silversage, I can speak to your question. I have four dogs, four cats, and three birds. I buy dry food in bulk and have for years. I get it in bags, but move it to the sealed buckets that I bought with pet food years ago. For prepping I use my vacuum food sealer. I do this with bird seed, bird pellets, large chunk dog food, small chunk dog food, and cat food. It really works. You can get a vacuum sealer kit at sams club for 130 or less. It comes with bags and cannisters. It’s saved me a fortune in cheese alone…more importantly, it’s kept the moth population exterminated from the bird seed.
I am assessing the medical needs of my mixed brood now and will have to contact the vet. I want so much for them to be okay. I have middle aged and elderly dogs, young to old cats, and toddler/teenage parrots. Nobody mentions birds in a good light on this forum, but they are my babies too and I fear a neighborhood panic of stampeding ignoramus’. There’s just not much one can do to silence an Umbrella Cockatoo. So, I prep.
I am concerned about cats and dogs as potential H5N1 vectors since the virus was found in some mammals. In many of the cases I did read that the animals had been fed infected fowl. There is an article re domestic pets (cats/dogs) and SARS on the Wiki somewhere that briefly discussed the possibility of this. Until H5N1 comes to the US where pets are so common we may not have a chance to know. Maybe Tom (DVM) could comment on the possibilities :).
Thanks, Orlandopreppie. I do have a food sealer. I’m going to start that right away so I don’t have to throw the new bag I just opened away!!
Orlandopreppie: Just because it’s the Bird flu, doesn’t mean we don’t love our feathered friends. I feel sad for them because they are getting decimated and can’t protect themselves. There are folks on here wanting to protect their flocks. I had a sparrow who lived to be 13 years old. You are among friends! :)
I was stockpiling dried dog, cat, and ferret food… but switched to keeping canned food for my emergency reserve… out of concerns of bug/rodent infestation of the bagged dry feed stuffs. I have too many critters to repackage it properly - so I am opting to the canned products as a result. I still keep two months of dry goods on hand… but that is the extent of what I am willing to have around and rotate through.
I feed our wild birds and squirrels - and have about a month of supplies on hand - but in an emergency I would begin cutting them back and ultimately cut it off altogether - as my priorities would be on the dependent critters and humans - not the wildings that can fend on their own naturally.
We also keep a “pet care” kit supply - wormer, flea products, ear mite medications, doggy aspirin, nail clippers, etc.
I’ve heard some people say that they plan on keeping their dogs inside all the time if they have to SIP. We have a very old (17 years) and incontinent dog. She gets to make trips outside but it’s completely unpredictable when she might have an accident. We have found something that has worked pretty well for us for over a year now. PetSmart sells something called a “diaper garment”. The brand name is “Simple Solution”.
These are a lot like the little pants that are put over a baby’ diaper. You use an adhesive pad inside the garment. They sell special pads for this purpose, but this is too expensive, so we use the pads that are made for human feminine incontinence and cut them in two pieces. I make sure the cut-end sticks out the back a little so it doesn’t wick onto the cloth of the garment. We chose the kind that are made out of jeans material and they have proved very long-wearing.
The pads that we buy from WalMart are 60 for $9.95, so after they are cut you get 120 pads per package. The pads are sold in different absorbencies. Our dog wears a small size (8–15 lbs), but the size range goes up to XXlarge (90 to 120 lbs). I’d hate to have to buy pads for that size though. ;-)
I think they make belly bands for males. I just thought someone might be interested. Let’s hope that it never comes to this extreme.
bgw in MT – at 23:01 Great idea!!
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