While National Pet Month itself does not have a stand at the British Veterinary Nursing Association (BVNA) Congress, which kicks off tomorrow in Kettering, there’ll be information on the NOAH stand there.

Nurses are so often the chief organisers of vet practice events, so do come and visit the stand and pick up some 2009 information. We’d love to talk to you about past events - or to think about some ideas for the future. If you’ve sent in some past event photos - you might even find that you’re a star on the display!

Bryan Muskett from Jubilee Veterinary Centre in Newtownards has written about how pleased he was to have worked with Mount Stewart for their prize-winning National Pet Month event…………

“Jubilee Veterinary Centre (JVC) are still celebrating and enjoying the euphoria of winning the National Pet Month ‘Best Event’ Award for 2008, in association with Mount Stewart National Trust Property. To bring this award to Northern Ireland bears further significance, considering the foundation of National Pet Week (NPW) was the brainchild of Belfast vet Desmond Thompson, at Earlswood Veterinary Hospital.

Jubilee Veterinary Centre is a ten (10) vet General Practice servicing the North Down community and Belfast Zoo. In previous years we supported NPW - and latterly, National Pet Month as the event expanded in 2007 - with open days and various social functions. This obviously involved a lot of planning, staff team work and support from animal medicine companies and charities etc.

When the opportunity was proposed to us to link up with the National Trust and run a joint function at Mount Stewart we were very positive, as our aim was to involve a lot more people and throw the function open to the community in general. This would create a family day where the various activities would provide interest for all; including agility competitions, working dog demonstrations (gundogs, police & rescue), guess the breeds, organised dog walks through the gardens, around the lake and the estate.

The forecourt in front of the ‘big house’ formed the core for all the charity and trade exhibits. Everyone turned up including Northern Ireland’s first labradoodle guide dog!

Visitors could join the professional National Trust Team and have a grand tour of the house and grasp an insight into the life and history of the Stewart family. Lady Mairi Bury is the last surviving member of the Stewart family. She still lives in the house and JVC have looked after her exotic pets and estate stock for many years. It was Lady Bury herself who was keen to introduce dog walks and responsible pet ownership at Mount Stewart, and as a result of which a lot of new and regular pet owners enjoyed the peace and tranquillity of the National Trust property on their doorstep.

The facts and figures speak for themselves. On the day, which was Saturday 19th April 2008, we had between 800-900 guests through the main entrance, accompanied by approx 1000 dogs, what a sight! Every breed and every conceivable shape and size! On arrival each owner was given a Drontal poo dispenser and competition entry forms. Not one dog fight or incident was recorded. Poo bags and receptacles were the norm. The responsible attitude of all that attended was to be highly recommended.

The highlight of the day was the children’s quiz. Ten owners with selected breeds wore arm bands numbered 1 – 10. They were told to meander around the estate taking different routes. A claxton horn sounded the start and finish for children to spend 30mins to find the owners and name the breeds. The success of this quiz was further apparent from the number of parents and grandparents who did not want to be left out.

Thankfully the weather was in our favour in a province where it seems to never stop raining. This fun day could not have been such a success without the help and support of many people. All at JVC say a very big “Thank You!” and look forward to next year, a huge challenge, but we have already started our preparations. The proposed date is on a Sunday. This should significantly increase our gate numbers as Saturday has too many other draws in the calendar. Time will tell and we are enthused by the number of other parties eager to come on board.

This year has proved to us that linking JVC to the National Trust has been a huge success, bringing home to people the feeling of responsible pet ownership without any hard sell or tin shaking. We hope more practices will follow our guidelines, join up with compatible organisations and give back into their local communities health and responsible counselling during National Pet Month.”

It may all seem very quiet on the National Pet Month front at the moment, but we’re already starting to make plans for next year. NPM 2009 will run from 4 April - 4 May, with a theme based on obesity and other health related issues.

We are also getting ready to unveil the winners of the 2008 Best Event competition and of course all the category winners. That will come through in mid August - watch this space! Many thanks to everyone that entered - the judges’ job was really difficult as we had some fantastic entries again this year. We’d still love to see any event photos!

Have a great summer with your pets! Alison

Today is the 1st April - and National Pet Month starts at the weekend! We’re getting loads of event pack requests in and are sending packs as soon as we can - and also responding to Tell Us You’re Interested enquiries.
We’re expecting a lot more requests too - because even though the Month starts in 4 days - it ends in 34 if you see where I’m coming from - so if you were thinking of doing something but worrying that it’s too late don’t despair - there’s still time!
We’ve had a few emails about logging in, and about downloading posters.
First, logging in - we do aim to get an event holder community going and issue event holders with passwords to come onto a forum, but I’ll be honest - we just haven’t had the chance to get it up and running. My ill-timed Jury Service that I mentioned before put paid to that and I’m still catching up after serving the community!!
Downloading posters is more simple - here’s the link http://www.nationalpetmonth.org.uk/events/overview.php and look under Step 1 - you’ll find the posters there. Don’t forget if you’ve registered your event you can order more posters either through the website or with the form in your pack. You don’t need to log into do it.
So to event holders, good luck with your plans - and if you just want to get involved as an individual, then have a look at our What’s On and see what to do close to you.

We’re still recovering from an extremely hectic four days at Crufts. We had literally hundreds of visitors to the stand - we gave out over 700 free dog walk books (thank you Iams) all stuffed with National Pet Month information. Thanks to everyone who came to see us - have a look at the info and see how to get involved!
We also had a great little competition going which appealed mainly (but not exclusively) to children. Back in March last year I went along to the launch of the Equine Welfare Strategy at Lea Valley Riding School, and the Horse Trust stand had 4 large fur-covered ‘feely boxes’ into which people were thrusting their hands to guess the identity of the hidden objects at the bottom, which related to responsible horse ownership. Perfect, we thought, for dog owners too - and the Horse Trust very kindly agreed to lend us the boxes for Crufts. We hid 4 things which related to our top tips for responsible pet ownership, and invited visitors to relate the object to the tip.

The passing dogs were amused too as they tried to unearth the dog food (provide a balanced diet!) and dried spaghetti (worm your dog!) from inside.

I think everyone thought it was great - except the poor taxi driver we asked to take us back to the car at the end of the show who after a 75min wait in the queue missed a £200 fare to Heathrow as we had to bring the boxes out of the exhibition hall in two batches!! He was not impressed with our £10 ride to the North car park!
We’ve notified the winners, and I hope they’re happy with their prizes - particular thanks to Mikki here who gave us some great grooming kit to give away.
I’ve included a couple of pictures from the stand - I will put some more onto Flikr soon so if we snapped you - keep looking at the site.

On Monday Nicole and Holly from PFMA went on behalf of National Pet Month to congratulate the Whitchurch Rainbow Guide group who were awarded joint first place in the 2007 ‘Teacher’s Pet’ scrapbook competition (alongside Grange Park School in Leybourne, Kent). The trustees were also joined by Claire Bevan of the Whitchurch Cats Protection branch who talked to the children about pet care.

The scrapbook was excellent - so much so that the rules of the competition last year were extended slightly from being just for schools to accommodate the rainbow’s entry - and this year’s NOAH’s Art competition will reflect this by being open to youth groups from the off.

Here’s what Sue Turrill, Rainbow leader, had to say to Nicole:

“I’ve just got home from school and will be back out to Rainbow Guides this evening but I wanted to drop you an e-mail to say a BIG THANK YOU on behalf of the Rainbows and leaders for the wonderful presentation assembly this morning. I know from talking to some of the girls during their lunch break, that they were over-the-moon with their certificates and surprise prizes. There was quite a buzz going around the infant section of the school this morning.

I’ve been asked to leave the scrapbook in the staffroom so that staff can have a look and I will certainly speak to the art co-ordinator about taking part next year - I’ve offered to help co-ordinate it at school and no doubt the Rainbows will want to take part as well!!

Thank you again. It has been one of the highlights of my 18 years with the Rainbow Guides and we look forward to seeing the photographs!!

Thank you again for everything you did.”

Check out the schools section of the website to see how you can enter this year’s competition - get creating as the closing date is 31 March!

If you’ve ever been on our National Pet Month contact list before - you should by now have received your first mailing from us - sorry it was a little late this year, but I got called to do my public duty on Jury Service and Emma, who has replaced Kleo this year and is in charge of the mailings, had a prebooked holiday. Looking at the picture of Kane on Maenporth Beach, Falmouth, I think it was a justified delay!

We’re now catching up with those people who sent in their details - and will then be sending out the packs. There’s some really exciting events registered already - keep them coming!

Time rushes by, and we’re just starting our preparations for this year’s National Pet Month.

Our theme this year is ‘Great British Pets’ and we’re really looking forward to all the exciting ways we can celebrate - while spreading the responsible pet ownership message.

Towards the end of the month we’re going to be mailing all our National Pet Month contacts, to check that your details have not changed and to see how you’re going to get involved. We’ll be asking you to register your event and claim your free publicity pack.

We’ll also be sending out some advice about how you can use JustGiving, to raise money for your favourite animal charity during National Pet Month, or even for National Pet Month itself.

We had such a fantastic response last year, and over the next few weeks we’ll be putting some of the reports of last year’s events onto the blog, so you can get some inspiration of what to do this year.

Here’s to a great National Pet Month 2008!

It’s the last weekend of National Pet Month and there’s plenty happening!

There are fun days, open days, a swimathon and the intriguingly titled Neolithic cani-cross (see www.canix.co.uk for more details) - the last event of their season. Their event on 22 April raised £1001.00 for charity - split between Cheltenham Animal Shelter and Riding for the Disabled.

Africa Alive in Kessingland are having a weekend of special events, there are dog shows, a cat welfare day at Pets at Home Romford - many more events - too many to mention them all but let’s hope they all have fantastic attendance and loads of fun.

If you are thinking of inviting a greyhound into your home - this is the weekend to meet some of these fantastic dogs. There’s a meet a greyhound weekend in Galloway Forest, there are greyhounds to meet in Penrith, Motherwell and a dog walk for Greyohound Awareness in Glasgow. And in Wales, there’s a fun dog show at Swansea Greyhound track.

Have a good Bank Holiday weekend and look at our What’s On to find a National Pet Month event near you..

Yvette Price Mear, founder of the Pet Bereavement Support Group (registered charity no 1104002) carried out an 20 hour charity sponsored ‘Bingo-a-Thon’ as her National Pet Month event on 27 April. She writes:

“At one o’clock this morning I finished my Charity Sponsored ‘Bingo-a-Thon’. It took me twenty hours and I played TWO HUNDRED AND FORTY ONE games in a row – and I didn’t win a single penny - nowt, zero, nada, zilch, nothing, nil. You wouldn’t think it was possible, would you?

Although I didn’t actually win anything from the Bingo itself (as it was a Sponsored Event too) I anticipate receiving a couple of hundred pounds of sponsorship so it was successful as a fund-raising event – just not as successful as it might have been, had I have won!

It was an absolutely fascinating thing to do and I don’t begrudge a single minute of it. I started at five o’clock in the morning and I was amazed to discover (at that ungodly hour) that there were already eighty-two people playing Bingo!
As I was playing I was telling fellow players (or ‘Roomies’ as they are known) all about my endeavours, the support and encouragement I got from them was simply incredible. People were wishing me luck and kept signing on throughout the day just to come onto the Site to say “How’s Smiley (my Username) doing?”

As they were enquiring about my progress – or lack of it! - they imparted information about themselves which made it enthralling as I could just imagine their lives too. The Landlady from East Sussex who kept leaving the Pub, the Security Guard from Leicester who popped in between his security checks, the Owner of the Kilt Shop in Dundee who logged in during her lunch hour, the recently bereaved widow who stayed with me until an hour before she took her Driving Test, all these immensely kind people made those twenty hours just fly by.

I got down to one number (a sweat) on numerous occasions and if ‘my number had come up’ I’d have won well over £2,000. But, like the lottery on a Saturday night, I NEARLY won!

I did research prior to the event and checked out all the Bingo Sites but found the Sun Site to be far superior to any of the others. The ‘Chat Rooms’ were flourishing with very friendly people, the Chat Room Moderators did a super job keeping the ‘Roomies’ entertained and the prize money was much better then on anyone of the other Sites. So that was where our stake money went – and stayed!

I actually felt very sorry for the Sun Bingo Site because they were in a ‘no win’ situation. If I’d have won I’m sure the Roomies would have said that it was fixed – when I didn’t win they said “It was for Charity – they should have fixed it”! Bless them, the Sun Site have said that they’ll make me a donation anyway so that will be added to my sponsorship.

The most abiding memory I will have of the whole event will be of another world that I accidentally stumbled upon. As ‘Roomies’ were chatting electronically a lot of very personal information was imparted and many a tragic tale of immense loss shared. As a Bereavement Counsellor it was just wonderful to witness that such an informal network does a simply amazing job of mutual support. It was both touching and heart-warming to share their stories and I feel privileged to have spent a full day of my life being part of a world that I probably wouldn’t ever have seen if I hadn’t have tried to think of something different to raise funds.

As a fund-raising event I wouldn’t recommend it but as a life experience I certainly would!”

Yvonne has put a most welcome cheque in the post for National Pet Month - and if you would like to find out more about her charity, see www.yvettesbook.com.