The best Christmas presents for pets.

Let’s not forget our most faithful friends at Christmas, our pets, who love us gladly, unconditionally, and uncritically every day of the year. Here at Hawk’s Haven, our friend Ben and Silence Dogood have a lot of pets: a dog, cats, a parrot, a parakeet, fish, a bunny, and, of course, our six heritage chickens out in the Pullet Palace. We try to make Christmas a special time for all of them.

Here are some suggestions for ways you can make Christmas joyful for your pets. Mind you, our friend Ben has never had alpacas, hamsters, mice, gerbils, hermit crabs, tarantulas, finches, turtles, or snakes. If anyone out there has these, or other pets I’ve overlooked, please send in your suggestions for great Christmas gifts for them! (Not to mention favorite gifts for your cat, dog, etc.)

Dogs: As any dog owner knows, dogs love food, and it takes very little to make them happy. Your dog would have a very merry Christmas if you fixed him a scrambled egg and buttered toast, gave her a modest portion of your turkey and stuffing or mashed potatoes, or handed out an oatmeal cookie or half a cranberry muffin, buttered biscuit, or quarter of a bagel and cream cheese. (Like us, our golden retriever, Molly, is especially partial to buttered potato skins.)

Dog bakeries have sprung up all over the country, and they specialize in wholesome, clever dog treats. If you put up a stocking for your dog, you could stuff it with a mixed bag of these, or make a batch of your own—it’s no harder than baking a batch of biscuits for the family. (I’ll include a recipe at the end of this post.)

For an older dog, there’s a special gift you can give that will make them much more comfortable and help them sleep better for the rest of their lives. Companies like Orvis (www.orvis.com) and L.L. Bean (www.llbean.com) carry a wonderful assortment of dog “nests,” or beds, that are comfy shaped cushion-beds in a variety of sizes and fabrics. They’re a great gift for dogs of every age. But for older dogs, they carry special foam-filled therapeutic dog nests that relieve pressure on an older dog’s joints. Our Molly loves hers, as do our cats, who often take it over entirely or curl up with her for a long winter’s nap.  

Cats: We’re firm believers that the simpler the cat toy, the better cats like it. A ping-pong ball makes a great cat toy. Catnip mice and other catnip-filled toys are always appreciated. One great source of handmade catnip toys filled with potent organic catnip is The Catnip Cafe (www.thecatnipcafe.com), and you can’t beat their prices, but you can find plenty of other sources online.

Our younger cats are also very partial to what we call “toys on sticks”—glittering plastic streamers at the ends of rods, feathers or toy “lures” on “fishing poles,” and the like. We’ve found ours at cat shows (a great source of quality cat toys) and craft shows, but you could even use a peacock feather for this. Of course, the success of these toys depends on your holding the business end of them and twirling them for your kitten’s or cat’s delight, but somehow I don’t think you cat lovers would mind devoting ten minutes a day to playing with your pets!

What you don’t want to give your cat are toys with small parts that could come off and be swallowed, like plastic eyes and feather tails, or toys he or she could choke on, like pieces of string. To be safe, our friend Ben suggests avoiding plastic toys altogether. And if you treat your cat to a peacock feather or “stick toy,” put it safely away when you’re not using it.

What about treats? We’ve found that, bizarrely, our cats simply love sweet breads, like pumpkin and banana breads. If you happen to have any of these, or muffins, on hand, you might try sharing a fragment with your cat. They also like a bit of sauced pasta, a fragment of cheese, and (occasionally) a piece of dry dogfood! You’re not suppposed to give cats tuna fish, which is apparently addictive to them, but on Christmas Day, perhaps a little wouldn’t hurt, or a bit of sardine or turkey.

Birds: Parrots and parakeets are very smart, and they love toys and treats as much as anyone. Parrots are omnivores, and will relish “people food” as the greatest treat. Like us and our dog Molly, our Plutarch the Parrot loves a piece of buttered potato skin, some popcorn or a pizza crust, or a few strands of spaghetti and sauce. He also enjoys pieces of most fruits and vegetables, cheese, bread, tortilla chips, hardboiled eggs, and (sure enough) crackers. Cashews and other nuts are favorites, too. Our parakeet Willow enjoys “honey treats,” the sticks and bells of birdseed “glued” together with honey-water. We also try to make sure she always has a mineral block and millet spray in her cage.

It may not be too festive, but one of the best gifts you can give a pet bird (or any pet) is to make sure they have the best-quality food you can afford and supplements like wheatgrass, spirulina, and vitamins. Good health is the greatest gift! 

Toys for parrots can range from the simplest—a wine cork—to rather elaborate. Plu’s favorite is a coconut cut in half and hung on a chain, with fiber ropes and beads hanging from the bottom. He must be a musician at heart—he loves clapping the coconut halves together, and he also loves ringing heavy metal bells and chimes. Our pionus parrot, Marcus Hookbill, preferred rawhide strips with wooden beads on the ends, which he would elaborately unknot. Our parakeet, Willow, also enjoys toys, including various bells, swings, and interactive toys. Having a selection of durable, well-made toys on hand—no cheap plastic toys that can shatter—and rotating them will keep your pet bird engaged and entertained. For a source of high-quality handmade bird toys, check out the offerings at Beakapoo (www.beakapoo.com), or visit a bird specialty store.

Fish: We feel quite strongly that fish deserve a better life than most people give them. Maybe it’s because we’re passionate gardeners, but we believe in landscaping all our aquariums with plenty of live plants. Fish, snails, shrimp, and all aquarium residents love the shelter plants provide, they add interest to the tank, and herbivores like goldfish will relish them. We also believe in treating them to the frozen blocks of “fresh food” that you can buy at pet and specialty aquarium stores. We like to get an assortment of frozen spirulina, brine shrimp, bloodworms, and etc., and give our fish a block once a week. If you’ve never done this, watching the ecstatic reaction of the fish as they rush to enjoy the fresh treat will convince you that it’s worth keeping a carton on hand in your freezer. Our favorite source of high-quality fish food, plants, and interesting aquarium denizens is Arizona Aquatic Gardens (www.azgardens.com).

Bunnies: Yes, bunnies do love carrots, especially organic carrots. (“Baby” organic carrots are excellent treats.) They also love lettuce and a wide variety of greens, including dandelions, endive, and chicory, and breads of all kinds. A great treat for your bunny would be some alfalfa or timothy hay, available in mini-bales at most pet stores. And to help their digestion, enzyme tablets made of papaya extracts are excellent treats (bunnies eat them like candy). One online source of Oxbow Papaya Tablets is Chinchillas.com (www.chinchillas.com), which also gives an unbiased overview of their effectiveness. Some bunnies enjoy wooden toy treats as well, which help them keep their teeth trimmed. 

Chickens: Our friend Ben and Silence wouldn’t dream of neglecting our chickens, who provide us with the best eggs on this planet, at Christmas. Like dogs and parrots, chickens are omnivores. They enjoy breads, pasta, tomatoes, popcorn, French fries, all kinds of greens, and pretty much any kind of leftover or scrap you have on hand, including pepper cores. (Ours even relish leftover cooked broccoli, as long as it has a bit of lemon-butter sauce on it, and of course, they too love potato skins.) We also like to give them a hay bale to play with at Christmas. We put the bale in their enclosed yard, cut the plastic ropes that hold it together and pull them off, and let the chickens rip into the bale. They love it!

Okay, that’s it for us, with one caveat: Never, ever, give any pet anything that contains chocolate, which is poisonous to them. (We confess that this makes us a bit nervous on our own behalf.) And our friend Ben would add, never, ever, give a pet some plasticy, no-ID food thing that you would not be willing to eat yourself. If it looks suspect, it is suspect. Don’t poison your pets with chemical-laced concoctions. Keep it simple and wholesome: They’ll love it anyway.

Oops, Silence reminds me that I promised to give you a simple homemade dog-biscuit recipe at the end of this post. Silence liked the “Cheesy Dog Biscuit Treats” recipe given on the GourmetSleuth site (www.gourmetsleuth.com), except for one horrific fact: They use margarine as an ingredient instead of butter. Don’t do it! Your poor dogs! Use butter instead. Here’s the recipe, with butter instead of margarine. Check the site for many other homemade dog-treat recipes, including vegetarian and vegan options.

                 Cheesy Dog Biscuit Treats

1 cup rolled oats

1/3 cup butter

1 cup boiling water

3/4 cup cornmeal

1 tablespoon sugar

2 teaspoons chicken or beef flavored instant bouillon

1/2 cup milk

1 cup shredded cheddar cheese

1 egg, beaten

2-3 cups whole wheat flour

Preheat oven to 325 degrees F. In a large bowl, combine oats, butter, and boiling water; let stand 10 minutes. Then add cornmeal, sugar, bouillon, milk, cheese, and egg; blend well. Lightly spoon flour into measuring cup. Add flour, 1 cup at a time, mixing well after each addition to form a stiff dough.

Silence says you can drop this batter from a spoon onto a greased cookie sheet and bake into dog treats. But if you want to make perfect dog biscuits, you need to take another step: On a floured surface, knead in the remaining flour until dough is smooth and no longer sticky, 3 to 4 minutes. Roll or pat out dough to 1/2-inch thickness, then cut with cookie cutters (bone-shaped, dog-shaped, or any shape) and place 1 inch apart on greased cookie sheets. Bake 35-45 minutes at 325 degrees F. Cool and store. Makes 3 1/2 dozen large dog biscuits or 8 dozen small dog treats. Can be refrigerated or frozen for longer life.