How to Reduce Pet Allergens at Home

Pets can be your best friends, but if you have allergies or asthma, they can also be your worst enemy. Pets shed dander, a combination of dead skin cells and hair (or feathers), which can trigger asthma attacks and allergic reactions in some people. However, you can cut down on pet allergens at home.

Cute but hazardous

Pets shed dander, a combination of dead skin cells and hair (or feathers), which can trigger asthma attacks and allergic reactions in people who are sensitive to the allergens. (Cold-blooded pets such as snakes and turtles do not produce dander.)
Some guidelines recommend that people with allergies or asthma avoid keeping pets—especially cats. If a doctor says that you—or your child's—allergies or asthma is aggravated by dander, you may ultimately need to find a new home for your pet. However, there are several ways you can cut down on pet allergens at home.

Minimize contact

You can reduce dander in your home by keeping your pet outdoors as much as possible. At the very least, you should bar pets from bedrooms where people with allergies or asthma sleep.

Children with allergies should also avoid petting or touching animals. If they do come into contact with a pet, they should wash their hands thoroughly.
Restricting pets to rooms with wood floors may also help. Wood flooring traps less dander than carpet and is easier to clean; keeping pets off carpet may help cut down on allergens.

Keep Fluffy off the couch

Keeping pets off carpets, upholstered furniture, and beds can reduce exposure to dander. (Using allergen-resistant bedding will help fend off any dander that does find its way into bedrooms.) Keeping pets out of cars—or restricting them to a tailgate area, if possible—is also a good idea.
In addition, any furniture, fabrics, or materials that pets do come into contact with should be vacuumed or washed frequently. This includes throw rugs, pet beds, cushions, pillows, and blankets.

Clean, clean, clean

Dusting as often as possible will keep dander (as well as dust mites and other allergens) to a minimum. Vacuuming, however, may not get all the allergens from the lower levels of a rug and may stir up a bit of dander as you clean. It may help to use vacuums equipped with a high-efficiency particulate air (HEPA) filter or double bags. However, it's still a good idea to dust or vacuum when the person with allergies or asthma is not at home.
Replacing wall-to-wall carpets with wood floors will make it easier to remove dander.
A 1999 study in the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology compared the levels of allergens in dog dander before and after a five-minute bath with an unnamed “proprietary shampoo” (which could describe an allergen-reducing shampoo). The researchers found that the bath reduced the dogs’ allergen levels by about 85% .

Close registers

If you have forced-air heating and air conditioning, closing air registers may reduce the amount of animal dander that circulates through your home. If closing all of the registers isn’t practical, try closing those in the rooms where asthmatic or allergic individuals spend the most time (especially bedrooms).
Replacing the filter in your furnace or air conditioner with a HEPA filter and/or purchasing a room air cleaner may also help. Studies on the effectiveness of these methods have been inconclusive, however. Research shows that frequently bathing your pet reduces the allergens found in their dander.

Clean cages

Though hamsters, guinea pigs, rabbits, birds, and other pets typically confined to cages tend to be less problematic for allergy and asthma sufferers, dander and urine produced by these pets can still provoke allergic reactions and asthma attacks.

Birdcages and rodent cages should be cleaned at least once a week and, if possible, the cages should be moved outside to a garage or shed. Likewise, litter boxes should be cleaned frequently and moved out of living areas.

Dog attack what to do

There are about 4.5 million dog bites every year in the U.S., according to the CDC. Nearly one in every five of those bites becomes infected (around 900,000), and between 1999 and 2007, dogs were the cause of 250 deaths. If you don’t count venomous insects, man’s best friend is one of the deadliest animals in the U.S.

A majority of dog attacks are caused by people’s pets that have either gotten loose or weren’t properly leashed to begin with, but some attacks are by stray or feral dogs.
Feral dogs, sometimes referred to as wild dogs or street dogs, are free-ranging, non-domesticated animals that are not and never were somebody’s pet. They’re usually afraid of people, but can be far more dangerous than a lost or abandoned pet (stray) if they’re cornered, starving, or infected with rabies. According to the Internet Center for Wildlife Damage Management, feral dogs usually form communities that travel together, and they often have rendezvous sites like wolves. They tend to scavenge for food, like garbage and roadkill, around human populations, but they’ve been known to hunt in packs as well. When feral dogs go hunting, it’s usually for livestock, neighborhood pets, and, occasionally, people who are in the wrong place at the wrong time. And don’t think feral dogs are something you’ll only find in rural areas. Feral dog packs can be found in almost any city, from Detroit to Dallas, where a woman was recently mauled and bitten over 100 times in the middle of the street.

f you encounter a single dog you’re not familiar with, be it a stray, feral, or a dog you’re sure is somebody’s pet, the CDC recommends you avoid it—even if it seems like it’s lost or needs help. This goes double for dogs that are sleeping, eating, or caring for puppies. Even if it’s obvious the dog is someone’s pet, an unleashed dog can be dangerous, especially for children. If an unfamiliar dog approaches you, do not run, panic, or make loud noises. Stay motionless, keeping the side of your body facing the dog while avoiding direct eye contact. Say things like “No” or “Go Home” in a deep, firm voice, and slowly raise your hands to cover your neck while keeping your elbows in. Now wait for the dog to leave or begin to slowly back away.

If the dog charges you, it’s still important to stand as still as possible. As Dr. Sofia Yin, DVM, MS, explains, dogs charge for one of two reasons: either because they are scared and know offense is their best defense, or because something you or another person in the vicinity did something that excited them and made them think they’re being rewarded. People’s pets can get caught in a self-reinforced feedback loop where they “play” a little too hard and don’t know any better. If you yell and move around frantically, the dog will think you’re playing along and won’t stop.

If the dog is clearly being aggressive, not playing (growling, snarling, barking), or obviously feral (dirty, no collar, not reacting to commands), Yin recommends you try and put something between you and the animal. A backpack, purse, jacket, or even a shoe can make for a great shield. Look at the dogs’ body language so you can prepare to block attacks. Tension in the body, raised hackles (the hair along the dog’s back), and ears that are flat against their head are things to watch for. Don’t try to hit the dog with the item, though, as this can make the dog even more aggressive. Just try to back away slowly. If the dog knocks you down, curl into a ball with your head tucked, make fists with your hands to protect your fingers, and use your hands and arms to cover your ears and neck.

Wild Animals | Rattlesnake

Rattlesnakes are predators that live in a wide array of habitats, hunting small animals such as birds and rodents.
Rattlesnakes receive their name from the rattle located at the end of their tails, which makes a loud rattling noise when vibrated that deters predators or serves as a warning to passers-by. However, rattlesnakes fall prey to hawks, weasels, king snakes, and a variety of other species. Rattlesnakes are heavily preyed upon as neonates, while they are still weak and immature. Large numbers of rattlesnakes are killed by humans. Rattlesnake populations in many areas are severely threatened by habitat destruction, poaching, and extermination campaigns.
Rattlesnakes are the leading contributor to snakebite injuries in North America. However, rattlesnakes rarely bite unless provoked or threatened; if treated promptly, the bites are seldom fatal.
Like all pit vipers, rattlesnakes have two organs that can sense radiation: their eyes, and a set of heat-sensing "pits" on their faces that enable them to locate prey and move towards it, based on the prey's thermal radiation signature. These pits have a relatively short effective range of about 1 ft, but give the rattlesnake a distinctive advantage in hunting for warm-blooded creatures at night.

Heat-sensing pits

Aside from this pair of simple eyes, rattlesnakes are able to detect thermal radiation emitted by warm-blooded organisms in their environment. Functioning optically like a pinhole camera eye, thermal radiation, in the form of infrared wavelength light, enters, passes through the opening of the pit and strikes the pit membrane located in the back wall, warming this part of the organ. Due to the extremely high density of these heat-sensitive receptors innervating this membrane, the rattlesnake can detect temperature changes of 0.003 °C or less in its immediate surroundings. Infrared cues from these receptors are transmitted to the brain by the trigeminal nerve, where they are used to create thermal maps of the snake’s surroundings. Due to the small sizes of the pit openings, typically these thermals images are low in resolution and contrast. Nevertheless, rattlesnakes superimpose visual images created from information from the eyes with these thermal images from the pit organs to more accurately visualize their surroundings in low levels of light. Research conducted recently on the molecular mechanism of this ability suggests the temperature sensitivity of these pit organs is closely linked to the activity of transient receptor potential ankyrin 1, a temperature-sensitive ion channel saturated in the pit membrane.

Skin and circulation

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Rattlesnake skin has a set of overlapping scales which cover the entire body, providing protection from a variety of threats including dehydration and physical trauma. The typical rattlesnake, genus Crotalus, has the top of its head covered with small scales, except, with a few species, a few crowded plates directly over the snout. The skin of snakes is highly sensitive to contact, tension, and pressure; they are capable of feeling pain.
An important function of the skin is the sensation of changes in air temperature, which can guide the snakes towards warm basking/shelter locations. All snakes are ectotherms. To maintain a stable body temperature, they exchange heat with their external environments. Snakes often move into open, sunny areas to absorb heat from the sun and warmed earth, a behavior known as basking. Nerves in the skin regulate the flow of blood into the veins near the surface. Rubio states, "The skin's acceptance of radiant energy, its ability to determine the temperature, and the snake's ability to move toward or away from one temperature gradient to another are among the most important behavioral actions in its daily life."
The skin of rattlesnakes is intricately patterned in a manner that camouflages them from their predators. Rattlesnakes do not generally have bright or showy colors (reds, yellows, blues, etc.), instead relying on subtle earth tones that resemble the surrounding environment.
Creases in the epidermal tissue connect the scales of rattlesnakes. When ingesting large prey, these creases can unfold, allowing the skin to expand to envelop a much greater volume. The skin appears to tightly stretch to accommodate the meal, but in reality, the skin is simply smoothing out from its creased state and is not under very high tension.

Jane Worll for Animalix