The 2009 Top 10 Best Dog-Friendly Beach - yes we know its the fall season!
Despite the vast majority of skeptics who are curious why a blog would be posted about beaches in the fall/winter, let me tell you friend, now is THE time to take your dog to the beach in the north. Ever thought about sea shell hunting in your hat and scarf? How about going for a morning run while listening to the waves beat down on the cold, sandy surface. What a great date night or morning/afternoon venture. During off-season, many major beaches allow dogs- even leash-free-at this time of year. Make an entire Saturday of the beach – Santa style. No crowds. No extra charges. Take a picnic or grab lunch at a pet-friendly diner. Your dog will surely appreciate the journey, and you'll feel better about giving your pup a change in scenary. Read up about our Top 10, look at the pics and check out the links!
10. Town of Bethany Beach, DE – Town of Bethany offers pet-friendly beaches from Aug. - May 15th. With a fresh market and lots of dog parks, you can practically explore the entire beach with your pup! Journey to Town of Bethany, make new memories and discover new places.
9. Down's Park Dog Beach, MD – The perfect place to be over the winter. Take your dog, off-leash – anytime to Downs Park Dog Beach. Just grab your pet carrier or your dog's carseat a few dog toys and some dog treats and you're good to go! With lots of festivities to participate in, including ice skating, Down's Park will liven up your weekends and vacations, all while being inexpensive.
8. East Beach, R.I. - Located on a beautiful beach spot, East Beach is perfect for taking your dog for a run, sea shell hunting or just basking in the beauty. You and your pet will enjoy and peaceful environment and a decadent view of the ocean.
7. Carson Beach, BA – Find award-winning landscapes, surrounding public amenities, a beautiful view of the harbor all on Carson. The benches and walkways allow for running or strolling with your pet. Enjoy a hot coco at a nearby restaurant and explore the sandy beaches of Boston.
6. Hither Hills State Park, N.Y. - Pack a picnic, your hiking shoes and your favorite cup-o-Joe, as Hither Hills State Park includes nature walks, places to picnic, great surf fish and a beautiful sandy beach to take your pup. You'll have a blast at an inexpensive cost.
5. Seabrook Beach, N.H. - With flat sandy beaches, rocky nature spots and seagulls, this beach is an ideal peaceful environment. Bring your puppy between Sept. 15 – June 1, or on weekends, to Seabrook. With lots of local events, holiday events and great places to eat, you can make Seabrook a weekend get-away – no worries about calling a sitter for your dog.
4. Ocean City Beach, MD – It's always a recreational atmosphere in Ocean City! With an amazing boardwalk, city parks and a great public transportation system, all you'll need is your dog's favorite leash as you take the train for a weekend with your furry family member. Between Oct-April, dogs are allowed on all beaches, and there's even a special dog playground.
3. Block Island, R.I., – Called a 'haven' for dogs, Block Island is perfect for one or all of your precious furry family members! Because this island supports dog everything, you'll find a lot of restaurants that allow dogs. Locals on the island claim that “no dog is a stray dog at Block Island.” Bring your entire family for a Sunday Funday.
2. Montauk Point State Park, N.Y.- Holding the oldest lighthouse in New York, Montauk Point is ideal for visiting during Aug-May. Bring your dog and favorite hot drink, because when the waters are calm, you can see all the way to Rhode Island on this sandy point. Take the opportunity to discover nature trails, camping sites or great beach spots to lounge.
1. Brigantine Beach, N.J.- Surf's up at Brigantine! Enjoy high waves, sandy beaches and all-natural sand dunes. There's surfing competitions and 4-wheel drive. From October 1st-May 29th, dogs are allowed on all beaches! As long as they have a dog leash or dog harness, your pet can enjoy the beach and sand. Make it a Saturday!
Oh - and be sure to keep these reasearched beaches a secret. These spots are so enjoyable, you'll have the entire northern crowded geared up for a beach trip next weekend!
Cartoons have been anthropomorphizing all kinds of animals for decades and no one ever did it better than Looney Tunes. Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Pepe le Pew, Wile E. Coyote, Roadrunner, Sylvester, Tweety, Speedy Gonzalez and a cast of thousands made the initials WB famous — well, more famous. Warner Bros. didnʼt neglect manʼs best friend in their casting calls. From the beginnings in 1930, canines populated the Looney Tunes world as main characters as well as foils, straight “men” and sidekicks, becoming some of the best loved of the supporting cast of characters.
One of the first pairs was Marvin the Martian and K-9. K-9 was the little green manʼs big green space dog in the gladiator helmet complete with scrub brush on top and Martian version of the Roman gladiator “skirt.” He was loosely parodied from Disneyʼs spacey dog, Pluto. In the initial cartoon, Haredevil Hare, K-9 had a speaking role, but was something of a dimwit. In later cartoon shorts, his part expanded and he became the more intelligent of the pair. K-9 wasnʼt a character who appeared very often, but he had staying power, appearing last in a couple of Duck Dodgers episodes.
Poor Spike! Big, muscle bound, bowler wearing Bulldog who kept getting beaten up by Sylvester, much to the chagrin and confusion of his sidekick, bouncy, ebullient Chester the Terrier. Thereʼs always some kind of extenuating circumstance, a sneaky black panther that stands in for Sylvester or a Mr. Hyde version of Sylvester.
The 1950s were a good decade for dogs in the Warner Bros. stable and one of the best loved was another bulldog, Marc Antony. Part of his charm was being paired with the cutest cat in cartoondom, Pussyfoot. The short where Marc Antony finds Pussyfoot, Feed the Kitty, is a well loved classic. Watching the big, tough Bulldog frantically try to hide the tiny kitten from his mistress, who has warned him not to bring one more thing into the house is surpassed in giggles only by the parts where the tiny kitten makes himself comfortable by kneading poor Marc Antonyʼs loose skin into a soft, squishy bed. Mark Antony and Pussyfoot would go on to star in several more shorts together over the years, only being antagonists in one cartoon, Go Fly a Kit. The Bulldogʼs latest appearance was in the last scene of Who Framed Roger Rabbit. For that role, Marc Antony appeared with a dye job from brown to gray.
Buttons and Mindy are the newest pair in the WBʼs animation stables. Buttons is a longsuffering German Shepherd left in charge, time after time, of Mindy, a precocious toddler with a talent for tripping unscathed through series of disasters. Poor Buttons. While Mindy blithely toddles on her way through the chaos as Buttons madly scrambles to catch up to snatch Mindy from the Maw of Doom, only to miss, time after time and get chewed and spit out in said Maws of Doom. Somehow, Mindy manages to get back to whatever highly effective and safe babysitting contraption her mother left her in, while Buttons staggers back just one moment too late and ends up getting scolded for leaving his post.
Poor Buttons. Bet he canʼt wait for Mindy to grow up.
Embedded pictures were provided by (c)2009 Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. and TM. All rights reserved.
The 21st century may be forever regarded by future anthropologists as the age when mankind developed a fetish for anthropomorphizing his pets, especially dogs, although if we take into consideration marketing mavensʼ use of squirrels, lizards, cows, bunnies, ducks, frogs . . . well, you get the picture. We love to dress our pets up like people, imaginary creatures, or even other pets, especially at Halloween; make that "Howloween." You can go as fancy and expensive as you wish on the costuming, but half the fun is using your imagination and bits and pieces you can obtain easily for not much cash outlay and coming up with your own outfit to embarrass your dog and entertain your friends.
Pet Mummy is an easy one. You can either start with inexpensive rolls of gauze bandages or raid the rag pile or local thrift store for old sheets. The sheets will probably be easier, especially on a larger dog, and stay on better. If youʼre using gauze, you can start winding without any preamble other than convincing the victim, err, dog, to stand still. Sheets will have to be torn into strips first. Theyʼll be easier to handle on medium and large dogs if you donʼt make them narrow. Remember, as your dog walks around (assuming he doesnʼt go on strike and refuse to move unless carried) the wrapping will get messier — a good look for a mummy — so you shouldnʼt be overly concerned with making it neat. Secure the ends by either tying them together and tucking the knots under a wrap or you can use safety pins (carefully). Knots will add a nice lumpy effect, like loose flesh or possibly a greedy scavenger that died under the coverings. Remember to leave room for movement (and calls of nature) as well as breathing and sight openings. Also, donʼt wrap too tight over the ears. Once all the wrapping is done, you can let your dog add that aged, just dug up look by rolling in dirt.
The Trash Diver isnʼt too far of a stretch for most dogs and itʼs easily accomplished by using a lightweight plastic garbage can. Slit the can from top to bottom down one side. Cut the bottom, or most of it, out. Thatʼs where your dogʼs head is going to be. Measure the distance from your dogʼs muzzle to his front legs and between the legs, side to side and front to back, then mark and cut out holes in the can, making allowance for movement. Remember, you want him to be able to see out of the bottom, but not necessarily have his head protruding more than an inch or two so it looks like heʼs worked his way through the garbage head first. Attach paper-type trash to the inside edges of the trash can, top and bottom — duct tape will work. Pad the inside of the can with batting or even old towels duct taped to hold them securely, fit the trash can around your dog and duct tape the seam together under the belly. Naughty dog!
Your dog might experience a meteoric rise to the heights of the social ladder dressed as a meteor (or a Mars rock), and itʼs almost embarrassingly easy to do. Using lightweight padding, perhaps wadded up tee shirts, socks, depending on the size of your dog, build up the rock shape you want around his body, leaving space for taking care of natural urges, of course. Secure the shape with strips of duct tape, not too tight. Once youʼve got the rock shape you want, start covering it with sections of aluminum foil. It can be secured by folding and wadding it into itself, or with strips of double sided tape. Use both the dull side and the shiny side out and scrunch it for a rough, rocky effect. Use non-toxic paint and markers to add detail. Dress yourself up like an alien or an astronaut and off you go! Wings are easy to form from wire coat hangers. Decide what kind of wings you want, fairy, butterfly, dragon, bat, and make your shape, adding a pair of loops side by side to run a harness through to secure them to your dogʼs back, then choose a fabric that gives you the effect you want, cut it to shape, with at least an inch of overlap on the frame, and use fabric or hot glue to secure it. Once itʼs dry, you can go back with paint, glitter, glue on crystals, even feathers and decorate them however you want. Small dogs make great sock puppets.
One thing to remember is to leave a place for the leash! Youʼre only limited by your imagination and your dogʼs patience. Better take along a pocketful of bribes, I mean treats.
There is always going to be debate on whether or not you should let your dog have “people food,” even though it is well established that feeding a raw or home cooked diet, provided the necessary nutrients for canine health are present and reasonably balanced, can give results superior to many of the manufactured dog foods on the market today. With that kind of data, it seems reasonable to assume that supplementing a dog's diet with “people food” treats — in moderation — isn't the mortal sin we've been told to believe it is for lo, these many years. As with most everything else, the trick is to use some common sense and learn which foods can hurt your dog.
1. Chocolate
Everyone has heard that chocolate will kill a dog. There are a lot of variables to that, but it's essentially a good assumption. It isn't really the chocolate, per se, that's the danger, but the theobromine in the cocoa. Milk chocolate has scant cocoa in it, so if your dog nullifies the three second rule on that M&M you dropped on the floor, don't panic. To put it into perspective: baking chocolate has the highest concentration, and, on average, two ounces would most likely be toxic to a twenty pound dog; semi-sweet chocolate would typically be mildly toxic at approximately .33 ounces per pound of body weight, or one ounce for each pound of body weight would be enough to wreak havoc on the nervous system of a chocolate craving canine. Milk chocolate jumps to two ounces per pound of body weight before becoming seriously toxic. All in all, it's best to satisfy your dog's desire for chocolate with carob.
2. Walnuts & Macadamia Nuts
Walnuts and macadamia nuts are another goodie that should never, ever be available to your dog. Not much is understood about just what it is about these two that causes the terrible effects, including seizures, tremors, vomiting and diarrhea, paralysis, elevated respiration and heart rate, an inability to stand or walk, excessive drooling, renal failure and death. Acorns also cause many of the same symptoms. Until we know more about what the causal factor is, best to not share the mixed nuts with your four legged buddy. Peanuts, remember, are not nuts, they're beans, and they're okay.
3. Raw Onions & Garlic
Raw onions and garlic are to be avoided as well. Even cooked they are suspect, although not as potent. They and other members of the allium family contain allyl propyl disulfide in the oil. It affects red blood cells by damaging the molecules of hemoglobin, causing anemia. Tricky, because garlic is often fed to get rid of fleas. Maybe there's a connection and the fleas don't want the affected red blood cells? Don't ever let your dog have raisins or grapes. Just don't. Renal failure can be the result. Very, very sad business.
4. Xylitol (Artificial Sweetner)
Never, ever, ever give a dog — or any pet — anything containing the sweetener Xylitol. It can cause liver failure within just days!
5. Fruit Pits
Make sure your dog doesn't get those peach, plum, apricot, avocado, or other similar fruit pits out of the trash. The flesh is fine, but the pits are, well, the pits. They shouldn't be eating avocado skins either.
6. Cooked Bones
Cooked bones are never, ever a good idea. Not boiled, baked, broiled, grilled, smoked or in any other way heat treated. It makes them brittle and dangerous. Raw meaty bones are another matter entirely, however, and most raw diet protocols include bones as an integral source of nutrition as well as being good exercise for those jaws and helping to keep those teeth white and tartar free.
7. Dairy Products
Milk isn't exactly toxic to dogs, but they are essentially lactose intolerant creatures as a whole. Sharing some cheese isn't likely to cause most dogs any real problems, but over feeding can bring on some nasty diarrhea. Yogurt, though, as long as it has active cultures present, is recommended by many knowledgeable dog nutritionists.
So, share with your dog, just please be aware and careful of the stuff that isn't good for him, and keep a jar of activated charcoal and 3% household hydrogen peroxide (to induce vomiting if recommended) and a can of plain pumpkin (for diarrhea) on hand, as well as the vet's phone number, and if you've got any doubt that something is okay for your dog to eat, well, that's one of those things that googling can help you find out — BEFORE you share.
9. Down's Park Dog Beach, MD – The perfect place to be over the winter. Take your dog, off-leash – anytime to Downs Park Dog Beach. Just grab your pet carrier or your dog's carseat a few dog toys and some dog treats and you're good to go! With lots of festivities to participate in, including ice skating, Down's Park will liven up your weekends and vacations, all while being inexpensive.
7. Carson Beach, BA – Find award-winning landscapes, surrounding public amenities, a beautiful view of the harbor all on Carson. The benches and walkways allow for running or strolling with your pet. Enjoy a hot coco at a nearby restaurant and explore the sandy beaches of Boston.
5. Seabrook Beach, N.H. - With flat sandy beaches, rocky nature spots and seagulls, this beach is an ideal peaceful environment. Bring your puppy between Sept. 15 – June 1, or on weekends, to Seabrook. With lots of local events, holiday events and great places to eat, you can make Seabrook a weekend get-away – no worries about calling a sitter for your dog.
2. Montauk Point State Park, N.Y.- Holding the oldest lighthouse in New York, Montauk Point is ideal for visiting during Aug-May. Bring your dog and favorite hot drink, because when the waters are calm, you can see all the way to Rhode Island on this sandy point. Take the opportunity to discover nature trails, camping sites or great beach spots to lounge.
These spots are so enjoyable, you'll have the entire northern crowded geared up for a beach trip next weekend!
