When I was a girl, I remember my father pulling over whenever he saw a turtle in the road. He’d pick it up (especially if it was a baby turtle!) and give it to us children and we’d take it home. We’d feed the turtle and keep it for a few weeks, but always released it back out into the wild because our parents said it was mean to keep an animal in captivity.

We did this with all sorts of wild creatures. I think this curbed a desire to have pets, but also influenced my attitude toward house pets. While we did have domestic animals at times as well as outdoor cats and dogs, we all felt pretty strongly that it was cruel to force animals to live with us for the sole purpose of our enjoyment.

I still think about all this a lot, especially now that we have children. I want our kids to love animals without ever feeling they are entitled to them… I want them to have a relationship with all creatures great and small — woodland creatures, barn cats, sheep and sheepdogs, calves, lizards, grass snakes, butterflies. I want them to experience the variety of nature and living things with respect, awe, and admiration.