Category: Pet Safety

Here is a great holiday gift idea for your pet. It’s not fattening, it’s not unhealthy, and it’s not some kind of toxic treat made in Asia that will end up killing your pet six months down the road. How about a gift that might save your pet’s life? 

You never think twice about strapping your child or grandchild into a car seat for his or her protection while on the road. Not only do we accept it, we expect it – in fact, we require it. However the same people who are loathe to the idea of allowing a toddler to crawl around in the front seat of a moving car think it’s cute to have a dog jumping around on the seat, riding with its head hanging out a partially open window, or bouncing around on their lap while they drive. Can you identify with that? I’m here to tell you that it’s time to rethink pets in vehicles. 

Somehow restraint of a pet has become some kind of an anathema to a lot of otherwise savvy people. It is considered to be some kind of punishment or torture by a lot of pet owners out there and, as a result of owner ignorance, every day unrestricted pets get poisoned, get hit by motor vehicles, attacked by other animals, or injured as passengers in automobile accidents. Use a little common sense and save your pet the pain and suffering that can result from your own negligence. Restraint is caring. Restraint shows love and concern. Restraint saves lives.

I work in an emergency hospital environment. I have seen the injuries that a low speed accident can cause. I don’t see the pets from the higher speed accidents. Those victims don’t make it to the hospital because they are dead. Plain and simple.

All of the statistics that apply to unrestrained children riding in vehicles are equally applicable to our pets. Don’t tell me that it’s cruel or inhumane or give me any other absurd claptrap, because any other viewpoint is flat out wrong! There is no argument concerning pets riding unrestrained in motor vehicles that is not equally applicable to kids. It’s why children are required by law to ride in child restraint car seats. It’s why airlines require pets to be placed in solid carriers when they ride in the hold of an airplane. The whole concept involves the protection provided by close quarters, and in the case of a pet, by the relatively forgiving plastic of a crate. If the pet should unexpectedly become airborne within the cargo hold, the carrier and pet fly around as a unit with the carrier serving to protect the contents. Not only that, but a pet carrier can be secured in such a way as to hopefully prevent it from becoming a projectile. 

Similarly, when riding inside a motor vehicle, probably the most secure device for your pet is to place him/her inside a well-secured airline type pet carrier. Anytime, but especially for long trips, this would seem to be the most logical choice. The carrier should be just large enough for the pet to curl up and lie down and should just allow room to stand up and turn around. Remember: snug is the word. We’re not after comfort; we’re looking for protection. This is the method that I have always recommended to my “Cruising with Pets” seminar attendees for carrying their pets aboard a sailboat while underway: pet inside pet carrier; pet carrier wedged in strategically or somehow strapped down. If there is a sudden roll or a quick stop or a surge of some sort, your pet is jolted within the close-quarters plastic of the carrier and not thrown across the room, across the car, or into the dashboard or the windshield – a blow that is much safer and friendlier than the alternatives.

If a travel carrier is too uncool for your liking, you might opt for something a little more fashionable in the way of improving your pet’s chances in a crash. This also might be more convenient and more appealing for short trips in town. How about a pet seat belt restraint system? There are a number of different vehicle pet harnesses on the market that are able to integrate with your vehicle’s seat belts. In the safety department these type restraints are a far cry from a sky kennel, but they may help to keep your pet from flying through the windshield or into the dash, or from launching off in some other direction that could prove lethal. They also will hopefully keep your pet out of the driver’s lap and stop it from dangerously hanging out the window (even though it’s cute, it’s still unhealthy) while underway and will even stop it from bouncing all over inside the car. Any kind of belt type restraint should be incorporated into a body harness of some sort and never attached to a neck collar. You can envision a person being hanged by the neck until dead dropping through the trap door of a gallows in order to understand why.

After the harness type restraint, one notch lower in the safety department is the doggy car seat. Here we are maybe just a smidgeon better than no restraint at all. Many of these do not even include a harness system, which makes them useless from a protection standpoint. But for relatively small dogs, a doggy car seat with an integral harness system might be an acceptable form of restraint to keep the pet in one spot and, again, safely away from driving the driver to distraction.

I don’t often favor treating our pets like children. They are not the same. But the need for safety restraints is something that they do have in common. There are still people out there with that primitive “it’s safer if you are thrown clear of the vehicle in an accident” mentality. We know that without proper restraint it is probable that you will be thrown somewhere, but usually it will be into the windshield or some portion of the vehicle interior, and usually it won’t happen safely. The same applies to your unrestrained pet. So if you really love your pet and care about its safety and well-being, think about how you want to save its life now, before the unthinkable happens.

“safe” pet toys….

Every pet toy that you see – any pet toy that you can think of – has the potential to injure or kill your pet. There are no safe pet toys, only safe pet owners. It may be true that beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but safety is most definitely in the hands of the user. A toy manufacturer or even a veterinarian cannot tell you that a given toy is safe for your dog, and there is no consumer product safety commission for pet toys. Any toy can be safe when it is used properly and under supervision, and conversely what is seemingly the safest toy, if left unmonitored and unsupervised, can be a killer.

So what’s good? I’m a big fan of Nylabones and Gumabones and Kongtoys. They are good, solidly constructed pet products that can withstand a lot of abuse from your typical dog with normal chewing and play habits. But remember, even these products can be dangerous if not used with some supervision and a little common sense. If you give a large dog a toy designed for a small dog, bad things will happen. If a dog starts to chew off pieces of the toy, bad things will happen. It’s up to the diligent pet owner to be wary of the dangers. If your dog is a super-aggressive chewer, nothing is safe. I used to buy my dog pig ears from a local butcher shop. They were smoked and looked and smelled good enough that I wanted to eat them myself. Organic animal by-products such as smoked pig ears, beef and ham bones, beef and pig hooves, knuckle bones all make great treats as long as you are aware of the risks. Dogs can break teeth on real bones and large dogs can crack and break up bones, chew them up and swallow them, and end up with an intestinal obstruction. The upside, if you want to call it that, of a real bone obstruction is that it is very visible on a diagnostic radiograph, as opposed to the plastic or nylon bone or rubber toy obstruction, which is not nearly so evident on film. Pig ears can be very rich and very fattening and can trigger some GI upsets or even a bout of pancreatitis. Also, any of these organic treats can suffer from the sometimes all too frequent risk of bacterial contamination – Listeria, Salmonella, or something else – in the packaged product, or environmental contamination once it’s been chewed on for a while and then left to lie around exposed to the bacteria in the house or yard. I

There is no consumer product safety commission for pet toys.

Balls can be good but are not without their own risk. Most veterinarians feel that a tennis ball is a safe toy. It is… unless your dog is a super-aggressive chewer or you’re not paying attention. I took half a tennis ball out of the intestinal tract of a dead dog years ago. Once the seal in a tennis ball is broken, it is easily separated into halves and chewed up and swallowed. Golf balls and ping-pong balls can be fun for small dogs with some supervision. Baseballs are okay for bigger dogs for playing fetch but if you allow them to chew for even a short time, they’ll chew off the cover (after all it is rawhide…), swallow it and possibly get an obstruction. If the baseball cover doesn’t get them, underneath the cover it is wound with yarn, which is extremely deadly if swallowed in a long enough strand.

Remember that NO toy is indestructible, NO toy is completely safe, and the longer a toy is in use the more likely it is to become damaged and dangerous.

How about a Frisbee? I think they are pretty safe. They can get pretty beat up, chewed up, and rough edged, but all in all I think a plastic flying disk is okay. Just don’t let your dog sit there and chew it up now that I said that. The pieces, if small enough may be relatively safe, but enough of them can lead to an obstruction and we all know now where that can lead. Just pay attention and you’ll be fine.

Cats love to play with those little micey things on the end of a long elastic string hanging from the end of a stick? You’ve seen them. These are really quite safe and lots of entertainment for your cat. BUT (saw that ‘but’ coming didn’t you?), if you leave the stick hanging there and your cat somehow swallows the string – dead cat. Swallowing string is probably one of the most deadly things your cat can do. It’s easily avoided by paying some attention.

So after all of this ranting, how are you supposed to protect your pet from unsafe toys? It simply requires that you think about any potential problems before you make a toy or purchase or before you offer a toy to your pet. Then you need to watch and monitor its use. Like driving defensively, try to envision all of the ways of abusing or misusing the product and make a decision about how much supervision will be necessary. A stuffed toy will need more supervision than a Nylaboneor a Kongtoy. A nylon bone or a Kongtoy may require more of your attention than a reasonably sized rawhide chew or a cow foot or pig ear. String and rope toys can be swallowed and can kill if left unsupervised but are fine when you are actively playing with your pet or closely managing things. Your dog may act entirely different when boarding or when otherwise left alone and may chew up and swallow a toy that has remained intact for ages. And finally, unfortunately some dogs are borderline psychotic and will manage to swallow just about anything that they come into contact with when the owner is absent. This is not the fault of the toy or of the owner but is simply the nature of the dog and may require some kind of behavioral therapy and/or medication.

Remember that no toy is indestructible, no toy is completely safe, and the longer a toy is in use the more likely it is to become damaged. Soft toys get chewed up, sometimes immediately, in other cases over time. Hard toys can injure your pet by damaging the teeth. Edible toys can easily be overfed. Animals can break their teeth chewing bones, hard nylon bones, or other hard objects. If your dog is a very aggressive chewer, watch really closely and be ready to substitute something softer and safer – but then you need to monitor that for any tendency to chew it up and swallow it. Life is difficult. Love sometimes takes time and effort. But that’s why your pet has you for his best friend!

Using your Leash – your dog’s lifeline; where is his nose?

Let’s use our imagination… You’re having a great time visiting the annual WhatzIt Festival. Pets are welcome and you and Max are having a great time taking in the sites and the sounds and the scrumptious smells of cooking whatzIt at every turn. You stop and check out a menu on one of the food wagons while Max checks out the situation around your feet. He sees something interesting under the little concession stand and starts nosing around. You’re not worried. After all he’s on a 6-foot leash and nobody is nearby for him to bother, so you let him do his thing as his head disappears through a gap in the fencing under the little trailer. While you’re engaged in making up your mind over the offered food items you momentarily forget that he’s even there. Then, when he backs out from under the concession stand he has a box of rat poison stuck on his muzzle. Now what? What happens now and how do you avoid having this situation repeat? 

The really cool thing is that you will probably never even know how really effective a tool your leash really is – because your dog is still alive and sleeping safely beside you.

Obviously you need to take Max immediately to the vet and follow your veterinarian’s advice.  The doctor will need to see the box to check out exactly what the contents were, and will then offer you a recommended treatment plan. You, being the ever-conscientious pet owner, will follow those directions to a T in order to cover the worst-case scenario possibilities and, thanks to your and your vet’s prompt and proper treatment, Max should do just fine. That’s enough of this imaginary episode for now.

Now, what could you have done to avoid this fiasco? Well, in reality probably not much. You did really well. You used a nice short leash and you were keeping him carefully at your side. There’s not a lot more you can do and unfortunately accidents happen. What happened here is that you did not follow my words of wisdom to “Always keep an eye on your dog’s nose. Know where his nose is at all times.” Admittedly that can occasionally be difficult and sometimes we simply have to let dogs be dogs. However there is an upside here: because you had him close up and under your direct supervision, you were able to catch this problem when it happened – not a week or two after the fact when your dog is bleeding to death and you have no idea what the problem might be – exactly what might have happened if he were running around on one of those worthless, superlong, retractable leashes.

The real issue is that so many people don’t take the simple precaution of using a leash at all, or if they do, they use one of those long 25-foot retractable leashes. A leash is not cruel and it should not be viewed as some kind of punishment. The purpose of a leash is to keep your pet safe – out of traffic and out of harm’s way. If he was not on the leash, or if you had him on one of those 25-foot retractable jobbies, you probably would have missed this lifethreatening danger entirely. And Max would have passed on to that sorrowful status of an old pet memory.

In my classes and in my talks with clients I emphasize that a leash is your dog’s best friend. If you use a leash whenever you take your dog out for a walk, you will hopefully never experience the disappointment, the shock, and the heartbreak of losing your dog to an unexpected dog attack, snake bite, poisoning, or automobile encounter. It’s just not worth taking a chance. You cannot imagine the number of times I have heard a client utter the words “I don’t understand what happened. He never went in the road,” while standing over the dead and mangled body of the dog they had cared for so deeply. It’s hard to tell them that any dog will go in the road. It’s just a matter of what kind of temptation it takes to get them to do it – a squirrel, a cat, another dog, or whatever. And it’s tough to imagine a dog that isn’t going to be tempted by the swish and rattle of a snake in the brush or by the eye-catching sudden hop of a potentially toxic toad in the damp, dew-covered grass of the early evening. Remember, danger lurks – and you are entirely unaware, but your dog is on top of it all.

When we were living aboard our boat Fidelisin the Dominican Republic a dog-loving couple aboard one of the local anchored cruising boats watched their dog die from simply picking up one of the local poisonous toads in his mouth. They knew the toads were poisonous; they just didn’t realize HOW poisonous they were. If their dog had been on a leash, he might have been saved. In Puerto Rico we met a couple of liveaboards. They had stopped in for a couple of nights in the harbor in Salinas and had a beautiful yellow Labrador retriever. The dog was a real sweet guy and very pleasant and people-friendly. While walking the dog on the street in downtown Salinas on a beautiful Caribbean afternoon, they were standing on a street corner when, as they looked at the dog backing out from where he had his head poking around under some bushes, lo and behold, stuck on the end of his nose was a box of rat poison. (Sound familiar?) They brought him to me hoping I might help. The best I could do was to send him to the local veterinarian who promptly and properly dealt with the problem. So no, I don’t necessarily make up all these things! In the islands of the Caribbean they keep rat poison in a lot of very accessible locations in an effort to control the rat population and also as an aid to controlling the stray pet problem. That’s not the only place where this is done. Don’t let your dog fall victim. If you are a jogger, get a dog jogging leash. They make them. Far better idea than just letting her run along, loose and vulnerable.

There are other, less lifethreatening reasons to use a leash, such as keeping your pet from bothering your neighbor or other people, but the really important objective remains: it will very likely, at some point in time, probably save your dog’s life. And the really cool thing about that is that you will probably never even get to know how really effective a tool your leash really is – because your dog is still alive and sleeping safely beside you.

So be wise and listen to a little well-intentioned advice. A leash truly is your dog’s best friend and, if you can’t keep him tethered up tight, at least keep a close watch on where he’s sticking his nose. At some point it may very well save his life. 

As far as your pet is concerned, getting lost might be the most important issue you will ever face. Hopefully your pet will never get lost or otherwise separated from your side. In the event that somehow happens, hopefully you will have taken every precaution to aid in his safe return. To help avoid the heartbreak of a hopelessly lost pet, please give serious consideration to the following ideas and suggestions.

First, if you don’t already have one, get some type of identification tag  (get one on Amazon or go to your local pet shop and pick one up – metal or plastic) with your name, your boat name, and a functional phone number on it (your cell number or a phone in your home country where a live person is likely to answer it – one phone call may be all your pet’s rescuer has the time or inclination to give). VISIBLE identification is the form most likely to get you and your pet reunited in the event of unexpected separation. And make certain the ID tag is firmly attached (via a good quality split ring) to your pet’s collar. Don’t be lackadaisical about this. Picture your pet running loose in a strange place and then picture that one person who might actually take the time to think that this pet looks like it could be lost; that person who might actually make an effort to bend over and look at your pet’s collar for a phone number! THIS IS IMPORTANT -MAKE IT EASY! That phone number has to be readily visible and it has to work in order for you and your pet to have a chance. The single biggest problem inherent in pet identification revolves around the fixed nature of a pet ID tag or collar and the limited amount of information it can provide. Being aboard a cruising boat or riding the roads in an RV, means that the best you can generally do is to provide your cell phone number or your e-mail address or even a phone number for a close friend or relative who is not traveling. But is that enough? What if they aren’t home when that call comes in, or what if the call goes to voice mail? Will it all end up in a frustrating game of long distance phone tag while your pet is running loose God knows where? Most good Samaritans are going to stop short of taking the pet home for an entire day or an overnight stay when they can’t even be certain that someone cares about the pet they’ve found.

Right now, the state of the art in pet identification is the electronic ID tag and the vast majority of people are completely unaware that it even exists! Electronic identification overcomes virtually all of the shortcomings of the engraved or written tag and the microchip. People are so unaware that a number of very efficient and potentially very effective ideas for electronic ID tags for pets have already come and gone. They disappeared due to poor design and poor promotion by their designers and an across the board general ignorance by the pet-owning public. As a result we are left with making do using the available items that are out there. This includes waterproof flash drives and QR tags.

For medium to large dogs, consider the Corsair Flash Survivor Stealth USB Flash Drive ($30.49 on Amazon) and for cats and small dogs, I’d suggest one of the smaller water-resistant flash drives, such as the all metal Raoyi Waterproof Metal USB2.0 Flash Drive ($6.49 on Amazon) or the GorillaDrive Ruggedized USB Flash Drive ($9.78 on Amazon).

Actually any of these (among others; there are a number of weatherproof metal flash drives with hooks, connectors, carabiners, and other forms of attachment available on Amazon if you just enter “waterproof flash drive” into the Amazon search box) flash drives will work on a dog (as long as it’s not a dog with a chewing fetish) of average size or larger, but you’ll need to check them out for size if you’re fitting a cat or small dog. They all look pretty durable. Whatever you choose to buy remember that none of them are completely indestructible. Don’t let your pet (or another pet in your household) chew on it; don’t let anybody beat the crap out of it, etc. And make certain the split ring (if necessary) that you attach it with is sturdy and ready to take a beating.

This type of device overcomes most of the limitations of the printed or engraved ID tag (not to mention your pet’s microchip, which we will discuss in a moment). For our intended use the flash drive only needs to hold a few megabytes of info to suffice, although most thumb drives now hold several to many gigabytes (far more capacity than you’ll ever use for this purpose). You can enter as much or as little information as you want, you can update the information as often as you need to, and the device can be read by anybody who might find it, providing they have access to a computer. Since it’s simply a computer flash drive, all they need to do is plug it into the USB slot of any computer and voila it’s all right there – pet name, contact information: your cell number, your mother’s home phone, your boat’s name, RV park, marina or anchorage location, the color of your boat or RV and any distinguishing characteristics, special needs, your upcoming itinerary, whatever you think might help somebody find you and get your cat or dog back where he belongs. You can even include your pet’s vaccination and critical health information. You can include files in both Word and PDF format if you choose, so that somebody doesn’t inadvertently damage a writeable file. Virtually any computer can read a word or a pdf file.

Visiting a non-English speaking country? Use a free online translation site to translate your information into French, Spanish, Portuguese, or whatever, and put that on there too; label it francais, español, or whatever so that a finder who does not speak English can recognize it. In this day and age, even in developing countries most people are familiar enough with computers to recognize a thumb drive when they see one. Even if the finder does not have a personal computer in his or her possession, most communities have places where one can go and rent or borrow time on a machine, such as a library, phone company office, or internet café. Not everybody everywhere has access to a microchip scanner, but this is the computer age and most people in most places are likely to have access to a computer. Give them the necessary information and make it as easy as possible to contact you and you are at least giving yourself and your pet a fighting chance. Just don’t get too carried away. Just because someone wants to get your pet back home does not mean they want to read your or your pet’s biography. My cat’s digital tag also includes, a written promise to any veterinarian willing to take him until I can retrieve him, that I will pay any and all charges associated with his rescue and protection.

Sample Text for Your Flash Drive Message

To whom it may concern:

Thank you so much for rescuing our dog, Max. Since you are reading this message, somehow Max has become separated from us. Max lives aboard our boat and he is like a member of our family. We are desperate to get him back. We live aboard a sailboat and we are presently cruising the islands of the Bahamas. We checked into the Bahamas in December with the intention of staying until May but we will now probably stay until we get Max back.

You can try to reach our daughter who lives in Maryland in the US. Please call her, collect if necessary, at 410-555-1234 or on her cell phone at 410-555-4321 and leave your phone number and a message stating that you have Max and are trying to contact us.

The name of our boat is the sailing vessel Second Wind. It is a white fiberglass catamaran and is 40 feet long. We normally anchor in harbors rather than visiting marinas.

If you have access to a high frequency or HAM radio, someone can contact the Cruiseheimers radio network any morning. The net starts at 8:30 AM and meets on the 8152 kHz frequency. Just break in and tell them why you are interrupting.

Please feed and take care of Max for us until you hear back from us. We will gladly reimburse you for all expenses associated with his care and his return to us. If you cannot keep him, please take him to a veterinarian or a shelter along with this flash drive so that they can try to reach us.

Message #2:

To whom it may concern: Thank you for saving me. I am lost. My name is Maxwell and I live aboard a boat with my owners. They are probably frantic because I am missing. The boat is a sailboat and its name is Desperation. My owners are anchored out in Dakity Bay here in Culebra. You can call them on a VHF radio by calling “Second Wind, Second Wind.” If they don’t answer, please make a general call on the VHF telling people that you have found me and need to contact my owners aboard Second Wind.

If you cannot reach anybody, please at least place a call to my owners’ daughter Jeannie in Maryland. Call her at 410-555-1234 or on her cell phone at 410-555-4321 and leave your phone number and a message stating that you have Maxwell and are trying to contact them. Please don’t let me go until you have found my owner. They will gladly reimburse you for any expenses.

These drives are supposedly tough and/or waterproof but I would be leery of placing a metal ID tag on the pet’s collar adjacent to the device unless the device is somehow protect, e.g. wrapped in tape, or similarly protected.

My cat’s digital tag does include a written promise to any veterinarian willing to take him until I can retrieve him, that I will pay any and all charges associated with his rescue and protection.

We’ll talk more about flash drives and such below, but here and now let’s discuss the other practical option that you have available for electronic protection of your pet, the QR tag. We have all seen QR codes in number of places, from products we buy, to billboards and the sides of vehicles. Even election candidates are starting to include QR codes on their junkmail campaign mailings. The QR code is that little (or sometimes big) square box with all the pixelated-looking gobbledygook inside the square. You simply point your phone at the code (with a free QR code reading app installed) and the code will connect you to a website where you will find more information, or in the case of your pet, the scanner will reveal your personal contact information which you had previously uploaded when you got the tag. These tags are available, often for less than $10 and range from tags that are specifically for use on pets to those intended for just general purpose identification use, such as on luggage. You buy the tag, go to the associated website and, often at no charge, sign up for inclusion in their database, providing all of the information needed to get your item (or your pet) returned. Check out the pet-specific combination QR tag from CNATTAGS that serves double duty with an engraved name and address on one side like a traditional pet ID tag, and a QR code on the backside – a truly great idea. There are also pet-specific QR tags from Dynotag, Red Dingo , PetDwelling , and others. Or you can order up a set of general purpose tags from Dynotag. Just remember to check if the purchase price includes free lifetime registration. I think that on most of these brands, that is the case.

(A special note to those of you living and cruising aboard boats (and also, to some extent, RV’s) when using a flash drive for identifying your pet:

As an example, if you are cruising aboard a yacht in the Bahamas, your flash drive should say so and might offer your intended itinerary. Not only should it give contact information for someone in your home country, it should also instruct the person finding the dog to contact the Cruiseheimers HF radio network. Tell them the daily time and frequency for the net and how they can break in and give the net your boat name and the pet’s return information. Cruiseheimer listeners, if they have the information, will seek you out even if you don’t have a HF radio aboard. These are the kinds of things that no conventional pet tag or microchip can do.

(Other cruising locales have similar regional HF radio nets that you might utilize, such as the Caribbean Safety and Security Net or even Chris Parker’s Caribbean weather net. [See cruiserswiki.org] Some popular cruising destinations also have local VHF nets. Thisis the sort of emergency that just about anybody is eager to help with.)

A couple of minor points worth mentioning: I would not offer a reward or make mention of anything more than reimbursement of expenses. If someone is concerned enough to take the tag and read your message, they will probably expend the necessary time and energy trying to contact you without any further incentive. You don’t want to come across as a wealthy yacht owner and turn a generous humanitarian gesture into some kind of extortion attempt. After the pet is returned, you can then (and you really should) express your gratitude any way you choose

Remember that you as a cruiser take your lifestyle for granted and tend to forget that most people have no idea whatsoever that people might actually live aboard boats and travel the oceans. Even in the U.S. normal people (after all, we can all completely agree on this – cruisers are not “normal people”) do not give this much thought. Inthe Caribbean, the average person on the street, unless he/she specifically deals with cruisers, generally assumes that you are from a resort or a cruise ship, not a private yacht. If someone finds your pet, it is important that they know the situation. And there is still no better insurance than a leash. Do not think of a leash as some kind of restriction or punishment. It’s your pet’s lifeline. Use it!)

Keep the above discussion for liveaboard cruisers in mind if you are a land cruiser living in a motorhome. You may very well be able to modify these ideas to fit your special needs.

If you are more into lowtech (i.e. not your typical cruiser) at least put some sort of small, waterproof container (A small zip-lock baggie attached to the collar with wire ties would work.) on the pet’s collar containing a paper or card with as much information as possible to help get your pet back in the event it becomes lost. Just like with the flash drives, you should include personal information, boat or RV information, home contact information, (how about a boat card or personal card?), etc. – everything and anything that might help – particularly a functioning e-mail address and a textable phone number that will reach you wherever you happen to be. This option is far inferior to the above devices, but it’s still better than nothing.