The Brits are apparently known as animal loving types. In fact there are 30 million people in Britain who own a variety of furry, scaly and feathered creatures, contributing to at least a £4 billlion pet food industry (source – The Independent Online). Additionally, according to an article on Google Answers there are between 40 – 60 million dog owners in the US alone, not to mention all of the other nations around the world.

In the grand scheme of things thinking about green pets may seem a silly and frivolous thing to discuss but when you consider those figures you can’t help but ask the question:

How big are our pets’ carbon paw prints?

I’ve always wanted a dog. Its just one of those little girl dreams that I’ve never grown out of. Sad as it sounds I was the kid who got really excited when a dog ran onto the school field and at home-time lured it back to my house with a packet of biscuits or my left over sandwiches in the vain (and highly unlikely) hope that my mum would say “no problem, of course you can keep him”. By the time I got my own home and could make my own decision about getting a dog my partner and I were working long hours and out of the house all day. Wanting to be responsible dog owners we decided that it would be too cruel to leave a dog alone for that length of time and resigned ourselves to believing the only way we could have a dog would be to win the lottery and quit work altogether. That was as likely as my mum letting me keep the stray pooch from the school field!

Now, however, my situation is very different. Running Make Hay (our own business) from home we’re in the perfect situation to have our very own dog, maybe two! But wait, there’s a new dilemma. How could we keep a dog or two or ten – hang on, I’m getting carried away – and make sure it fits into our lifestyle? We’re not perfect, but we do consider very carefully where we buy our food, clothes and things for our home taking into account environmental impact, human rights and animal welfare. Would it be possible to do the same with dog food, treats, toys and bedding?

OK, so toys and bedding are easy. Just carrying out a quick search on Google this morning I see there’s no shortage of places where you can buy hemp and biodegradable puller toys and doggie beds. I could even make my own dog bed with some recycled fabric. Sorted!

Food is a very different matter though. For starters I’m vegetarian and made that decision 19 years ago because I didn’t want to support the cruel farming and slaughtering methods that were commonly used back then. Fortunately nowadays we have more choice with the kind of meat we can buy and although I don’t eat it myself I know I can get organic and free-range meat for my partner who isn’t a veggie. I’m not the sort of person who would preach my choices to other people, I personally don’t think that’s the way to effect positive change but a dog would be my responsibility and since it couldn’t debate with me on the merits of free-range versus factory farming my choices would inevitably also be his / hers. Making a wild guess (ahem) I would say that many of the known dog food brands we see in the shops probably do not include meat from ethical sources. Knowing what I know about factory farming there’s no way I could support it for as long as I own the dog, probably the best part of fifteen years. I guess you could say, “well buy organic meat and cook that for your dog then”, but I don’t think I could afford that. So what would I do?

Alicia Silverstone is one of many famous vegans and from what I understand about her lifestyle she’s pretty strict right through to her pet owning. I don’t doubt for a second that she loves her dogs but is forcing them to be vegans too healthy and fair?

OK, so now my lacking knowledge of dog biology is going to show but humans are omnvivores and dogs are carnivores, right? So humans, as long as they plan their diet carefully, can live entirely on non animal products and be super healthy. Vegan humans can eat fruit, veg, pulses, grains and soy and may sometimes take supplements to ensure a balance of necessary vitamins and minerals but can we plan an equally balanced and appropriate diet for our carnivore canine? Well, I don’t think that’s been decided yet. Some clearly believe you can, Alicia being one of them, others would argue that it’s just not natural. I haven’t made up my mind yet.

I guess my point here is that when we take an animal into our home we should be considering how their lives will affect the environment and how our own lifestyle choices relating to the environment affects them.

In case you were wondering, we’ve decided against having a dog for now. It is a huge responsibility that we don’t want to take lightly. Previously I’ve had house rabbits as pets (sadly I lost Del, my house bunny, recently) and I’ve found that giving them a green lifestyle is very easy, especially as their strict vegan diet would give even Alicia Silverstone a run for her money. Our bunny ate home grown or local, shop bought organic veg, plants from the garden (even the ones I didn’t want him to eat!), had a home-made bunny bed and even helped us to recycle by letting us put shredded office waste paper in his litter tray which would later go in the composter.

I’d love to hear about how other animal lovers have tackled these issues, not just dog owners but those with all kinds of animals – four-legged, feathery or wet.