Pets | featured news

Citing inhumane and unsanitary practices, lawmakers want to regulate online pet sales. The current law allows breeders who sell puppies online to escape all health and safety requirements.

The economy may have remained sluggish last year but Americans refused to scrimp on their pets, with animal lovers spending upwards of $53 billion on food, veterinary care, kennels and other services in 2012. That's up 5 percent from 2011, when spending first broke the $50 billion barrier, says the American Pet Products Association, a trade group based in Greenwich, Conn. And APPA President and CEO Bob Vetere predicts another 4 percent gain this year.

"This second hypothesis says that when we settled down, and in conjunction with the development of agriculture, we produced waste dumps around our settlements; and suddenly there was this new food resource, a new niche, for wolves to make use of, and the wolf that was best able to make use of it became the ancestor of the dog," explained Erik Axelsson from Uppsala University.

600 in the area have joined the new City Dog Share pack, which matches up pet owners with others eager to help them out when needed. Other places are also sniffing out the idea.

Author Dennis Lehane is offering an unusual reward for the person who finds his family's beloved missing beagle. Lehane says he'll name a character in his next book after whoever finds Tessa, who disappeared from the family's home in Brookline, Mass., this week. He says on his Facebook page that Tessa jumped a fence at the home, and even though she has been micro-chipped, she was not wearing her tags. Lehane says Tessa is "smart, fast, and immeasurably sweet."

How to explain the loss of a pet to your child.

Dogs have long been recognized as man’s best friend, and we have no problem opening up our wallets to let our furry friends know just how much we love them. Americans spend $53 billion annually on our animal friends, lavishing them with the best squeaker toys money can buy, fashionable collars, comfy beds and even gourmet treats from bakeries catering solely to four-legged customers. And when our pets have departed this mortal coil, we're willing to dig deep one last time to pay for an appropriate sendoff.

Babies who spend their first year in homes with dogs have fewer colds and ear infections and need fewer antibiotics than babies in pet-free homes, a new study from Finland shows. Babies who live with cats also seem to have a health advantage, but it's not as big.

A man's 275-pound pet cougar escaped from its cage and killed a neighbor's dog before being recaptured.

Americans spent $50.96 billion on their pets in 2011. That's an all-time high and the first time in history more than $50 billion has gone to the dogs, cats, canaries, guppies and the like, the American Pet Products Association said in a report issued Thursday.