Photo by Robin Glauser
What you’re less likely to see are Kids
By choice, what’s not high on the radar of Young America is owning cars, homes or parenting. However, in one category, Pet Ownership, they leave all their predecessors in the dust. City Journal reports, “What you’re less likely to see, especially in America’s largest cities are children. Pets are now more common than kids in many U.S. cities. San Francisco, for example, is home to nearly 150,000 dogs but just 115,000 children under age 18. Farther north, Seattle has more households with cats than with kids. Nationwide, pets outnumber children in apartment buildings”.
Have Your Morning Coffee with an Owl
Photograph by Virginia Warren
But hold up, there are lots of stats on Dogs and Cats. But they aren’t the only pets people choose to live with. Look at these numbers. In the U.S pet ownership for Freshwater Fish tops the chart at 142 million, birds, 16 million, small animals, 24.3 million, horses, 13.8 million and reptiles, 13.4 million.
Worldwide, depending on the region, the choice of pets vary widely from that of the U S. Japan’s highly populated urban areas have gone Buggy. Popular low maintenance pets are Giant Horned and Stag Beetles. Other creative solutions are Pet Cafes as popular alternatives to pet ownership. Patrons can order up a Yama Tower Iced Coffee. Then spend up to 30 minutes with an animal of choice: reptile, owl, monkey and the like. Peruvians love their family pet Alpacas with the same fervor as dog lovers worldwide. No real surprise considering 90% of the world’s Alpacas hail from there. But unless you’re Nicole Kidman and Keith Urban, you won’t find one on most American lawns.
An Easy Out?
Care-giving and loving, done right, is lots of work. It could be said, commitment to an animal, rather than another human, is an easy out. But maybe Millennials got the order right in first nurturing a pet. Caring for animals (or bugs) is a great segue to building long term relationships like marriage and parenting.
Photo by Hutomo Abrianto
Sandra Moses, Ashes 2 Essenz