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Updated Tuesday, August 12, 2008 0:00 am TWN, By Angel Lin, Special to The China Post

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Pets now up for rent; animal-rights organizations protest

TAIPEI, Taiwan -- Cars, luggage, maternity clothes — it seems most all can be rented these days. Add now to the list a considerable selection of domestic company, thanks to a fresh sales scheme that will let out pets for a pilot run, and then take them back with open arms.

For NT$300 a day, a customer may rent a Chihuahua, or at another premium, bring home any of the sundry ensemble of dogs, cats, rodents, rabbits, hermit crabs, turtles and tarantulas at Ocean on Land, wholesale pet shop (medi.com.tw) of Yuli, Taitung. Trial owners take out pets for a minimum of three days and sign contracts, promising the return of the animals, alive and well. Young trial owners must secure the permission of parents. Should these owners decide to keep the pet, cost is sticker price minus half the amount gone toward rent.

Said Ocean on Land manager Tong Shan to local media, he has noticed that, over the years, scores of customers buy pets out of excitement and curiosity, only to abandon their purchases by the road once the novelty has worn off.

Reception toward the rental service has been positive, continued Tong. Parents in particular approve. Recently, the store provided white mice to a child whose parents had adamantly refused to purchase, but were amenable to renting.

At Taoyuan's Pet and Aquarium Department Store, rabbits and rodents are available in a similar program. Available at NT$10 a day, the program is pet ownership at a pittance. NT$500 more and you get all the accouterments: cage, wood chips and a bag of feed.

But while rabbits and rodents are all very well, Rent-A-Pet could get iffy quickly. A kitten, after all, is not a car. Flexpetz, a similar program that launched last year in California, is up on hot coals this summer as it attempts to branch into Boston, Paris and beyond.

For a hefty chunk of cash — monthly US$99.95 membership fee, US$150 orientation fee, daily US$45 "doggy time" fee and an optional shuttle fee of US$25 per trip — Flexpetz allows customers to spend time with dogs of their choice. A little over a year after its launch, Flexpetz has been questioned by the British Parliament, the Massachusetts Senate and animal-rights organizations.

"While it may be well-intentioned," issued the Humane Society of the United States, "Flexpetz is not likely to benefit the overall welfare of the dogs they rent. Dogs form attachments to their families and instinctively learn to protect their packs. Frequent and abrupt changes in location, routine, discipline and attention are confusing and are likely to lead to stress-induced behavior problems."

Said Daphna Nachminovitch of PETA's Cruelty Investigations Department in response to Newsweek inquiries, "This business exists to make money at the psychological expense of the animal."

Pet welfare aside, the message imparted to society by these pet shops and to children by parents isn't a William Bennett life lesson by any means. Rather, it smacks suspiciously of the mindset that leaves dogs in the street. Flexpetz founder Marlena Cervantes said it best: the program is for pet lovers who would like to stay "guilt-free, worry-free and commitment-free." One wonders if these folks might be happier with a Tamagotchi.

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