Today, I’m sitting down to calculate the cost of owning my pets.

I’m not including any cost like worm pills for the dog, vet visits or grooming expenses.

We currently have 1 dog (a chocolate lab), 1 cat, 2 hamsters and 1 1/2 fish.  With the fish, sometimes we get new ones when the fish dies and sometimes we don’t, thus the 1 1/2 number…  We really like having pets, but they do require a lot of work (I hate cleaning cages) and if you add up the cost per years, it’s ends up being a little over $1,000 dollars.

Obviously, the most expensive pet for us is our dog.  She eats about 1 bag of dog food a month (@ $45 per bag).  We got unlucky with our dog because she has a food allergy that requires us to spend $45 per bag.  Our cat goes through about 1 bag of cat food every 3 months (@ 10 per bag).  Cat litter usually runs about $12 a month.  The cost of the hamsters and fish pale in comparison to the dog and cat from a food perspective.  But the hamsters do require frequent bedding changes (once a week, but we stretch it to 2 weeks).  So the bedding cost for a hamster usually runs about $5 per month.   The fish cost about $3 a year. 

When we go on vacation, we only board up the dog.  We get away with the cat because we bring out extra litter pan for her, and she use all 3 until we return.  Note, we only take 1 week vacation, 2 weeks and we’d have a problem…

My kids really enjoy there pets though, so for the time being, this is an expense that I can’t get out of. 

If you do want a pet, that isn’t expensive, fish are the way to go.  We currently have 2 beta fish, and they are both pretty and easy maintenance.

-D