As anyone with a furry friend or two can attest, your pets become an integral part of your family. In fact, more than half of American households own a pet, and 70% of those households have a dog.

Oftentimes we may have all of our focus on the human members of our family or the stresses of everyday. This can leave your felines and canines in precarious situations when you leave the house for extended periods.

Thankfully, through a combination of home security advances, pet safety, and basic home preparedness, you can ensure that your pets are happy and healthy whether you are home or not.

Pet Preparedness 101

Before we go into the more advanced methods of keeping your pets safe, it's important to go through the basics. It can be helpful for people to create a quick checklist to remind themselves to pet-proof their homes before they leave each day.

A few pet safety tips to remember every day include:

• Extinguish any open flame such as your fireplace and any candles
• Keep any items that would cause a choking hazard out of reach
• Remove any food and household items that are toxic to pets (onions, sugar-free chewing gum, lilies, and weed killer to name a few)
• Lock all windows and doors and keep the doggie door latched shut

Staying Cool and Keeping Warm

One of the main concerns when leaving your pet at home during extreme weather is how they would fare in sweltering heat or the blisteringly cold. Heat, especially, can put your canine friend at risk. Did you know that a dog is susceptible to heat stroke when the heat index reaches 105° F? And that can be reached during 90° F weather?

In the past, pet owners would simply set the thermostat before they left for the day and hope for the best regardless of rising temperatures and the inherent inconsistencies of their systems.

Smart thermostats are great for pet safety. These devices enable you to take full control of the temperature of your home to suit your pet’s needs completely. This is due to the fact that your smart thermostat can be accessed by your smartphone, tablet, or computer regardless of where you are.

Environmental Dangers

Just as we don't want to think something as catastrophic as a fire or carbon monoxide incident would never happen to us, we certainly don't think a pet would get in that type of danger when we aren't around. But the sad truth is that these horrific occurrences can and do happen.

While we all have smoke detectors in our homes that make those loud, irritating, high-pitched noises when it comes in contact with smoke, they are not enough to keep your pet safe. Since a regular smoke alarm only alerts the people inside a home, your furry friends won't be able to take action.

But today's monitored smoke detectors can now send for help from the fire department immediately and contact you at any sign of a fire in your home. This is the perfect pet safety solution to environmental dangers. Carbon monoxide poisoning also can be prevented with a monitored carbon monoxide detector-at any sign of a gas leakage, help will be contacted promptly.

Security for Pets

Above all else, you want your pet to be safe when you aren't around. So how can smart security devices help with pet safety and assist in kicking your worry to the curb?

Much like smart thermostats, today's home security systems can be the perfect answer to your pet worries. Wouldn't it be great to be able to physically see your pets throughout the day, instead of simply wondering about their wellbeing? With a home security system that includes video surveillance, you can now access a live feed of your pets whenever and wherever.

Motion sensors can also be very helpful when leaving your pet alone for most of the day. For example, if there is break in, or a disturbed sensor in your home, your security system sends an alert to your smartphone or device that takes a picture of the disturbance. You can find out immediately if your home and pets are in danger from a burglar or if it’s just a false alarm caused by your pet getting into mischief while you’re away.

As cases of pet theft continue to increase, it’s important to have complete awareness of your home and pet.

Watch our ADT LifeSaver Video: How This Veteran Saved His Dog After She Started A House Fire.
As seen in the New York Times: Pawing for Attention: Pets Can Start House Fires

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