InventorSpot

"Wolfing down food" is instinctive to wolves because if they don't eat their prey fast, another animal will. Unfortunately for many domestic dogs, they've inherited that instinct from wolves and wild dogs, but because of the domestic dog's more delicate digestive system, wolfing it down (or "wooffing it down") might end up as dog bulimia.

2008 is a wonderful year to be judging Halloween pet costumes. My gosh, the dog, cat, ferret and bird costumes are even cuter than they were last Halloween. This year, Lady Bee was barely able to pare the awards down to 14. Some of the award categories are Lady Bee's Best Couple In A Famous Movie, Scariest Cat, Most Devilish Dog, Best Human Impersonator and, of course, the What In The Heck Is That? category.

Indoor cats have it rough. It's hard enough for them to squelch their instincts to hunt, but they have to stay in the same environment day in and day out. B O R I N G for a cat.

Animals are forever capturing our attention with the silly things they do. Some don't even have to do anything, they just look funny. Check out some inventions for animals and articles about animals from our archives and from other great sites on the web.

Jungeschachtel (shit happens) is a new design agency founded by two established graphic, advertising, and packaging designers -- Nina Dautzenber and Andrea Gadesmann -- and the agency dog, Cuno, whose prior experience was being "the cutest little lab on earth."

The most efficient way to recycle things is to reuse them. Austrian design company Walking-Things.com has the perfect design-it-yourself solution to recycle your plastic water bottles!

Now, drink the water first....

What can you do with those old used up toys that your children used to play with, but are now collecting dust in the corner of your attic? Artist Robert Bradford makes good use of them and creates sculptures out of these toys.

Marco Morosini is a successful Italian artist and designer who expresses what he perceives around him through lively graphics, a line of clothing and accessories, poignant photographs of the Bosnian War, and just about anything he puts his attention to. Giving his wink and a nod to the god-like way dogs are treated in modern society, Morosini has created six godly temples to honor dogs in his series Dog Is A God®.

I doubt if B.F.Skinner ever thought his training methods would be applied to soccer training for goldfish, but they are now! Dr. Dean Pomerleau has developed a training kit to aid you in training pet fish to play soccer and other un-fish like sports, using the operant conditioning training methods he uses to train larger sea animals.

Lazy days of summer may slow some down, but these InventorSpot writers find lots of fun in the sun.

Have you exhausted your options when it comes to getting rid of pesky animals (not your own, of course) from your backyard?

Well, here's a Scarecrow® that really works!

Professional athletes have experienced the benefits of Q-Links for more than a decade.The pendants worn around their necks have helped many a professional golfer, for example, score some birdies. And even Madonna is reported to wear a Q-link!

But, now pets can experience the same focus and positive, healthy energy with the Q-Links Pet Pendant!

If your 10 year old Labrador Retriever with hip dysplasia could run like a pup again, would you consider it a miracle? Or if your horse could be freed from arthritic pain without drugs and be able to race or jump again, would that be a miracle? Right now, dogs and horses with soft tissue injuries and diseases can be helped with the miracle of science, in the form of a treatment called Vet-Stem Regenerative Medicine (VSRM).

Disturbing yet practical, the Bird Trap and Cat Feeder makes feeding your cat simple at the expense of all the birds that like to fly around your yard.

Photos of an extremely tolerant cat wearing a Hello Kitty costume that made the rounds a few months back may have given the impression that this was a novelty item. Just the opposite – Hello Kitty suits are the cat's meow in Japan; so much so that even DOGS want to get in on the act!

If I had my dog's teeth, I would definitely not want to smile for a camera or anything else. No, I'm not suggesting he needs braces, although there is such a thing as pet orthodontics. But he does have a lot of tartar, a big problem for dogs and cats and, as they get older, the tartar gets worse... and so does their breath!

Spark, a Dutch design and innovation company, has created what it calls a "revolutionary" horse saddle. Why revolutionary? The saddle, called Unite, can actually be fitted by the rider to the contours of the horse's back! So if the saddle fits....

We've been scoping out dog swimsuits and their models all spring and, finally, on the official first weekend of Summer, we're ready to announce the 10 winners of Inventor Spot's Illustrated 2008 Dog Swimsuit Contest! The top dog swimsuits are winners in 10 categories, including Best Itsy-Bitsy-Teeny- Weeny-Pink-Polka-Dot Dog Bikini, Geekiest Dog Jammers, Best Butt Dog Jammers, and If You've Got It, Flaunt It Dog Bikini. Come on in and see them....

The Smithsonian Institution's National Zoo just disclosed that surgery was performed late last year on a horse to reverse a vasectomy originally performed in 1999. This was the first reverse vasectomy ever performed on a horse. It was not just any horse: it was the National Zoo's endangered Przewalski horse, one of a few hundred wild horses alive today.

It remains to be seen if the oxygenating capsule for humans or dogs is going to have legs as the hottest health and fitness craze, but in Japan anything and everything is worth a try. So if you happen to be in the vicinity of the Yoyogi Uehara station in Tokyo, stop by with your dog or cat and let him try out the OWND Cafe special!