Unleashing Fresh Data About Our Animal Friends

Granted, the Census Bureau publishes lots of fun data, but it’s all so anthropocentric. What about the nonhuman U.S. population? Happily, a report from the American Pet Products Manufacturers Association has come our way with several hundred pages of data on our canine, feline, piscine, avian and reptilian friends. (Nor are rodents, pigs and crustaceans neglected.) Dogs inhabit 39 percent of U.S. homes, cats 34 percent, freshwater fish 12 percent, birds 7 percent, miscellaneous “small animals” (including gerbils and hermit crabs) 5 percent and reptiles 4 percent.