Our pups have a great Vet.  She's kind, loving, highly skilled and often discounts her services.  Still, owning a dog comes with an expense.  They're always eating some shit which requires a visit to our lady Vet.  She applies medication which in turn makes the pup barf up whatever it was they ate.  Last visit for this sort of thing was with Kiri who coughed up a shitload of plastic.  She's since discontined the habit of consuming anything that's not organic.  Now it's the youngest pup in the group, Kinszie, 5 months old, and chewing/eating/consuming anything she can get her teeth on.  She has yet to visit the Vet for a barf-'em-up procedure. 

Even though expensive, the barf-'em-up visits are cheap compared to the cost of surgery to remove a foreign object lodged in a dog's intestine.  Even with a discount we're talking a couple of thousand.

I think folks often don't think when they start thinking about bringing a new pet into their home about the expense of caring for an animal.  Food, that's one thing.  Grooming (whether at home or at a professionals).  Heart guard medication.  Immunizations.  Spay and neutering (CONE TIME!).  Toys.  Stuff to chew on (much less expensive than a teething pup chewing on the leg of great gramma's favorite chair).  Obedience school (important ... remember, there's no such things as bad dogs only bad owners who fail to train their dogs). 

If' you're going to own a dog do it right.  The days of buy a dog and let it live outside with no regard to its health or training, feeding it Skippy canned food and bones from the butcher are over.  Dogs have become our best friends, you know. ...BFF.  The people we know treat their pups well just like family.

That being said there's are people in our town that don't spay or neuter and allow their females to reproduce.  Then they discover that it's either too expensive to keep the pups or that no one really wants another dog.  So they do what they think is the right think (mind you these clowns don't really think like your and I) is the right thing.  The pups are put in box which is placed in a public place and left for some kind person to do the right thing.  These are the same people who don't care for their animals leaving them to fend for themselves in the out of doors.  You know the type.

Then there's those who abuse animals.  Enough said other than this:  Those found to abuse animals should lose a finger for each offense.  Like chopped off without any medication.  That will fix their wagons.

 I'm rambling and finding it difficult to wrap this post up.  Time's a wasting and there's things to do this Monday morning other than sit here spinning on one topic.  Just love your animals and treat them well.  Okay?