Pets
Find and offer pets in Costa Rica.
When a family in Heredia moves into an apartment, it rarely passes on just the animal. Out go the fish tank with its filter, the cage that housed a pair of guinea pigs, the transport box and the half-used bag of food. Both sides of that handover turn up here: new and pre-owned kit for anything from a dog to a gecko, and animals looking for a new home, which are rehomed rather than sold. Lost and found animals have their own corner, with notices written the Costa Rican way, by landmark. Ask the animal’s age and habits, or exactly what comes with the cage, before you meet.
A dog, a pair of guinea pigs or a tank of guppies, and what each one lives in:
the animal decides where to look. Dogs and cats have the deepest branches, because they are the animals most often looking for a new home: rescues and families rehome them under adopt a dog and adopt a cat, next to the beds, leads and litter trays in the supplies sections. For birds, fish, rodents and rabbits and reptiles and amphibians, the listings are mostly about housing, because a canary, a betta or a gecko does only as well as the cage, tank or terrarium it lives in. Now and then an animal turns up too, when its owner can no longer keep it.
Years, space and noise before a parrot or a rabbit moves in:
those three settle most choices. A hamster lives two or three years; a large parrot can outlive the person who takes it in, and one calling at dawn carries through every wall of an apartment block. Rabbits need time out of the cage every day, and guinea pigs are happier kept in pairs than alone. Reptiles depend on their lamps, so the kit matters as much as the animal. Fish ask for patience: a new tank has to run for a few weeks before the first fish go in. Get the housing first and size it for the adult animal, not the young one in front of you. A cage that suits a rabbit lets a hamster walk straight out between the bars.
Second-hand aquariums, cages and terrariums:
most of the risk sits in a few places. On a tank, run a finger along every silicone seam; peeling, bubbles or a white hard-water line along a joint mean it has leaked before, and so does a swollen or stained stand. Seeing it full and running is worth more than any promise, so ask the seller to fill it the day before. On cages, look for rust on the bars and welds, chipped coating that a parrot or a rabbit will chew, a cracked plastic tray and a door a clever bird can lift. Plug in every heater and lamp, because a heater that has died gives no sign until the water goes cold. Used tanks go for well under the new price for a reason: they are heavy, they crack in a car, and the buyer takes on the leak risk. One that you have seen holding water is the exception and is priced like it.
A dog lost to the fireworks, and a notice that gives a landmark:
Christmas and New Year nights are when many dogs bolt, so a tag with a phone number on the collar does more than any photo. A good notice under animals lost and found says what the animal answers to, the date, and where it was last seen the way people here give directions, such as a hundred metres south of the plaza in Santa Bárbara. If you find one, ask a vet clinic to scan it for a microchip, and leave one distinguishing mark out of your notice so the real owner can describe it.
Rehoming an animal with its cage and its routine:
tell the next home everything you would want to know: age, whether it is spayed or neutered, the vaccination card for a dog or a cat, what it eats, and how it gets on with children and other animals. Send its things with it, and meet the family before the handover. For kit on its own, give the measurements, list exactly what is included, from the lid to the filter, and photograph it set up. Anyone coming to collect a tank from Puriscal or Moravia should bring buckets and towels: it travels empty, and the filter sponge rides in its own tank water so the bacteria living in it survive the trip.