Aug 20, 2008 — There are plenty of Mexican cats, since spaying and neutering are pretty rare here. One of them lives with us:  Misty, shown here exploring a bouquet. She came into our lives through an unlikely series of events. In 2005, we were living in the charming small town of Bernal, about an hour from the city of Queretaro. We rented a house, fixed it up, and thought we were going to live there indefinitely.

One day, a small kitten turned up in the inside patio of a an American friend of ours, chased there by a huge tomcat. His houseguest fed the little waif, but it couldn’t stay long as our friend was quite allergic to cats.

I enjoyed holding the pale orange kitten, who was quick to purr in my arms. When the kitten was offered to me, I could think of many reasons to say no, but my heart yearned for her. Kelly was inclined to be rational — who needs a cat when they are planning to go back to the US for a few months? But our landlord (who lived next door to our rental) was willing to feed the kitten while we were gone and nobody else had turned up willing to take her. Tossing her back onto the street was not an appealing option.

So Kelly and I agreed that Misty would become ours. She was a dear little thing, and very entertaining as kittens are, chasing balls around our house and back patio. Other cats could easily get into the patio via rooftops, and twice we came home to find she had literally been scared sh*tless by one of the large cat bosses of our neighborhood. It was quite a mess to clean up, and Kelly created a little covered cat area in the patio where she could be outside, with her own door inside, and sheltered from the bullies.

Spaying Not Easy

We thought Misty was younger than she must have been, for very soon she went into heat. Once that was past, we looked into having her spayed. A vet in a larger town could do it for 1500 pesos, about $150 US. A retired vet in Bernal was going to do it for a more reasonable price, but after some time he confessed that it had been some years since he had spayed a cat, and he was concerned that his skills might not be up to it. By then, we needed to go back to Colorado, where we would sell our house, pack things up, and return to Mexico. We found a local horse-and-cattle vet in Bernal, who gave Misty a "birth control" shot not available in the US, but he had never spayed a cat. He said he would come by and give her the shot while we were gone, but he never did. Luckily, the housing Kelly had created for her kept the boys away.

Departure and Reunion

I was in tears when we left her there, but I had to agree with Kelly that it was the best thing to do. Once back in Colorado, we did succeed in selling our house, but everything took longer than we expected. It was half a year later that we came back to Mexico in our little RV, with LarryDog. This is when fate intervened by bringing us to Lake Chapala, where things unfolded and we ended up buying our house here.

When we finally went back to Bernal to get Misty, it was no surprise that she hid under the bed and wouldn’t come out. We slept there that night, and I woke in the night feeling her climbing over me and purring gently. We were friends again, and she was a good little traveler back to Lake Chapala. Getting her spayed her was simple and inexpensive.

So now Misty lives with Moonlight, our part-Siamese cat we brought back from Colorado the next year, and our two dogs. Misty keeps them all in line. Just yesterday there was a startled yelp from our Rottweiler Lola as Misty whacked her for some infraction. Misty has had enough large animals bothering her; now, she’s the boss.

2 Comments from the old blog:

• At August 21, 2008 12:57 PM,  Catalyst said…

  Wonderful story! When we moved to Mexico back in the ’80’s, we were told by people in Guadalajara who sold a service about moving to Mexico that we should leave our cat behind, that it was way too much trouble to bring one to Mexico from the U.S. So we tearfully did, only to find out that was all b.s. We soon adopted a Siamese in Mexico who traveled to the U.S. with us several years later and lived happily here until he was nearly 16! We have more now but still miss our Mexican Siamese, Chulapay.

• At August 25, 2008 11:04 AM,  1st Mate said…

  Here in Sonora we have affordable neutering, and two vets in town who’ll even neuter ferals for free.
  I’m glad your Misty was still there when you got back. What a joy it must have been when she woke you up to tell you she forgave you.

Mexican Cat Misty is a post from: Mexico with Heart - Living, Traveling, and Retiring in Mexico

Many foreigners who live in this area adopt Mexican dogs, and it generally works out well. The main caveat would be to use your common sense about what size dog to get, relative to your ability to handle it and to give it enough exercise. Many of the dogs who have known hunger and the street life are immensely grateful to humans who adopt them. (It’s hard to know sometimes if a dog is homeless or just belongs to a family that lets it run, but my impression is that while there are a lot of street dogs in this area, the shelters  and their spay/neuter programs have made inroads into the problem.) Many Mexicans are real dog-lovers too.

These dogs may come with some emotional baggage, so patience may be required. See another of my websites, training-dogs.com, for lots of information on training dogs with pain-free, positive methods.

Another bit of advice would be to take your dog to a good veterinarian for an exam. If you have other animals at home, you might do that even before taking your new friend home. In this area, we are fortunate to have quite a few very good vets who speak English.

If you are driving down, you can bring your dogs with you. We did this with LarryDog, our now-11 mixed breed from Colorado. Here, he’s demonstrating a trick where he waits to eat the bits of dog food on his paws till he gets told "Okay!" He needed to be in good health and to have a vet’s certificate saying so, plus he needed a very current rabies shot and paperwork to prove it, to get into Mexico. In typical Mexican-style bureaucratic fashion, you don’t know if such paperwork is really going to be needed and in Larry’s case, it wasn’t. At the border, he was barking his head off, guarding our little motorhome from the uniformed Mexican official, and the man asked if the dog bit. Assured that he didn’t normally, the man just asked if we had any drugs or guns, and when I said no, that was it for LarryDog’s border formalities.

I’ve heard that going into the US is much the same. The requirements are pretty much the same, and as a middle-class Mexican friend of mine said, "It’s easier for dogs and cats to get into the US than it is for people!" Quite a few foreigners have adopted dogs here and taken them north with little or no problems.

There are a variety of pet-sitting options here, from Doglandia, a boarding facility run by a very caring foreign woman, to in-house pet-sitters, to having a trusted maid or gardener either come by or stay in your home. The most popular sitters are often booked way in advance.

Flying with dogs internationally can be done, but I don’t know anything about how easy it is. Neither of my darlings shown above would qualify for being squeezed under my seat in the cabin of a plane, and I would be very reluctant to subject them to a journey in a crate in the luggage bay.

You can get a decent array of dog foods and toys here, though I do miss the more holistic foods available up north, and I make part of our dog food. Interestingly, LarryDog suffered from a terrible itching problem in Colorado, no matter what we fed him, and that has gone away completely here!

Comments from the old blog:

• At August 15, 2008 6:55 PM,  Steve Cotton said…

  Every word fell on fertile soil on this end. My dog, Professor Jiggs, is having an interesting time with our heat wave. If he lives until I head south, I am certain he will accompany me.

• At August 18, 2008 8:55 PM,  John W said…

  Our Boston Terrier, Rosita, thrives in Mexico. There’s ample food, good water and lots of attention from Mexican children who have never seen such a strange looking dog before.

• At August 25, 2008 11:08 AM,  1st Mate said…

  Thanks for reminding me about having current papers for dogs. Mine have expired (the papers, not the dogs). We make frequent trips across the border at Nogales and have NEVER been asked for papers, but Murphy’s Law is still in effect, and one of these days if I’m not prepared, they’ll ask. A quick way to ruin a trip.

Our Dogs at Lake Chapala is a post from: Mexico with Heart - Living, Traveling, and Retiring in Mexico

We had lunch one day last week with a dog-loving friend, also originally from Colorado, who lives in the Lake Chapala area too. She commented that in her town here, Riberas del Pilar, there have also been more problems lately with things being taken. Her family has not had anything taken, and she said it’s because they have a Doberman and two other large dogs. She made a pretty strong case for large guarding-type dogs.

Well, we have usually had two dogs. It’s just been the last couple of years, with travel and all, that we’ve just had one. We’d already been talking about another dog, and now that we’re back from the US and have no travel planned, it’s a good time.

So when she emailed me about a 6-month-old Rottweiler puppy who neeeded a new home, Kelly and went to take a look. The rest is history, and I posted pictures of Lola, Kelly, LarryDog and me and that story on my dog training blog:

Meet our new Rottie puppy!

I will add that Lola and I are already very bonded. When I pop into the bathroom, she comes too and settles down companionably at my feet! I’ve been on a Rottweiler forum and discovered this desire to be your shadow is characteristic of the breed!

Rottweiler Puppy in the Family is a post from: Mexico with Heart - Living, Traveling, and Retiring in Mexico

I locked my gate and started walking down the road. Some distance away, the child had gotten off his bike and was standing in the dry weeds on the side of the road, next to something. He looked at loose ends.

As I got closer, I saw that it was a large dog he was next to. The smell told me the dog had been dead a while, as did the bloated form. “Es un perro… muerto,” I said. (It’s a dog, dead.)

The boy glanced at me and said “mio.” (Mine.)

He was somber but dry eyed. “Que lastima,” I said. (What a pity.)

I asked if it had been hit by a car and he answered something I couldn’t completely follow, but it seemed he was saying yes and adding details. Children’s Spanish can be difficult to understand.

At a loss for words, I just said again “Que lastima” and continued on my way.

Que lastima. I was close to tears as I walked on.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

A week later I walked that way again, for the first time since meeting the boy. As I passed where the dog had been lying, I scanned the bushes and was glad to note that he had been removed.

As I turned my head back to the street,  I saw a boy of about 7 walking toward me, with a young puppy on a sturdy leash. My eyes met this boy’s and joy passed between us.

I stopped, and so did the boy. Immediately the puppy was chewing on me with his sharp new teeth. I asked how old the puppy was, the boy said he didn’t know, and we continued on our ways. I was smiling for at least another block.

And so the circle turns.

• Working Gringa said…

  Que lastima indeed… the plight of dogs in Mexico is so sad. We have rescued two perros de la calle and they are the most wonderful dogs. I highly recommend it to everyone! At least then, when I am confronted with a sad dog situation here, I can take some comfort in knowing that at least two dogs are having a good life.

• And I said…

  Good for you! I am open to doing that at some time in the future. I do support the local rescue groups here, all foreign-run as foreigners have the emotional motivation for it and relatively few Mexicans do. One of our 2 cats is a Mexican rescue.

UPDATE 2009 : WE GOT A MEXICAN DOG, A RESCUE, THE NEXT YEAR. LOLA IS STILL WITH US AND A TOTAL LOVE.

Two Dog Stories in the Same Place is a post from: Mexico with Heart - Living, Traveling, and Retiring in Mexico

She was not pleased when we came back from the US with Moonlight, our six-year-old half-Siamese talker. She tended to find high places that she could glare at him from:

But with time, they are getting along better. Their favorite place to hang out is our bed:

We’ve seen them even closer. But no cuddles yet, not with each other.

If I hadn’t been so extremely fond of Moonlight, we would likely have found him a good home in the US. (His sister Midnight did stay behind with friends in Crestone, and she is doing great there.)

There is certainly no lack of cats in the Lake Chapala area. Barb Hess, the cat lady at the Animal Shelter in Riberas del Pilar, told Kelly the other day that they have many, many cats available for adoption at present. It’s a great situation for the humans who adopt them, as they are given topnotch health care before being offered. If you live in the Lake Chapala area, and are thinking of a cat in your life, do go by! They also welcome cat-lovers who just want to pet some cats.

Mexican Cat and Gringo Cat is a post from: Mexico with Heart - Living, Traveling, and Retiring in Mexico

I’ve never had to find accomodations for a cat before, in any country. In the US, Motel 6 accepts pets and we stayed in one in Deming, NM, one night. The next morning was taken up with crossing into Mexico, then waiting our turn and eventually getting our car permit for the 2003 VW Jetta we recently bought. It was after noon by the time we were done with formalities. We had veterinary papers for the cat, and his shots were current. It turned out that no border official noticed him or asked us anything much. Some Mexican friends who took a cat to the US for a year had essentially the same experience entering the US… their papers were checked, but not the cat’s!

Moonlight was in a spacious cat carrier in the back seat. The first day or two, we had a small litterbox in there, but he didn’t use it, so we stopped putting it in his crate, and he could stretch out better. He seemed fine with that arrangement. We offered him water from time to time as we traveled, but he always refused it. He did his eating, drinking, and pottying once we stopped for the night.

He didn’t exactly like the trip, but only part of the time did he seem frightened, often when there were noises around. Speaking of noise, I wondered if we would be listening to his very Siamesy voice for miles and miles, but mostly he was quiet in the car.

We were concerned about him being cool enough when we stopped for meals, but rarely could we find any shade to park in. Our car has numerous safety devices, and we were frustrated that we couldn’t lock it with the motor on and the air conditioning running. Generally, through New Mexico and northern Mexico, the weather was quite hot and dry. So we would take turns being out by the car with its windows open mostly.

In each place we stopped for the night, Moonlight’s method was to find the place he felt safest — under the bed or whatever — and use that as a home base. He slept on the bed curled up next to me most of the time each night.

I knew from other Americans who have traveled with pets in Mexico that you just never know which places will accept pets. It’s very rare for Mexicans to travel with them. Our first day in Mexico, we stopped a ways south of the big city of Chihuahua, capitol of the state of the same name. It was around seven in the evening, and we were tired. An okay-looking roadside hotel with a restaurant caught our eyes, and we stopped. I went in to the hot restaurant/office and asked, and the lady said no. She said that they had lots of perritos, or small dogs, who would chase the cat. I explained that the cat was in a crate and traveled with his own bathroom. He would not be running loose. She relented, and a very kind man with a speech impediment and awkward gait showed me a tiny room. (Never did figure out what was the matter with him, but he was a sweetheart.) Seven dogs followed us back from the car to the room. They were nice too.

The room was on the dismal side, but the mattress seemed okay and there was an air conditioner, which the man turned on. I wasn’t thrilled but driving on offered no guarantees. Kelly looked at the room too and we went ahead and took it.

Staying there turned out to be an experience of old Mexico — not the quaint Olde Mexico of the travel posters, but the Funky Mexico I experienced years ago. Once we got ourselves and Moonlight into the room, the cat immediately discovered an area under the bathroom sink which had a lot of dead bugs and other debris in it. He staked that out as his safe place until I smelled the insecticide odor, pulled him out, and blocked off the entrance with some of our luggage.

Other “old Mexico” features included the toilet shaking every time we sat on it, the shower not having hot water and not having any water in the morning after I flushed the toilet, the TV getting three scratchy channels, and the air conditioner sounding like a jet about to take off. We started off with the air conditioner on, which added a cool breeze over us to heat being radiated by the bed and the walls. Kelly turned it off in the night, and we slept pretty well till around four in the morning, when Moonlight began wandering around and meowing steadily. He settled down again about an hour later.

The next day, we were pretty tired and stopped earlier in the afternoon, in the small city of Rio Grande, north of Zacatecas. It took three tries before we found a motel that accepted Moonlight. The room was much nicer, for the same price ($30 US), and all three of us had a better night there.

Our last day on the road got us home around six in the evening. Introducing one cat to another was a challenge, but I must say I am very impressed with a product called Feliway, which made our trip much easier. It’s a spray bottle of artifical cat pheromones. You hardly have to use any of it to mellow out a cat. Used originally with cats not using their litter box, it really seemed to help Moonlight accept the vagaries of travel. We got it from a site called Catfaeries, but it’s widely available.

Comments from the old blog:

• Chinle: Glad you are home and that it worked out OK with Moonlight. My cat Angelina sat on the back of my chair looking like she was reading this entry along with me. Maybe she wants to try a car trip to Mexico.

• Me: Believe me, Chinle, she probably doesn’t! Moonlight was very good but it was clearly quite stressful for him. Now you and Bill and Sammy would be a different matter… (though how welcoming would Larry be to Sammy? seems like they’ve had some doggy skirmishes in the past.)

• Anonymous said…  Next time stay at “love motels”. They don’t ask and they don’t tell-about cats or anything else.

Driving Through Mexico with a Cat is a post from: Mexico with Heart - Living, Traveling, and Retiring in Mexico

In the Lake Chapala area, there are several programs in which foreigners are very active, both as volunteers and with financial support. The Animal Shelter is on the highway in Riberas del Pilar, between Ajijic and Chapala. Kelly and I made yesterday a day of errands, and my dentist is in that area too.

Now I don’t normally go into animal shelters, as there is too much risk I’d come out with a new family member. But this one is also an extremely well-stocked pet supply store, and we needed several things for our dog and cat, so we stopped. It was a bit easier to do because I knew that the dogs were in another building on the other side of the highway. Still, there was a talkative deep orange cat who fixed me with his bright eyes. I momentarily thought how cute he’d look with Misty, who is a pale orange, before I came to my senses.

But I did come home with a small paperback that isn’t available on Amazon (I just looked) and is probably just available locally here. Tales from the Cat House: A Collection of True Stories, by Barbara Hess, “The Cat Lady” shows one way of reacting to the condition of Mexican cats.

With devoted love which translates into action.

Barbara Hess has done this.

Story after story tells of the cats who have come to the Animal Shelter, sometimes brought in by people, sometimes dumped on the doorstep at night. With the help of a remarkable duo of Mexican veterinarians whose clinic is next door, cats with many terrible health conditions have been saved. The shelter has an amazing cattery right in the middle of it, where you can watch the cats living their daily lives, in a group or in individual cages nearby. You are welcome to go in and visit the cats, which you do through a chain-link entry into a tiny space and then another such entry into the main cat area. There is a warning sign: escape artists present, so close one door before opening another!

It’s a great setup for adopting a cat, and often people come back time and again before deciding on a particular cat. Many times, the cat has already chosen those particular people.

I read the book in one sitting and learned a lot about the Animal Shelter and its denizens. I was inspired by the love radiating from this woman and the others involved with the cats. Maybe I’ll go help out a little next week, when more dental appointments will take me back to the area.

Tales from the Cat House is a post from: Mexico with Heart - Living, Traveling, and Retiring in Mexico

Good news! An American friend who’s in Bernal wrote:

Misty is fine, she was all over me the other night.
She was purring up a storm and being very frisky and
playful.

Ah! That’s great news! I’ll return to my tasks with new energy. Mexico suddenly seems much closer.

~~~~~~~~~

I hadn’t talked with our landlord at all till recently, when I needed to check with him about something. He reported that our cat is just fine — I was quite sure of this intuitively, but it was good to hear! He says she’s grown a lot. He also told me that he gave away his cat, Capullo, to someone in another town. When we left, Capullo had a pretty bad infection so I was glad to hear he survived that.

News of My Mexican Cat is a post from: Mexico with Heart - Living, Traveling, and Retiring in Mexico

May 21, 2005 — A couple of months ago, I dropped by our friend Rob’s house. He was away, but Carolyn, another American, was there. She showed me a small kitten, looking to be two months old or so. A few days earlier, Carolyn had come upon the kitten on the lookout of the house, with a large tomcat about to attack her. Carolyn ran off the tomcat and fed the very thin kitten, who had the good sense to stick around the patio.

“She’s the sweetest little thing,” Carolyn said, picking her up and stroking her. “I’m sure she’d turn into a great pet in no time.” The kitten was a soft orange color and displayed the mellow qualities that often go with orange cats.

I was enchanted and took a turn holding the wary but purring little fluffball. Carolyn (a great cook) gave me some little bits of chicken for the kitty.

“She can’t stay here,” Carolyn told me. “Rob is allergic to cats.”

“He knows a lot of people in Bernal,” I said. “I bet he can help you find her a home.”

“He said the only people he could think of were you guys.”

Uh-oh. Should I have said “No, thanks” at that moment? Kelly and I are animal lovers but we have never taken in strays. I gulped and started to say no but the kitten was so happily curled up in my lap with such a loud purr that I agreed to at least think about it.

I went home and told Kelly. After some discussion, he agreed to at least go look at the cat — provided our landlord and next-door neighbor Francisco would agree to feed her while we went back to the United States.

Francisco agreed. Kelly met the kitten. We thought about the lack of other choices for the cat. And we agreed to take her.

Carolyn brought the kitten over the next day. She soon acquired the name of Misty, discovered several places where she could get behind things and be safe, and purred so much and so loudly that I called her the motor of the universe. She sometimes slept with us on our bed, and other times preferred her own little cat basket we’d found at the crafts market in nearby Tequisquiapan.

After we’d had her about a week, we went out for a couple of hours in the afternoon, leaving her with the run of the patio, which hadn’t yet been enclosed as it is now. When we came home, she was crouching wild-eyed in a corner and there were bits of her fur and her poop scattered around the floor. She had been attacked by one of the many free-roaming cats in the neighborhood. Was it Francisco’s cat from next door, Capullo, who was a frequent visitor, or another one of the toms we’d seen in our yard? We had no way of knowing. Misty was pretty traumatized and we were more careful to keep her in. She had already been wary around Capullo but also played with him. He would sometimes play with her, despite his adult status. I think he’s a young adult.

Capullo

Her wariness toward Capullo did a complete about-face one night when she began uttering mournful little cries. Our baby was in heat, and oh how she yearned for Capullo, who of course stayed around our place almost all the time, deftly navigating roofs and walls to come see us. He is part-Siamese and seems to have inherited all the genes for talkativeness, so we always knew when he was arriving.

We revised our estimate of her age upwards a bit and borrowed a rabbit cage from Rob. Misty spent a few days in there. It had been years since I had been around a cat in heat, and she was so soft, so beguiling… it was fascinating.

With time, Misty was less afraid of Capullo but he did attack her quite often and she would usually run under the bed where he couldn’t go. He sprayed a rug by the bed to mark his territory. Kelly had put the roof on the patio, and we were glad when he got the doors and glass in, and we could keep Capullo out. We slept a little better without his early-morning visits. He still came in the yard.

I wished we could take her back to the United States with us, but I had agreed to leave her here when we decided to take her. Kelly was very clear that she would greatly complicate what is already going to be a very busy time. We will be doing some traveling in the U.S. as well as deciding what to do with our two other cats and our dog before we return here. My mind could easily see his logic, but my heart ached. Misty would lie on my chest as I napped in the afternoon, keeping the universe on track with her purrs, while I shed more than a few tears.

It is not simple to create a life where you have animals and also have a lot of freedom to travel. I knew that, but now I was staring it right in the face. Things turned around emotionally for me one day when in a kind of meditative state, I received the message from Misty that she wanted to stay here. Over ten years ago Kelly and I had produced a video, Telepathic Communication with Animals, featuring Penelope Smith, and ever since then we had become more telepathic ourselves.

So I paid attention when Misty said she belonged here. She went on to say that I had been her second mother but that she was growing up fast and would not need a mother soon. She reminded me how attached cats are to their places, and she said she loved living in our house here in Bernal. She loved feeling safe and she loved having food to eat. She had already told Kelly once that she had chosen Bernal to be born in because she was interested in what’s going on here, the healing energies and the people that are drawn to them.

Over the years, Kelly and I have come to trust these kinds of communications. So we worked out our plans. Francisco will feed her a couple of times a day. A Mexican friend will spend some weekends here. An American friend will come by to play with Misty now and then when he is in town. We will be in touch telepathically. Kelly built Misty her own totally enclosed yard and she can come and go from the house via the cat door. This also eliminates the need for litter boxes. Capullo and any other cats can visit but not get to her.

Misty in her totally enclosed yard, seen from above

She has the balls she loves to play with.

There was also the matter of ensuring that she doesn’t get pregnant. A retired veterinarian was going to spay her, but he was away and when he returned, he had broken bones in his hand. While the first vet was away, we had found a local veterinarian who was of the opinion that birth-control shots (not available in the US but widely used in the rest of the world) were the way to go, and we had had him come to the house and give her the first shot.

I phoned a veterinarian in Tequisquiapan, and he said he could do the spaying the next day. I got directions to his clinic — my first successful phone call in Spanish — and then asked the price. “Mil seiscientos,” he said. I couldn’t believe it. Sixteen hundred pesos, about $150 US? I said no thanks. Later I found out that the concept of doing low-cost spays is not common in towns though some of the cities have free programs. For now, we will stick with the shots, and when we come back we will see about spaying. Misty had her second shot yesterday and will need one in a month, then every six months. We favor spaying. Misty has told us she might like to have kittens. I must admit that Misty-Capullo babies would be enchanting but we have told her that we are not into kittens and that’s part of the deal for living with us.

Every time there has been a frustrating delay in getting our FM-3 visas, the silver lining has been more time with Misty. Soon we will part from her… and knowing she is here will help keep me on track in getting down the various tasks that await us north of the border.

4 Comments on the old blog:

• At May 25, 2005 8:20 AM, Abundio and Ruth said…

  Interesting…. About a month ago or so, a stray appeared at our garage. I told Abundio not to feed it or it would hang around. I ended up feeding it and so we now have Zeke…. an orange Tom.

  When I come back in July, he’ll be here waiting for me, and he’ll be my only company when I drive back down.

• At May 25, 2005 2:54 PM, Rosana Hart said…

  Theoretically both Mexican and US officials have the right to require a very current certificate of health on any cat coming in, but I hear they are both pretty loose about it.

  Considering that you won’t exactly be living down the street from a veterinarian, Ruthi, you may want to consider having him neutered on a low-cost program in the US before you go. Mexico does have an abundance of toms!

• At May 26, 2005 12:30 PM, BillieS said…

  We travel back and forth across the border all the time with Taylor our cocker spaniel. At first I got health certificates for him but no one ever asked for it. So finally I just started carrying his shot records signed by the vet in the USA. Now Taylor gets his shots in Mexico….much less expensive and the vet provides us with a signed and “stamped” letter stating that he administered the shots.

  Never has anyone asked to see the records until last year. As we crossed back into the USA the border patrol asked to see a record of his rabies shots. We produced the letter from the Mexican vet and told her that she was the first agent to ask for it in all the years we went have crossed the border with Taylor. She smiled and said, “I’m new” then waved us on.

• At May 26, 2005 4:34 PM, Rosana Hart said…

  Thanks for letting us know, Billie! I’ve wondered about that. When we come back we might have our dog with us.

Tale of a Mexican Cat is a post from: Mexico with Heart - Living, Traveling, and Retiring in Mexico

It was an easy choice for us not to take a dog because we don’t have a dog who is a really good traveler. If we had had one, we might have taken him or her along with us. Certainly a lot of people do. When we stayed recently at the La Fiesta campground in San Miguel de Allende, it seemed that almost everyone had a dog or two. I enjoyed that, as I got in some great dog cuddles with the dogs we were camped next to.

But there are good reasons to leave the dog(s) at home. It really depends on what your trip is for. If it’s a vacation and you will easily make time to be sure the dog gets plenty of walks and regular attention (including not leaving it in a vehicle that could heat up), that’s one thing. But we knew we would sometimes be away from our motorhome for most of a day, and that at other times the 21-foot length of our small rig would be rather crowded with a dog or two around and us trying to concentrate on the computer. (When we eventually get another dog, whenever that is, I am thinking small.)

UPDATE:  Umm, we got a Rottweiler.

Another factor is that many parts of Mexico are full of street dogs, either strays or more-or-less loosely owned by someone. The health and behavior of these dogs can be dubious. As I mentioned in a previous post, one of them bit Kelly (luckily so lightly that it only hurt his trousers). Another camper told us a story of a loose Rottweiler trying to attack his dog. I would not find it enjoyable to be walking a dog in areas where various unpleasant dog encounters were a possibility. Leaving the dog in the campground isn’t an ideal answer either.

Admittedly I am more concerned about this sort of thing than many dog owners. I was rather surprised at how oblivous of the risks some dog owners were. In one campground, two very friendly dogs were being loosely supervised but the owners became much more attentive after both dogs’ collars disappeared. Everyone’s best guess was that someone had taken the collars off, not that they had somehow come off by themselves.

I’m also a little queasy about what my dog might be eating or putting its nose or mouth on (especially thinking of street dogs’ droppings), so if I do travel with a dog in Mexico in the future, I would be more vigilant and I would wash my hands more than I do now.

It’s easy to take a dog into Mexico — there may be some regulations but I’ve not heard of any travelers who were asked to provide any kind of papers. To get your dog back in the U.S., you need proof of a rabies shot within the last 30 days. Again, I don’t know how often you need to produce those papers, but I do know of people who have adopted Mexican dogs and easily brought them back to the U.S. Seems like I read somewhere that the pet has to be in okay health, not carrying a contagious disease.

There are plenty of veterinarians in Mexico, so if your dog should need care, that shouldn’t be too much of a problem.

We leave our cats at home (though people tell me that cats who are accustomed to it from a youngish age adapt easily to travel) and thus we need some sort of pet care while we are gone. We’ve usually found a friend to live in our house while we are gone, and that’s our situation now. Once in a while we’ve paid a petsitter, but that can add up fast.

There are plenty of good reasons to take your dogs along in an RV. They are part of your family, and I surely miss mine on this long trip. A barking dog can provide a real deterrent to theft. It’s really a personal decision, and one that may be different from one trip to another.

Traveling with Dogs in Mexico is a post from: Mexico with Heart - Living, Traveling, and Retiring in Mexico