Wildlife – Welcome

“I have kept largely to work of recognized scientists…these studies show what most laypeople have always believed: that animals love and suffer, cry and laugh; their hearts rise up in anticipation and fall in despair. They are lonely, in love, disappointed, or curious; they look back with nostalgia and anticipate future happiness. They feel.”
– Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson (Author: When Elephants Weep)

Welcome all champions of wildlife! Over the course of the past few thousand years, we humans have drifted away from our place in the natural world and even further from understanding the vital roles that all wildlife play in keeping ecological balance and healthy bio-diversity. We’ve encroached into their habitats with ruthless abandon, hunted, trapped and even demonized certain species to appease lobbyists and a misinformed public’s reactions to fear mongering.

Here, we’re going to bust myths and uncover startling truths about wildlife that will challenge old dogma and much of the prejudice against wildlife.

“Did you know that the shy, misunderstood opossum is one of the most benign and beneficial members local wildlife that we WANT to see passing through our yards? They are triple A, first class venomous pest control! One opossum can eat 4,000 ticks a year! Think of the dent in Lyme disease a family of opossum can make! Along with black widows, brown recluse spiders and scorpions, opossum hunt rattlesnakes; immune to the venom of all of the above!” – RA Conroy

Like Ms. Conroy, we here at The Pet CARE Pro are forever students. Hence this gazette. We’re here to learn too, right along with you.

The exponential changes over the decades in the fields of veterinary medicine, behavioral sciences, training techniques and nutrition can sometimes seem confusing, contradictory and by sheer volume, overwhelming to anyone, including the experts.

Yet at the same time, along with advances in research, technology and sharing via the internet have come monumental leaps in knowledge, especially with the revolutionary discoveries in cognitive ethology, Theory of Mind and sentience in animals.

It’s a breathtaking, exciting time. We are standing at the crossroads of major sociological, evolutionary change, a paradigm shift of the highest order: one of the mind.

So, let’s meander with Rascal the raccoon around the next bend and explore what’s new on the horizon…

The Pet CARE Pro recommends:

• When Elephants Weep by Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson. One of the most profound explorations of scientific studies, observations and findings about the emotional lives of animals to date.
• The Emotional Lives of Animals by Marc Bekoff.

Recommended classics:

• Rascal: the award-winning, beloved novel by Sterling North (based on his childhood “pet” raccoon).
• Ring of Bright Water: best selling book about Mij and Edal, two rescued otters, by Gavin Maxwell.
• Born Free, Living Free, Forever Free: the incomparable trilogy about Elsa the Lioness, by Joy Adamson.
• In The Shadow of Man: by Jane Goodall
• Lilly on Dolphins – Humans of the Sea: by John C. Lilly M.D.