That Pet Blog That Pet Place Pet Blog

The Guinea Pig has been domesticated for over 5,000 years (please see article below).  It’s no secret that domestication can radically change an animal’s appearance – most taxonomists now consider the Domestic Dog to be a subspecies of the Gray Wolf, and not a distinct species – but you’d never guess that when viewing a Maltese and a Wolf side-by-side!  Read More »

Hello, Eileen here. Dog people are familiar with the long history of dogs as not only companions, but as workers, trained to herd and hunt amongst other things. As a marine scientist, dog owner and history buff (especially English Tudor and Renaissance), a recent news story caught my eye and I couldn’t resist sharing it. Researchers working on the Mary Rose, a 16^th century English warship made a surprising discovery on the sunken vessel – the almost-intact skeleton of the ship’s dog. Read More »

Ferrets seem so “mainstream” these days that it’s easy to forget their unusual natural and “unnatural” history.  Please read on…

Classification:  Just What Exactly is a Ferret?

The domestic ferret is classified in the order Carnivora, family Mustelidae, along with 75+ species of weasels, otters, skunks, badgers, wolverines and related animals.

Ranging in size from the least weasel (which, at 2.5 ounces in weight, is the world’s smallest carnivore) to the 7-foot-long, 100 pound Giant Otter, the family Mustelidae includes familiar animals such as skunks and sea otters as well as the little-studied Chinese Ferret-Badgers and tayras.  Read More »

When the Spanish conquistadors breached the Andes Mountains and entered Peru, they found that the Inca people were breeding an animal unlike any that had ever been seen in Europe. The wild ancestor of these rodents, later christened guinea pigs or cavies, was lost in antiquity, as cavies had been domesticated as a food source 5,000 or more years earlier. Read More »