Episode 3 Pet Island

Pets. Don't you just love them?

In this series, we're going to meet plenty of people who really,

really do.

It's like having more children. It's as easy to have two

or three as it is to have four or five.

Our obsession with them has even turned some pets

into celebrities.

The internet love her. She always gets loads of compliments.

We would have a sort of core following.

The ones that read it every day.

Our love for them appears to have no bounds.

Coming up on Pet Island, we're in Belfast with a former model

who is being tormented by his Chihuahuas.

This is where a lot of the damage would be done.

We travel to West Cork to meet a man who can talk to the animals.

I've a small amount of cat, and a small amount of pigeon.

But first, we're in Dublin with cat lady Roisin Mills,

as she prepares to move house.

Merlin, come on.

In Lucan, County Dublin, lives Roisin Mills and her two cats.

My two cats are Merlin and Morgana, but they are endearingly

known as Mr and Mrs Mills, because

they are actually married.

In the respect that, you know, I couldn't have them living in sin.

We did a very small, little ceremony with a couple of friends of mine.

And we had tea and wine and some cupcakes. It was lovely.

It was a lovely little ceremony.

Roisin plans to move house and is scared of upsetting her cats.

Last time I moved them, which was two years ago,

that was from the UK to here,

and it's just very different,

because they know that they're moving.

They know that it's a long journey, but because this time,

they're only moving 25 minutes down the road,

it's a much shorter car journey.

It's not quite defined as being, we are absolutely moving house,

so I have asked for a specialist to come along, just to make sure

that I'm doing the right thing

because I don't want my little puss cats stressed.

Jim Stephens is a pet behaviour counsellor who works

throughout Ireland.

-Hi, Jim.

-Roisin.

-Nice to meet you.

-Nice to meet you. Come in, come in.

Welcome to my humble home.

Ah. Very cat-friendly, I can see.

If the owner doesn't take the precautions to help settle

the cat securely into its new environment,

ultimately, the cat will leave.

Cats want to feel safe in the environment.

If they don't feel safe in their new home,

they will find somewhere else, where they do feel secure.

So, the cats have moved before?

Yes, but it was a much easier move,

-because it was actually from the UK to here.

-Are you moving far?

We're moving from here to into town, into a smaller house.

OK. Well, that also can be a bit of a problem.

If they're used to larger spaces, it's much more difficult

for them to start to cope, but there are ways of getting over that

and helping the cats settle in.

We might look at, firstly, if you have access to the house,

making sure it's cat-friendly, so, tucking away any loose wires,

-or filling up any holes that the cat might try to get out of.

-Yeah.

Also, looking at settling the cats into their new area, which is

by scent.

So, we might use something like the pheromones,

or we might be looking at the simple things of a clean cloth,

rubbing over the cats and then rubbing onto the surfaces

that they're going to be moving into.

I don't know if you've heard this old wives' tale about

putting butter on cats' paws, when you're moving house?

And this is meant to do what, exactly?

Well, apparently, it's the last thing you do with the cats.

So, you've moved everything else out,

you put them into the crate and before you put them

into the crate, or the carrier,

you put butter on their paws,

and they wash the butter off,

and because of the grease in the butter,

it picks up dust mites from the old house,

and by the time they get to the new house, they've washed their paws.

The minute they step out into the new house, it picks up

the new smell from the new house, and stops them from wandering.

Have you heard of that?

I can't say I have,

but I think it probably has a little basis in some science.

But technology's moved on now, and with the use of pheromones,

I think it can be a lot quicker

and a lot more guaranteed to be successful.

Pheromone is a synthetic version of what the cat actually rubs

when he's rubbing against you, or against furniture.

They put their own scent down.

So, really, just at head height, just a little spray over.

-Great. And it doesn't stain or anything, no?

-No.

Time is the biggest thing with cats to help them

settle into anywhere, or a new situation.

Don't be tempted to just open the doors and say, well,

this is your new area. Go.

-Work at their pace.

-So, no butter on the paws?

-No.

-Go on, just for the laugh. Could I try it?

-You could try it.

-Yeah. Or peanut butter.

-Peanut butter?

No, but then I might end up licking their paws for them.

Jim has one final piece of advice which Roisin must keep

when she and her cats arrive at their new house.

Really, to successfully settle a cat into a new home,

it's about restricting the area to a safe,

maybe one room, and gradually, over a period of up to two weeks,

allow the cat to explore further,

and if you are moving into an open-plan area, it's going

to be slightly more difficult, I would suggest.

I think it will be all right.

I have a really good feeling about the house, but we'll see.

For all I know, it could just erupt into a volcano of stress levels,

but I'm hoping not.

Next, we're in Belfast to meet former model Chris.

Hello, you two.

What have yous been up to? Come on. I'll get you some food.

Chris and his cat, Tyler,

are being terrorised by his two Chihuahuas,

Bruiser and Parlow.

So, this is Bruiser. This is Tyler, the cat.

And this is Parlow.

Where are you going? Are you coming up?

So, this is Parlow. He has about three teeth left.

He's about... What are you now? You don't want to look.

He's about ten years old.

Having had a successful career in London, Chris has recently

moved back to Belfast

and wants to establish some new rules in the house.

The house in London was destroyed.

Furniture had to be thrown out, most of it,

because it was just eaten away by pee.

It stank.

So, when I moved back to Belfast, I didn't want that to happen.

I got a lovely new house here, and I just didn't want it

to be the same thing, of it just turning into

a cesspit, really.

The cat has to eat his... Even though it's very unhygienic,

and I'm constantly getting shouted at by my parents,

for letting the cat eat off the work surfaces.

Like, they have them tortured.

Mainly, I would have a wee sort of barricade across here, to keep

them in this area, and this sort of leads down to their wee bedroom,

that they sleep in every night, now.

I can't have them in the bed with me any more, because whilst

I'm asleep, they just go crackers,

and I don't get a good night's sleep.

So this is the hallway where they spend a lot of their time,

with their water and their biscuits, and things.

Then, this leads on to the living room.

As you can see, under the dining-room table,

that is just from one day.

So, you see the new curtains that I had put in,

down right at the bottom, there's a definite yellowy tinge,

that is gradually creeping up and up and up. You proud of it?

Are you proud of yourself?

There's a lamp I have here, that is

now all rusty in one corner of it.

Luckily, the lamp is meant to look old and battered,

so it kind of adds to it, but at the same time,

you can just see the damage is done.

There's rust. And also, it's electric.

If they peed on it when it was on, they could get electrocuted.

I nearly have to mop the floors every night I get in

before I can get my dinner, before I can sort things out, because

in London, I didn't do that and that's why it got into such a state.

Then when I did have to do it,

things just kept falling apart in my hands.

There were bits of skirting board, as soon as I touched them,

they fell off the wall.

They were like dust... I don't know what is they pee,

but it's very acidic

and it just seems to destroy things, doesn't it, Bruiser?

In London, it wasn't my house - I was renting a house and things

and I didn't mind.

I had friends over and stuff, but it didn't bother them,

but when I moved home, Mum and Dad would come round

and I have a new niece now and I don't want her coming into an...

Well, I don't think my brother and sister-in-law

would let her in the house, frankly, if there's...

It's just an animal toilet.

I don't want friends coming over or something

and just thinking that I'm a filthy animal in a stinky house.

Chris has decided that it's time to call in an expert.

My dream would be that it would just be a nice, clean house.

It smells nice, that would be it.

That I could come into the house

and it would not be this odour of dog toilet.

Next, we risk life and limb by travelling to Cape Clear Island

which lies nine miles off the Cork coastline.

Here we meet Ed Harper,

a goat farmer who was left blind after a childhood accident.

We have my guide dog, Izzy, who is a German Shepherd.

We have three cats and we've also got the goats.

You can work a guide dog over pretty well anything

and I used to have the balance.

Oh, I got that one wrong!

Ed's cats are surrounded by beautiful scenery.

If only they could enjoy it.

Occasionally, I will sit down on this water trough

and I'll listen to the scenery because there's the birds,

there's the sea, there's the wind.

There's all that kind of things and the animals.

The years spent listening to nature has taught Ed

to speak to the animals.

HE BLEATS

Come on, then. Come on, kid.

There's several different calls that goats have

and it depends what you want them to do.

There's a noise that mothers make which means "stay close".

They go, eh-eh, eh-eh, eh-eh.

Like that. And it works. If you do that, they'll stay close to you.

But the general call command from a distance is basically

something like...

BLEATING

I have a small amount of cat and a small amount of pigeon

and, actually, they're very related.

Oh, and a tiny bit of raven, as well.

It pays to keep in with the people who are liable to kill your kids

if they are born outside

so you have to be able to talk to the ravens, as well.

They go, sort of...

HE IMITATES BIRD CALL

But pigeons, they go something more like this...

HE COOS

But again, it's a long time since spring,

so I'm not speaking fluently at the moment.

And the cats, it depends on the cats.

I notice it's a thing they do and especially,

they do it to the kittens.

They sort of go...

HE PURRS

It's a funny noise because it's not like the usual meow they do at us.

It's a sort of broken...

It's a bit related to pigeon, funnily enough.

They sort of go...

HE PURRS

It tends to work.

When not listening to the sounds of the sea,

the goats are serenaded by Ed.

# Well, good friends, one and all

# I just thought I'd make a call

# For I love to see a crowd of happy faces... #

You'd like all the goats

and obviously occasionally you like one more than another,

but I'd say the one I cared about most

and who cared about me most was a goat called Elsie.

She died in 2010, sadly.

It all started one morning, I was really, really upset

but I had to go milking, so out I went.

That's the first time that Elsie suddenly seemed to twig

that I was really upset.

When we'd be in the milking parlour,

if I was sad or upset or whatever, she'd put her head out

and she'd rub my cheek with her cheek.

It was a very deep, emotional attachment.

Yeah, I'd go as far as saying that the two of us loved each other.

I'm going to have to get out of farming sooner or later.

I can see what's going to be happening really is,

I'll be spending more time on the mainland,

less time on the island, but I don't see me not coming back here.

I've spent 36 years here now and that's more of my life

than I've spent anywhere else.

I just love the island.

# I'm a member of that multitude of labour... #

Roisin Mills has been planning a house move along with her two cats

and it is finally time for them to leave.

This is the case I'm going to take them in.

It's nice, it's big, it means they can see around them.

I've just got to remember how to put it back together again.

Because I forgot to keep the instructions.

There we go.

Then what I'm going to do with this is put it into the car

and then grab them and put them straight into it.

Ta-dah!

Open Sesame!

Right, I need to go and get a blanket and put that in.

Ah, yes, my domesticity comes out in me.

Oh!

So, I'm going to get Merlin and put him in.

Right.

No, he's going to go down.

That'll be a no.

Right.

Yes, you stay there.

Merlin, come on.

It was the only place they could be.

There was nowhere else for them to hide so it's just a case

that they're obviously a little bit more freaked

than I thought they would be.

Merlin.

Relax. Relax. Relax.

In you go.

He's calling for you.

Look who's coming, Merlin.

Yes, are you going to make room?

And in. Right.

I've decided to calm then down a bit, to give them a bit of cover.

So I'm going to give them my coat - the sacrifices a parent makes

for her cat kids - just because you can see Merlin is still quite upset.

A cat's natural instinct when they are fearful is to go undercover

so when they're dying, as well, they do the same thing.

The reason they both went underneath the dresser is

because it was cover and there was no other cover in the house

because everything's moved out.

As you can see,

Merlin is already burying his head down into the blanket.

OK, kiddoes.

Are you ready?

Start your engines!

We're going to the new house.

Merlin, don't worry, you'll be fine, pet.

Let's open the window a bit and get some air

and get me some water.

All good.

So, are you all relaxed in the back?

No, of course, Morgana is wanting to look out,

to see what's going on in the world.

-Roisin and the cats have arrived at their new home.

-Where are we going?

The inelegance of cat travel.

The outside world!

God, you do weigh a ton!

Cat carriers would be so much easier.

No, Morgana, don't stick your head right against the bars, you numpty!

Not the coolest way to arrive, but, hey, you know what?

Better than me trying to carry you and bumping you all the time.

Cat travel at its best, right?

Come on, baby boys and girls.

That's one door open.

Morgana is the more curious of the two, so she'll be out first.

And then I'm just going to leave them to wander as is.

And close the door.

Morgana is straight out of the cage

because she is nosey extraordinaire and Merlin will take about

five minutes to come out and then he'll do a little potter about

and work out where the dry food is and there's the water.

I know Jim said a week or two but I was like, yeah,

that's never going to work for my two.

I'll leave them until they start scratching at the door and go,

right, we're bored with this space now,

we want to see what else -

especially considering they came in in a cage so they could see

there was another area to explore

so it'll take them a while to settle in.

There will be a lot of yowling, which is just their norm.

They're like bats with sonar testing to find out where Mum is,

but this is a lot shorter drive than the last one

and I have promised them that this will be the last move

until I buy somewhere because it does stress them quite a lot.

In Belfast, former model Chris is being tormented

by his pet Chihuahuas.

There's signs of them everywhere around the house.

Little puddles.

I would just like to come into a nice, fresh house

and these two sitting there.

Obviously I want them to be happy too,

but I would just like to be able to live in a house

that you don't live in danger of standing on something

and the curtains aren't about to disintegrate from uric acid

and where your dogs don't eat the cushions either

because that would just be nice, as well.

Just two well-behaved dogs.

Chris has engaged the services of dog behaviourist Elaine Power

to see if she can change their behaviour.

Come on in.

Yes, this is generally where they would spend a lot of their time.

This is their wee bedroom.

-Do you mind if I have a wee look?

-Of course, fire away.

-How cute!

-I know, it's their own personal wee space.

This is generally where they have their breakfast.

The cat's litter tray is also a very popular spot for them to pee on.

They literally would lift their leg in it all the time.

So it's one of the areas that I just have to mop and mop.

Around the table legs, places like that.

-Just anywhere they can lift their leg, they will.

-Right.

Do they do a proper puddle in the house?

Only if they have couldn't get outside and then you would see...

-So it's not really a house-training issue, it's more marking.

-OK.

It's working out, is it house training or is it just marking?

Like when they used to sleep with me, it would be, because

I always have white bed linen, just a yellow spot

or a little jet, so that would be them marking the bed?

Yes, that's not a proper pee.

OK, I'll show you the living room.

This is where most of the damage happens.

If you want to come in here,

this is generally where they would spend a lot of the time.

This is where a lot of the damage would be done.

You can see there's rust on the legs of the chairs and stuff.

This is only the furniture that made it back from London.

There was thousands of pounds worth of furniture I had to throw out

because it was just destroyed.

You can see there on the carpet,

they've already left me a little accident.

It is just anything they can lift their leg on and I'm just worried.

This is a laminate floor

and I'm just worried it will get under it and lift it up.

-Have any of them marked on you?

-Always on my clothes and shoes.

I have had pairs of shoes that are destroyed

and they will sometimes sleep and if my jeans are beside the bed,

and I get up in the morning to pull my jeans on and they'll be damp.

So that would generally be my stuff.

There's an order of the pack.

I'm not at the top of the pack.

-No, they are trying to find out where they belong.

-Oh, OK.

The most relevant things at this moment in time are hormones

-and habit. There is an implant you can get.

-OK.

Which, again, doesn't mean neutering,

but it's a little bit like a microchip.

It's an implant that goes underneath the skin and it lasts... I think

there's an option for six months and an option for 12 months.

If that does show a definite improvement in behaviour,

I would then be thinking about neutering - especially Bruiser.

The fact that they're bit older, because now it's habit.

You see, the testosterone may be irrelevant at this point,

-it could be pure habit.

-Just doing it for the sake of it?

Yes, and we'll do some work on that

and we can do a little bit of training with them.

Instead of being his pride of place, Chris's living room

is his hall of shame, but Elaine thinks she can change all that.

She hopes to devise a programme for the dogs that will transform

their behaviour, but first, they need to understand who is leader.

If you want to go in and just turn around and watch what I'm doing.

Out!

I just want him to make eye contact.

Out!

Come on, in you come. Good boy! Right?

I think the problem is me. It's not the dogs, actually.

The problem is me because I'm far too soft with them.

So, it'll be more me having to be more dominating with them

and I can do it. I know I can, so I'm pretty confident.

I will see you in a couple of weeks' time and call back out

and see how you're getting on.

Just try to implement things as best you can.

I'll send the information out to you by post

and if there's anything that you're not sure about or that concerns you,

please give me a ring in the meantime.

Later in the series, we find out if the Chihuahuas become Chiwow-wows!

Roisin Mills and her two cats have now spent three weeks

in their new home.

They've settled in really well, actually,

considering it's a lot smaller. It took them about two or three days.

They were running around, sussing stuff out.

Of course it took me a while to get everything where it needs to go.

But they settled in pretty quick.

Merlin was doing guard duty on the end of the sofa,

so he's quite happy with that.

When he's not doing that, he's asleep on the beanbag,

making sure everything is going on.

According to my neighbours, Morgana sits up in the window

quite a lot, staring out and watching the world go by.

So they know where everything is,

they know where their litters are, they know where their food is.

When I've moved before with cats,

having pheromone around the place works, but with these guys,

especially because they have quite a strong relationship with me

because I'm the only person who lives in the house.

If you're living in a house with a lot of people or kids,

it's better to have that kind of thing around,

so I didn't use it, I'm sorry to say.

But they settled in really well, actually, and considering we are

so close to town, it's actually very quiet

and the neighbours are lovely, too.

I do like my neighbours. Very chatty. A bit like me, really!

Shannon Locke and her assistance dog, Poppy, live in Bangor.

Recently, the pair became world-famous after Shannon

uploaded a video of Poppy assisting her during an epileptic seizure.

I started having seizures about 17. I wasn't diagnosed until I was 18.

My neurologist has told me it is idiopathic -

there's no known cause of it, it can just happen.

It's one of those things.

I was at college and the seizures became quite frequent

to the point where they were every day

so I eventually had to leave college because every day I was going in

and they were calling an ambulance and I was having to go to hospital.

I just couldn't focus on my work, I was getting nothing done,

so that's when I became quite housebound.

I didn't really leave the house for a good couple of years.

We got Poppy to keep me company while I was in the house

and something to do, to train her and take her for walks

and then I had to get out of the house.

That's when I noticed her behaviour.

When Poppy arrived, she wasn't a trained assistance dog,

but soon Shannon began to notice some unusual behaviour.

She would pace up and down, pant loads, just showing general signs

of stress that dogs would show before a thunderstorm.

She was doing this may be five minutes before I was having

a seizure, so I caught on quite fast

and my partner noticed it, as well, so I knew it wasn't just me!

So then I got in contact with Neil Powell, who is her dog trainer.

I brought Poppy up to meet him and she began her training.

The signals that she might be responding to could be

an auditory signal, it could be a visual signal, it could be

a scent signal, but I suspect

it's an electromagnetic signal.

All I did was teach Poppy to paw Shannon.

If Poppy detected the onset of a seizure,

she would go and paw her leg and that would allow her to take

safety precautions, basically, about her seizure.

When Poppy alerts Shannon, she can now go somewhere safe

where she will avoid injury during a seizure.

When Shannon has a seizure,

the dog clears her mouth constantly of anything that comes from her

mouth and she will not leave Shannon's side until she recovers.

Shannon decided to film Poppy helping her during a seizure.

It was heart-warming to see Poppy.

People tell me that's what she does, but to see it with my own eyes,

it just made me love her even more

and I didn't think that was possible!

Shannon had been talking to me

quite a lot about the isolation that people with epilepsy

experience in their lives.

She has felt then that

if she was to expose what happens in her life on YouTube,

it might help people feel less isolated,

knowing that there are others out there experiencing the same thing,

but, also, giving them hope

that perhaps there is a way of resolving it.

And so what Shannon was hoping would happen

was that people would contact her and say,

what is it that you picked up on and perhaps I could do the same thing?

Within days of going online,

the video had been watched by millions of people.

I'm so glad.

It was really, really overwhelming the first couple of days.

The amount of support, the message I'm getting from all over the world

about how I have made them feel more confident in their epilepsy

and they're no longer embarrassed, it's been amazing.

It's so rewarding, knowing I've helped people in some way.

Today, Shannon and Poppy have been nominated for an award.

Just nothing more to say other than to congratulate Poppy and Shannon.

First place.

Poppy is my seizure alert assistance dog

and she has been alerting me prior

to seizures from about ten weeks old.

She has pulled me off roads before, she has alerted me

while being in the bath, which has given me time to get out

so I didn't drown having a seizure.

She saves my life on a daily basis.

Everyone who voted, we really, really appreciate it. Thank you!

I'm lost for words. I don't know whether to laugh or cry.

I'm just full of so many emotions at the moment.

But I think she deserved it, she really did.

It's not me, I'm not concerned about me or the prize,

it's Poppy deserved it.

She's a brilliant, brilliant dog.

Next time on Pet Island, we meet a raccoon with impeccable manners.

Sometimes Laura likes to wash her hands!

We make a jumper out of dogs' wool.

I'm amazed that this was what it was before, his wool.

And we meet a former agony aunt who dreams of being a Roman empress.

What do you think of that?

Ah, that's great!