Everybody and their dog, it seems, is going on holiday, with almost 12,000 pet passports issued in Ireland so far this year.
Over 11,720 of the travel documents were purchased in the first six month to the end of June. The figure is is already up on the 11,471 issued last year and the 10,159 issued in 2013.
According to the Department of Agriculture, the numbers have doubled since 2012, when the rules around pets travelling between Ireland and Britain changed to require the use of passports. The vast majority are now issued to dogs, while the rest are registered to cats and in rare cases to ferrets. Each passport is valid for a maximum of two years.
The high number of applications indicates that travellers are increasingly unwilling to trust someone else to mind their pets or pay for boarding services.
A recent survey in Britain found that more than half of owners take their animals on holidays because they are “part of the family”. One third said they did not want their pets to miss out on “travel experiences”.
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Not everyone, however, is convinced that bringing pets abroad is a good idea.
“The hard truth is that it’s usually better to find a safe pair of hands at home who can look after them while you’re away,” Gillian Bird, of the Dublin Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, said.
“Even if you are going to a plush villa in Spain, you need to know if your dog is going to be comfortable there. It’s not fair to leave them inside all day while you are out at the beach or shopping. You have to make sure they will not be left without shade for too long.”
To get a passport dogs, cats and ferrets must be microchipped, given a rabies vaccination and be travelling with their owner within the European Union. Rodents, rabbits, birds, fish, and reptiles do not need a passport to travel within the EU.