Pet Tainment

Owning a pet comes with responsibilities: maintaining the pet’s general wellbeing. The list includes caring for health, safety, food, training, exercise, socializing, day care, fashion, grooming, as needed vet visits. And, one more. What about those extra hours your pet is at home —with or without you? What about entertainment? Know that there are abundant solutions accessible via various screens devoted to your and your pets real or imaginary needs. Videos on television channels and You Tube offer a plethora of choices. Many are directed to human viewers, but as science writer Emily Anthes reported in the New York Times “TV, It’s Not Just for Humans Anymore.” Clearly. Videos have evolved that singularly focused on attracting and amusing pets.

For humans there is advice on how to handle concerns about pets for most anything, some said to be scientifically based. Subjects range from how to keep a (specific) pet happy and healthy through food, supplements, stimulation, socializing, behavior analysis and communication interpretations to explain what a pet’s actions actually mean. Plus, animated shorts present positive life changes that a pet can bring to a human to reduce anxiety, loss, loneliness, or to provide inspiration, or whatever else might be a help or relief.

For pets the focus is on entertainment with the goal of alleviating loneliness and/or to prevent under stimulation. Programs aimed at dogs offer videos for individual breeds, for daytime hours, for bedtime calming, and such. Mostly dogs seemingly like to watch other dogs rather than other animals or cars. Of course, it all depends on the pet’s personality—bold, timid, anxious, etc., on what content may be best suited to entertain or relax the pet rather than cause stress. It isn’t just sights, it is also the sounds. Pets are individuals and can’t be categorized as even being slightly the same. Cats are just as complicated. Shows of birds, mice can entertain. Some may prefer to watch a show simply of string running across a screen. While the majority of shows are made for dogs and cats, birds, especially cockatoos, may enjoy other birds or music. There are videos of and for rabbits, squirrels and others though there is less information on interest or attention spans. For the foreseeable future it will be humans, hopefully attuned to the pet’s interests, in charge of what videos to play and when. Are pet controlled remotes next?