’s got several tales involving cats in the freezer and hamsters fished out of waste bins that make entertaining listening.
on 03 May 2007 at 7:33 pm 2.dulwichmum said …
I am not kidding, I have had enough of this entire pet business. I had to get rid of my darling “Krug” Persian cat because he was constantly releasing cute field mice, frogs and pigeons into the house (also he destroyed the roof of my husbands soft top car with his tallons), upsetting our super au pair. Now I am left with a window ledge full of ’sea monkeys’, a worm farm, and an ant farm. When will this torture end?
I hear good boarding schools admit at seven? Roll on Winchester I say…
on 03 May 2007 at 7:37 pm 3.Beta Mum said …
Omega Mum - thanks for your kind comments.
I did think of including another tale I heard of a hamster that was buried becuse the owner thought it was dead, which then dug its way out. It was only hibernating.
But I’ve heard this before and reckon it’s apocryphal.
Like the ice cream van story, it always begins “a friend of mine….”
Dulwich Mummy - we’ve just acquired some sea monkeys - another thoughtful birthday present for my daughter.
We’ve put the eggs in and it says on the packet “if you’re over 35 you should use a magnifying glass to see them, until they grow bigger.”
What kind of bloody pet is that?!
on 03 May 2007 at 8:11 pm 4.Mutterings & Meanderings said …
You need to get big, proper pets…
I have a horse and two cats. Wouldn’t be without them.
on 03 May 2007 at 8:44 pm 5.Scruffy Mummy said …
I think there is something werid about pets in the city frankly!! It should be outlawed - particuarly those horrible pit bull things - one savaged a cat near my house and I saw another lunge at a lovely guide dog! I think the city and it’s restrictions drive animals mad - there isn’t enough space for territorial animals!
Guinea Pigs are strange creatures - a friend of mine has two and one is ok but the other one is really introverted and strange. We’ve nicknamed it the socially excluded one - because it’s strange behaviour is just leading it to be rejected and socially excluded by her daugher and all her daughters friends who continually pet and play with the other one. So poor little ’social exclusion’ is getting even werider!
on 03 May 2007 at 8:57 pm 6.Beta Mum said …
M&M (I prefer Smarties) - Hannah wants a horse. She says it can live in the shed and eat the tiny patch of grass. I quite like cats but Mike doesn’t.
And now we have guinea pigs we have to think of their safety!
Scruffy Mummy - actually one of our guineas is more terrified of life than the other. But luckily Hannah has taken over that one, while Ben roughs it up with the braver one. So they do get equal attention.
on 28 May 2007 at 2:41 pm 7.brom said …
We have a new pig.(Latest posting on my Flickr, via the blog) The weather is so bad that she is spending her quarantine in with us!
A friend of a friend decided it was a good idea to get some pigeons to live around his house. After a few cycles of breeding the things were becoming a pain. So, he caught them all, took them to London and let them go in Trafalgar Square on his way to work. Lunchtime he gets a call from his wife… “I thought you were taking those pigeons today”
on 16 Nov 2007 at 7:01 pm 8.Pet Monologues said …
Caw to art! #2…
Caw to art! is an effort to showcase pets and animals in an ARTFUL manner. A photograph, fine art, a scribble, sculpture. A poem, a monologue, a short story, motion.
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