foster cat

Can good science debunk the hype about outdoor cats and toxoplasmosis?

A flurry of media articles broke out last year, associating cat ownership and exposure to human mental health problems including schizophrenia, and attributed it to cats as carriers of toxoplasma gondii, a parasitic protozoan. Was the hype justified? No, writes Best Friends Animal Society’s Peter Wolf on Vox Felina, citing an article about a paper… Learn More

Does using the language of retail devalue shelter pets?

When animal shelters and rescue groups talk about “promoting” pets available for adoption, or adopting “two for the price of one,” does that choice of language reduce pets to the level of a commodity? At a daylong workshop presented by Maddie’s Fund® at Animal Care Expo several years ago, Bonney Brown, then Director of the… Learn More

TLC from humans staves off respiratory infections in shelter cats

Cats who receive positive attention from human caretakers while in animal shelters exhibit fewer signs of stress and a lower incidence of upper respiratory disease than cats who don’t. These results, reported in the October 2015 issue of the peer-reviewed journal Preventive Veterinary Medicine, are consistent with the authors’ earlier study on petting shelter cats,… Learn More

How dog owners can help keep dogs out of shelters

Is there something dog owners can do to keep other people’s dogs from ending up in shelters due to behavior problems? Yes, says board-certified veterinary behaviorist Dr. Nicholas Dodman, Director of the Animal Behavior Department of Clinical Sciences at Tufts University’s Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine. He’s spearheading a two-year, crowdsourced study of dog behavior… Learn More

The state of veterinary discussion on spay/neuter surgery and pet health

There’s no question that spaying and neutering are critical components of pet population control. But some of the science on its risks and benefits isn’t as supportive, and more and more pet owners are asking questions about routine spay/neuter that those of us in animal welfare may not be able to answer. Recently, the American… Learn More

cat at piano

Cats are picking up good vibrations from music created just for them

Does music created specifically for the feline hearing range, using their natural pitch and tempo, actually help them feel happier? Science says it just might. Actually, whether they’re happier or not is open to discussion, but they certainly reacted positively to such musical compositions in one recent study reported on by the Winn Feline Foundation:… Learn More

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