The following post comes to us from guest blogger Mimi Ausland, who has previously appeared on Ellen to discuss her pet charity work.

Hi, my name is Mimi Ausland. I’m a 12-year-old girl from Bend, OR, and I started two websites called Freekibble.com and Freekibblekat.com, to help feed homeless dogs and cats. Here’s how it works: Everyday, there is a dog and cat trivia question (Bow-Wow and Meow trivia). Each day you answer the question, right or wrong, we donate 10 pieces of kibble to homeless animals – it’s fun, you learn something, and it’s free!

I started the websites to feed our local dogs and cats at the Humane Society of Central Oregon (HSCO). It was doing that for the first couple of months, then in July, NBC Nightly News and the Today Show did a story on Freekibble, and it changed fast! Now, we’re feeding 11 shelters every month and have fed over 460,000 nutritious meals to hungry dogs and cats! And this number is changing by the minute!

In late September, I was very, very lucky and got to go on The Ellen DeGeneres Show. I had an amazing experience and not just because I got to be on a huge talk show. It was so cool to know that I was going to be feeding so many shelter animals, by spreading the word to all the people that watch the show.

Plus, Ellen DeGeneres and HALO donated $20,000 of HALO pet food, to Freekibble! It was awesome! We gave all of this healthy, natural food (you should read the ingredients!) to five different lucky shelters in NYC, Los Angeles, Central Oregon, and Las Vegas.

This is not only feeding hundreds of animals, but it’s feeding them wholesome food with real ingredients that make a big difference! It has really helped all these shelters and they are all so grateful. And the money that they would be using to buy kibble they can now use on other expenses. It was a perfect experience!

We have helped so many animals so far with the help of so many wonderful people, and you can help us feed even more! Please go onto my websites and play the game and spread the word. The more people that play, the more dogs and cats we can feed!

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According to a recent survey of 3,000 pet owners, some everyday gadgets have proven dangerous for our furry friends. Over a third of those responding to the Petplan insurance company’s survey said that injuries have occurred when their pets ate small pieces of various items. Other injuries reported include dogs getting tangled in wires from televisions and video game consoles.

Top gadgets involved in pet injuries, according to Petplan:₁

• MP3 players

• Laptops

• Remote controls

• Plasma TVs

• Video game consoles

• Mobile phones

• Karaoke machines

Obviously, there’s nothing wrong with having both pets and these gadgets in our homes. However, it is important to remember that pets are not unlike small children, and we need to keep wires and items with small pieces out of their reach.

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1 Moore, Matthew. Nintendo Wiis and iPods on pet danger list. [Online] Available http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/howaboutthat/3219651/Nintendo-Wiis-and-iPods-on-pet-danger-list.html, October 17, 2008.

I was raised by a family who taught me that to vote is to be an American, and to this day I still believe that. I like to vote because it allows me to voice my opinion about who is elected to office in this country.

There is also another great reason to vote: you get an opportunity to vote on your own state’s ballot questions. There are about 150 state questions being voted on this November. And while some of the states vote on controversial issues including immigration (AZ, CA, MO, OR), tax limitations (AZ, MA, ND, OR) and abortion (CA, CO, SD), there will be a handful of other states who will be voting on animal rights issues (CA, MA, OK).

This isn’t a blog telling you which way to vote; I am just talking about one of the many reasons to vote. Like every other American you have the ability to make your own decision. The most important thing you can do is to go out and vote on November 4th. Since the animals cannot vote, then we humans hold their future in our hands, and that is why it is so important. There are many state animal issues that did not make it to the ballots, but the three that did are listed below. (more…)

Halo Pets was proud to take part in the huge Columbus Day Parade that took place in New York City! An estimated one million people turned out for the annual event, which featured the “Celebrity Dogs Unleashed” float, sponsored by Halo Pets.

The float displayed fiberglass dogs painted by celebrities including Richard Gere, Rachael Ray, Robert Kennedy, Jr., and Vanessa Williams. It was constructed for the 60th anniversary of Green Chimneys, a non-profit organization that operates a special education school, residential treatment center for children and a farm and wildlife rehabilitation.

If you would like to take home one of the dogs yourself, an online auction is being held at www.charityfolks.com/unleashed. Proceeds from the auction will benefit the children and animals of Green Chimneys.

Check out video footage of the float:

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Images and video courtesy of Green Chimneys.

The benefits of natural pet food and supplements have been all over the news lately! Just this morning, the CBS Early Show featured a report on the importance of knowing what ingredients make up your pet’s food.

One woman in the Prairie Wolf Dog Exercise Area in Lake Forest, Illinois told The Early Show’s resident veterinarian, Dr. Debbye Turner Bell, she had “no idea” what’s in her dog’s food. When told the third ingredient was beef byproducts, the woman admitted she didn’t know what that meant and said, “I wouldn’t want to know, I don’t think.” Legally, Bell explains, byproducts can include part of the lungs, brain, blood, stomach and intestines.

The report encourages pet owners to read the ingredients of any food they choose to buy for their pet. To check out Halo’s Spot’s Stew ingredients, which include chicken, carrots, celery, and yellow squash, please read the ingredients list at HaloPets.com.

Furthermore, The Natural Food Merchandiser recently interviewed Halo’s own resident vet Dr. Donna Spector about the positive impact of natural pet supplements on cats and dogs.

Said Spector, “There are literally hundreds of remedies available, for a range of health issues including allergies, arthritis, digestive problems, skin and hair problems, anxiety, liver problems and even protection from inflammatory diseases and cancer through the use of antioxidants.”

You can check out the Early Show report on the CBS website, as well as Dr. Donna’s interview on The Natural Food Merchandiser.

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