If you're looking for a way to lower your stress, improve your health and get your children off the couch, part of the answer may be fish -- not eating them, but keeping them.

Whether you choose a small tank with a few freshwater fish or a stunning saltwater setup that makes you feel like a deep-sea diver without getting wet, you'll be getting some of the proven health benefits of keeping fish.

"It doesn't have to be difficult to keep fish," said Dr. Roy Yanong, a veterinarian with a lifelong love of fish-keeping that he pursued into a career with the Tropical Aquaculture Laboratory at the University of Florida.

"Depending on the species, you can start with a 10-gallon tank. But you always have to think about the water," he said. "Fish make ammonia, which is excreted through their gills. You need the right number of fish, and a bio-filter with the right set of bacteria. If you don't have that, the water will turn toxic, and that's when fish die."

But just as you don't need to be an ichthyologist -- a fish expert -- to keep healthy fish, you don't have to be a chemist either, says Dr. Yanong. All you need to make sure the water is right for your fish is to test it yourself with easy-to-find kits, or have it tested at a specialty aquarium store.

"Help with fish-keeping is pretty easy to get," he said. "You can talk to someone who's keeping fish successfully. You can also find sites online that can help."

Dr. Yanong has been working with fish since 1992, which is also when the popularity of keeping aquatic pets started to grow. While the more complicated and expensive saltwater setups have remained the interest of only a tiny percentage of dedicated hobbyists, keeping freshwater fish has risen steadily for the past two decades.

"That's a pretty good rise," said Dr. Yanong, who, despite having fish all around him pretty much all his working hours, still keeps a tank of mud-skippers nearby. "Aquaria is a where a lot of kids first got their interest in nature. I know I did. And while any pet can be an entry into the world of nature, the fascinating thing about fish is that you're not just keeping pets, you're running an ecosystem."

At a time when it's hard to get kids to put down the video console and get off the couch, experts say looking into a fish tank may be key to getting youngsters up and out the door -- perhaps to a career in science. And it can all start with a small tank and a couple of guppies.

(Video bonus: Training expert Mikkel Becker demonstrates the proper way to teach children to safely hold a cat or small dog (vetstreet.com/train/how-to-pick-up-and-hold-a-cat)

Q&A

Is lighting behind

bird feather woes?

Q: Are fluorescent lights bad for birds? I have read online that they cause feather-picking. -- via email

A: I asked board-certified avian specialist Dr. Brian Speer (my "Birds for Dummies" co-author) for help with this one. He has his doubts that there's any problem with having birds in rooms lit by energy-saving compact fluorescent lights.

"Although there is a different flicker frequency that birds see as compared to ourselves, there is no confirmed direct causation between feather-damaging behavior and fluorescent lighting," says Dr. Speer, who owns the Medical Center for Birds, a birds-only practice in the Northern California town of Oakley.

He doesn't rule out CFLs completely, however, at least as a contributory factor to the problem. Feather-picking is complex behavior, he stresses.

"This type of light may function as a stressor, and it is possible that some stressors may trigger anxiety," says Dr. Speer. "Anxiety may be addressed by displacement behavioral activities, and of these, feather damage could be seen.

"But this is a bit of a simplistic 'cause and effect' assumption for a problem that more often than not is multifactorial in nature," he says.

Stopping feather-picking, in other words, will remain a difficult road for many bird owners, with a lot of strategies employed along the way to find the magic ingredients to the cure -- if it can be found at all. -- Gina Spadafori

Do you have a pet question? Send it to petconnection@gmail.com.

THE BUZZ

Disney crew includes

lot of veterinarians

-- Working for the Walt Disney Co. is no Mickey Mouse affair if you're a veterinarian. Dr. Mark Stetter, recently named as dean of the College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences at Colorado State University, leaves behind a big job at Disney. DVM360.com reports that Dr. Stetter directed the company's animal-health programs around the world and managed a team of more than 500, including veterinarians, curators, zookeepers and aquarists. He also helped to oversee the company's international wildlife research and conservation programs.

-- Of the more than 150 breeds recognized by the American Kennel Club, 13 commonly get ear crops, 48 have docked tails, and 11 have both cropping and docking. Ear crops seem more likely to disappear as a common practice sooner, as fewer pet owners choose to have their puppies' ears cut into an upright posture, and fewer veterinarians are willing to perform the procedure. The American Veterinary Medical Association opposes ear cropping and tail docking when done solely for cosmetic purposes, and has encouraged the elimination of these procedures from breed standards.

-- A "three dog night" was once described by comedian Johnny Carson as a "bad night for a tree." But the term originates with the Inuit tribes of Alaska, who measured nocturnal temperatures based on how many of their sled dogs they needed to serve as bed warmers. -- Mikkel Becker and Dr. Marty Becker

ABOUT PET CONNECTION

Pet Connection is produced by a team of pet care experts headed by "Good Morning America" and "The Dr. Oz Show" veterinarian Dr. Marty Becker and award-winning journalist Gina Spadafori. The two are affiliated with Vetstreet.com and also the authors of many best-selling pet care books. Dr. Becker can also be found at Facebook.com/DrMartyBecker or on Twitter at DrMartyBecker.

If you're looking for a way to lower your stress, improve your health and get your children off the couch, part of the answer may be fish -- not eating them, but keeping them.

Whether you choose a small tank with a few freshwater fish or a stunning saltwater setup that makes you feel like a deep-sea diver without getting wet, you'll be getting some of the proven health benefits of keeping fish.

"It doesn't have to be difficult to keep fish," said Dr. Roy Yanong, a veterinarian with a lifelong love of fish-keeping that he pursued into a career with the Tropical Aquaculture Laboratory at the University of Florida.

"Depending on the species, you can start with a 10-gallon tank. But you always have to think about the water," he said. "Fish make ammonia, which is excreted through their gills. You need the right number of fish, and a bio-filter with the right set of bacteria. If you don't have that, the water will turn toxic, and that's when fish die."

But just as you don't need to be an ichthyologist -- a fish expert -- to keep healthy fish, you don't have to be a chemist either, says Dr. Yanong. All you need to make sure the water is right for your fish is to test it yourself with easy-to-find kits, or have it tested at a specialty aquarium store.

"Help with fish-keeping is pretty easy to get," he said. "You can talk to someone who's keeping fish successfully. You can also find sites online that can help."

Dr. Yanong has been working with fish since 1992, which is also when the popularity of keeping aquatic pets started to grow. While the more complicated and expensive saltwater setups have remained the interest of only a tiny percentage of dedicated hobbyists, keeping freshwater fish has risen steadily for the past two decades.

"That's a pretty good rise," said Dr. Yanong, who, despite having fish all around him pretty much all his working hours, still keeps a tank of mud-skippers nearby. "Aquaria is a where a lot of kids first got their interest in nature. I know I did. And while any pet can be an entry into the world of nature, the fascinating thing about fish is that you're not just keeping pets, you're running an ecosystem."

At a time when it's hard to get kids to put down the video console and get off the couch, experts say looking into a fish tank may be key to getting youngsters up and out the door -- perhaps to a career in science. And it can all start with a small tank and a couple of guppies.

(Video bonus: Training expert Mikkel Becker demonstrates the proper way to teach children to safely hold a cat or small dog (vetstreet.com/train/how-to-pick-up-and-hold-a-cat)

Q&A

Is lighting behind

bird feather woes?

Q: Are fluorescent lights bad for birds? I have read online that they cause feather-picking. -- via email

A: I asked board-certified avian specialist Dr. Brian Speer (my "Birds for Dummies" co-author) for help with this one. He has his doubts that there's any problem with having birds in rooms lit by energy-saving compact fluorescent lights.

"Although there is a different flicker frequency that birds see as compared to ourselves, there is no confirmed direct causation between feather-damaging behavior and fluorescent lighting," says Dr. Speer, who owns the Medical Center for Birds, a birds-only practice in the Northern California town of Oakley.

He doesn't rule out CFLs completely, however, at least as a contributory factor to the problem. Feather-picking is complex behavior, he stresses.

"This type of light may function as a stressor, and it is possible that some stressors may trigger anxiety," says Dr. Speer. "Anxiety may be addressed by displacement behavioral activities, and of these, feather damage could be seen.

"But this is a bit of a simplistic 'cause and effect' assumption for a problem that more often than not is multifactorial in nature," he says.

Stopping feather-picking, in other words, will remain a difficult road for many bird owners, with a lot of strategies employed along the way to find the magic ingredients to the cure -- if it can be found at all. -- Gina Spadafori

Do you have a pet question? Send it to petconnection@gmail.com.

THE BUZZ

Disney crew includes

lot of veterinarians

-- Working for the Walt Disney Co. is no Mickey Mouse affair if you're a veterinarian. Dr. Mark Stetter, recently named as dean of the College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences at Colorado State University, leaves behind a big job at Disney. DVM360.com reports that Dr. Stetter directed the company's animal-health programs around the world and managed a team of more than 500, including veterinarians, curators, zookeepers and aquarists. He also helped to oversee the company's international wildlife research and conservation programs.

-- Of the more than 150 breeds recognized by the American Kennel Club, 13 commonly get ear crops, 48 have docked tails, and 11 have both cropping and docking. Ear crops seem more likely to disappear as a common practice sooner, as fewer pet owners choose to have their puppies' ears cut into an upright posture, and fewer veterinarians are willing to perform the procedure. The American Veterinary Medical Association opposes ear cropping and tail docking when done solely for cosmetic purposes, and has encouraged the elimination of these procedures from breed standards.

-- A "three dog night" was once described by comedian Johnny Carson as a "bad night for a tree." But the term originates with the Inuit tribes of Alaska, who measured nocturnal temperatures based on how many of their sled dogs they needed to serve as bed warmers. -- Mikkel Becker and Dr. Marty Becker

ABOUT PET CONNECTION

Pet Connection is produced by a team of pet care experts headed by "Good Morning America" and "The Dr. Oz Show" veterinarian Dr. Marty Becker and award-winning journalist Gina Spadafori. The two are affiliated with Vetstreet.com and also the authors of many best-selling pet care books. Dr. Becker can also be found at Facebook.com/DrMartyBecker or on Twitter at DrMartyBecker.

When you pick up a prescription from your veterinarian, do you know that it's likely a "people med" your pet is getting? It's true! Aside from flea- and tick-control products and some non-steroidal anti-inflammatories, most of the medications your pets receive are crossovers from human medicine.

And when I say "most," I mean "almost all." Some 80 to 90 percent of the drugs used in veterinary medicine come from human medicine. This so-called "off-label" use of human drugs allows veterinarians to treat medical conditions (and species) that aren't always priorities for drug companies when it comes to developing and selling medications.

Some of the medications may be used for different health conditions in animals than in people. For years I'd get raised eyebrows when talking about dogs prescribed Viagra (in dogs, it can be used to treat a heart condition) or Botox (used to treat problems caused by deep skin folds in some dogs). More routinely (and less surprisingly) prescribed are "human" antibiotics, anti-anxiety medications and many other drugs that pretty much treat the same issues in both people and pets.

The practice of veterinary medicine is challenging, that's for sure. We have to work with multiple species, none of whom can say, "It hurts here, Doc!" And we have to know more about pharmacology than our physician counterparts. After all, in human medicine, all drugs are FDA-approved, meaning that they have undergone significant scrutiny for safety and efficacy -- but only in one species: ours. The guidelines for use are fairly clear.

But when a veterinarian believes a particular human medication can help an animal, she'll prescribe based on information that's often not quite as regulated with regard to its use in animals. This has been the case for decades, of course, but the practice has only really been legal since 1994, when Congress passed the Animal Medicinal Drug Use Clarification Act (AMDUCA) regulating the conditions under which "off-label" use is acceptable.

Even before the legislation was in place, however, there was a working system for prescribing human drugs to pets. Veterinarians relied on peer-reviewed studies, clinical trials and published formularies that included suggestions for safe uses and dosages of human medications given to companion animals.

Today, with the legal issues cleared up, veterinarians and their patients have more options and better access to medications. Veterinarians have always been glad to provide in-house pharmaceutical services, and general pharmacists, too, have usually been willing to fill prescriptions written by vets. But recently, online retailers and specialty pharmacists have recognized that pets are an expansion market. These developments open the door to even more changes, including discussions on generic meds and walking out of your veterinarian's practice with a prescription instead of a pill bottle.

Chances are you won't be taking a prescription for Viagra or Botox with you the next time you go to the veterinarian's office, but you should still talk with the doctor about your pet's treatment options. A good veterinarian will discuss what medications your pet will need, tell you what screening tests may be required for safety beforehand, what side effects to look for after you get home and answer all your questions before you go. Your veterinarian should also encourage you to call with questions or concerns.

Good communication, after all, is as important a part of good medicine as, well, medicine.

Online bonus: Dr. Becker reveals the 30 best pet-care products of 2011 (vetstreet.com/dr-marty-beckers-top-30-pet-products-of-2011).

Q&A

How to stop

a chewing cat

Q: My cat has developed this really weird habit of sucking on fabric. She seems to be in some kind of a state while she's doing it, almost like she's on a drug. The throw at the end of our bed seems to attract the most attention, and it has three places where there are "sucked-up" areas that are pretty much ruined. Before I replace it, I'd like to cure her of the habit. Should I use that nasty stuff to stop pets from chewing on the areas? -- via email

A: The behavior you've described is generally called "wool-chewing," and it's not uncommon, especially in the so-called "Oriental" breeds such as the Siamese. While the target is often a soft fabric such as wool, some cats prefer other objects, perhaps plastic grocery bags. No one's really sure what causes the behavior, but since it is more common in some breeds than in others, it is suspected to have a genetic component.

People have long believed that wool chewing was a result of a kitten who was separated from the mother too soon (probably because the behavior looks like nursing) but that's no longer believed to be the case. Best guess: It's one of those habits that relieves stress and brings comfort.

Unfortunately, there is no 100 percent effective cure for it. Things to try:

-- Put away the heirlooms and cashmere. If your cat prefers soft wool, put your finest away and keep the drawers closed. Keep bedroom doors closed to protect your good blankets.

-- Use deterrents. Set out some "decoy" blankets (along with the already ruined one), and apply Bitter Apple, Tabasco, hot pepper oil or a similar product. Spraying fabrics lightly with perfume is also a common recommendation.

-- More exercise. Daily play with your cat may also help -- and it certainly won't hurt. In addition to interactive play, bring in food puzzles to keep your cat busy and entertained. -- Gina Spadafori

(Do you have a pet question? Send it to petconnection@gmail.com.)

THE BUZZ

Secondhand smoke

can be pet killer

-- Need help with a New Year's resolution to stop smoking? Do it for your pet. Three separate studies at three different veterinary colleges showed that dogs and cats whose owners smoke are more likely to develop health problems from secondhand smoke, including cancers of the nose, lung and lymphatic system. If you do quit for your pet you'll not be alone in doing so: Another study suggests people are more likely to quit for a pet than for a spouse.

-- As deer populations continue to grow, so do the numbers of ticks and cases of tick-borne illness. Of concern to both physicians and veterinarians is the discovery of a new tick-borne bacterium causing ehrlichiosis that has been discovered in Wisconsin and Minnesota. According to DVM360.com, researchers at the Mayo Clinic, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and the universities of Minnesota and Wisconsin, more than two dozen people have contracted the disease. So far, despite the testing of thousands of ticks, this particular strain has not been found outside of the two states yet.

-- Animal bites should never be taken lightly, even if they seem minor at first. Even "minor" cat bites are like a hypodermic needle jamming bacteria deep into the flesh, and they can become a severe medical crisis. Pet rodents could also be carrying deadly disease. If bitten by an animal, immediately head to the sink for a lot of soap and water, and keep the lather and rinsing coming for about three minutes. Then call your doctor for treatment advice -- you may need antibiotics. -- Mikkel Becker and Dr. Marty Becker

ABOUT PET CONNECTION

Pet Connection is produced by a team of pet care experts headed by "Good Morning America" and "The Dr. Oz Show" veterinarian Dr. Marty Becker and award-winning journalist Gina Spadafori. The two are affiliated with Vetstreet.com and also the authors of many best-selling pet care books. Dr. Becker can also be found at Facebook.com/DrMartyBecker or on Twitter at DrMartyBecker.