Hi! I saw an Associated Press article in our local northern Lake Co., IL. newspaper, about a breeder in MA. that uses a "pet travel agent" to ship her animals to adoptive homes around the country, and world. Her travel agent's name is John McGee, founder of PET AIR. It's a 3 yr. old Kansas City, MO. based firm, one of 65 domestic and 35 foreign members of the Independent Pet and Animal Transportation Assoc. International, an industry group known as IPATA. The association members handle the arrangements for shipping, not only cats, dogs and other family pets, but all kinds of animals within the U.S. and around the world. McGee had a 23 yr. business of selling animals wholesale to pet stores. As air shipping became more difficult, he dissolved the wholesale business to apply his expertise exclusively to pet travel. For a fee, Pet Air books flights, picks up and delivers pets to the airport, provides temporary boarding, gets them on planes, and arranges for them to be picked up and boarded at their destinations until the owners can retrieve them. Pet Air ships approx. 1,000 animals a week, tracks shipments and handles paperwork for medical requirements. Pet travel agents, per the article, have been around for at least 20 yrs., but it's still a relatively unknown industry. Has anyone used this service, or others like it? The article continues........... Millie Woolf, who co-founded IPATA in 1979, said pet travel has become a multi-million dollar industry. In 1977, she and her husband opened Air Animal after their Tampa, FL. vet clinic received frequent requests to pick up and board animals that had flown into the area airport. Services and types of animals handled vary among IPATA members. One specializes in horse shipments, others (like Pet Express in San Francisco) deal only in dogs, cats and birds. Most don't do reptiles because it's difficult to recognize stress in this species. Pet Air does a lot of corporate relocations, as well as individual moves. McGee's clients include dogs, cats and lab mice, and hamsters. He has also shipped fish, parakeets, rescue dogs, and Hollywood animal actors. (No mention of ferrets, but I'm sure they're included. Have any ferret breeders that subscribe to the FML use any of these services?) Unfortunately, no listing of phone, address or e-mail for these pet shipping groups, but no doubt, an Internet search for the IPATA, or phone work will yield this info. This seems like such a better way to ship animals for breeder to owner, ferret shelter to adoptive owners, rescues to distant shelters, etc. If anyone would like a copy of the full article I have, you can contact me via e-mail: [log in to unmask] Phyllis Berker Lake Villa, IL. [Posted in FML issue 3048]