The Environmental Impact of Pets
Name:
Questions: You can type into this document without making it a PDF!!!! Submit to me on Google
Classroom.
1. Fill in the following table:
Organism
# of global hectares of resources used per year
Large dog
Small dog
cat
Average human in Bangladesh
Average American (look this up)
2. The article says that feeding ​American pets​ has as much of an environmental impact as the
combined populations of which 2 countries? Look up the populations of those countries and write
them here.
3. What resources (besides food) are our pets using?
4. In 2011, what law did Shanghai pass?
5. Why is it important that we shrink the population of pets?
6. What 4 strategies, that were listed in the article, would help shrink the pet population? Explain each
in the table below (how would each strategy reduce the environmental impact)?
strategy
How does this strategy reduce environmental
impact?
1
2
3
4
7. How did you feel when you read about the four strategies that this author suggests for reducing pet
populations.
8. What known benefits do pets provide for humans? These are not mentioned in the article but you
can look it up.
9. Which strategies would you support? Why?
10. Which strategies would you ​not ​support? Why?
11. The article does not mention fancy doggie day care centers. Do you think that these are necessities
or luxuries? Why?
12. What are the top 3 countries of pet ownership?
13. Why are feral cats an ecological problem?
14. What productive, smaller pets did the article suggest people might switch to in order to reduce
ecological impact?
15. Were you surprised when the article mentioned how much the average American spends on a pet
over its lifetime? Why or why not?