I never had an animal die, but now I have many animals so the inevitable is going to happen. What happens when your animal dies? I know people bury them in their backyard, but what if you don’t? Do you drive it to a local vets office and have it cremated for money or do you throw it in your trash (sorry for offending anyone, but this was told to me by a friend…I hope they are joking)? Wouldn’t throwing an animal in the trash violate laws about waste, plus it feels cruel and sad.
Small animals (mice, rats, etc) I’ve tossed in the bin. I buried a ferret in the back yard. For fun we encased him in a ball of wet concrete and covered the lot with dirt.
I’ve buried cats in the back lot as well.
Fish, if they fit, get the flush. My 2 foot long koi ended up going out with the trash.
When our 100 pound dog was put down we left him at the vet. If she had died at home I would have lugged the old girl into the car and dropped her at the vet. The dog was cremated (we didn’t ask for the ashes) and it cost about $75 or so.
I’ve been told if you have no cash to pay for cremating a large dog the ASPCA can help.
Cat was buried in the garden. Dogs were cremated (we still have the ashes, the plan is to sprinkle them at the fav park…oneday) they are just too big for a hole in the garden.
The next pet to go will be the ancient cat, with permission, she will be buried in the neighbours garden. It is a very pretty spot and her favourite place. If the the neighbour says no (very unlikely) she will go in our garden.
There’s at least two small dogs and four to six cats buried on my property. No large dogs, so any of them (from before my time) may have been left with vets.
I’d probably bury small animals - I certainly bury dead mice and birds found on the lawn, but only to keep the flies off, not because I mourn them.
From 1992 till this year, I always had my pets buried in a local pet cemetery. Unfortunately the owners recently divorced, and the husband ketp the land and is allowing no more burials there. Then grounds are not being kept as nice, either 
. So when my old girl Fancy died this summer , I opted for cremation. She was returned to me in a very nice wooden urn, and now resides in my curio cabinet with her collar and a little stuffed pig I bought for her before I had even brought her hom back in '94. (She always took excellent care of her stuffies)
I have a couple kittens and various small animals buries in the yard.
I had to shoot one of our cats a couple months ago. (It was blind.) I just left it the back field for the coyotes to eat.
Buried in the back yard (cats, mice).
If the dog died, I don’t know. We could bury him, given the yard. And would seem more fitting than cremation. I don’t know.
The mouse I had in my dorm room is currently intered in Washington Square Park.
My brother buried a dead horse on his property. It was 110 degrees on a Friday afternoon, and the carcass would not wait until Monday. His neighbor was a contractor with a backhoe, so he came over and dug a pit, and pushed the carcass in. The horse landed on its back, with hooves pointed straight up; if anybody takes a metal detector to part of the yard, they will discover four horseshoes about 18 inches under the surface.
Jerry, my next door neighbor held a funeral service for his dog, Mocha, a German Shorthaired Pointer.
Jerry put Mocha in a little, hand-made casket, lined it with silk, put Mocha in it and lowered it into the backyard grave. Then Jerry delivered a eulogy, thanking God for giving us Mocha, and recalling the many years of happiness that dog gave us.
I was deeply touched by all this. In my experience, Mocha was the best dog that ever walked the earth.
I’m trying to picture a German shorthaired pointer in a little casket.
We have a “puppy graveyard” up on the wooded hill on the back end of our property. Two cats are buried under brick next to path leading up there. There’s a guinea pig under the crabapple tree in a shoe box. Birds get cremated on our burning pile (although one body “survived” the cremation and we had to take her ribcage away from one of the dogs the next day, ew.)
Miss Emily’s ashes reside in a brass urn on the piano, with some of her treasures and her old collars (first (puppy collar) and last, with tags).
We had our dear Labrador Alpine cremated. Then we buried the remains next to her favorit spot in our yard (next to a small pond). We added a few of her favorite toys as well.
And we got a marker made for her. Got it online. A place especialy for pets. It’s cast, not a real stone. And flat. Just lays on the ground.
What sort of sick question is this?
Oh sorry…garden burial.
I will tell you one of my favourite kid stories.
One of Bing Crosby’s kids had a pet hamster. When it died he was inconsolable, weeping in his room. Bing came up with the idea of a memorial service. They made a little shoebox coffin and put the hamster in. They dug a grave in the flowerbed. All the family gathered around and Bing delivered a eulogy and sang a couple of suitable songs. With the coffin in hand he asked his son if he wanted one last look at the hamster. His son agreed. Bing lowered the “coffin” and as they looked inside the hamster began to move. Bing looked at his son and his son gave it a little thought and then said, “Oh, lets bury him anyway.”
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I’m trying to picture a German shorthaired pointer in a little casket.
How ineffably petty.
Will ‘medium sized’ do?
Mocha was a medium sized dog.
Hope your picture improves.
Throwing a dead cat into the trash is no different from a sanitation viewpoint than tossing the trimmings from your meat preparation.
This is exactly what I did for my Quinn.
When I was 7 years old, I had a “pet” crayfish that I found in a creek. I called him “Lobster” and showed him to everyone. When he died, I conducted a solemn burial ceremony in the vacant lot across the street. Later that same day, the neighborhood bullies dug Lobster up and attacked me with the poor crustacean’s corpse. I carry the emotional scars of that incident to this day. (Well, maybe not emotional scars, actually, but I sure remember getting pinched by those little dead claws!)
Several kitties and two parrots are buried in the woods of catville.
There’s probably about a dozen cats, one largeish dog (80 pounds), and an unknown number of fish and hamsters in Mom’s backyard (Mom probably would have just flushed the fish, but we kids were sentimental sorts). I was away at college when Bear (the dog) died, so I don’t know the details of how the burial was conducted, but there’s a slight mound at that spot, with a rhododendron bush (his favorite shrubbery) planted on top.
And what the heck does Google think this has to do with geneaology?
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To IMHO.
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Cut into quarters, fricasee in bacon grease till well done, serve with hot grits, greens, and milk gravy.