BELTON — In many ways, the Pet Extravaganza at Cadence Bank Center this past weekend was much like the eight previous shows in Belton, but a few things were definitely different.
“Animals need a home, so we keep going and adopting,” said Ronald Ducharme, founder of Rescue Magazine, which sponsors the event. “Rescue has improved over the last 20 years, but in fact the economy is hurting animal adoptions.”
He pointed out a photo setup of a Captain Jack Sparrow lookalike impersonating Johnny Depp’s character from “Pirates of the Caribbean.” Talking to people near a pirate ship replica, Dan Kneale of the United Kingdom said they enjoy interacting with him because the character is such an iconic figure. He said he has met Depp and has his initials tattooed on his right wrist.
“We raise a lot of money for children with cancer,” he said.
He does promotional videos, he said, and raises money and awareness for different groups, including Folly Wildlife Rescue. He has been playing the pirate role for about 10 years, usually at children’s hospitals in the United Kingdom.
“I do international work as well,” he said. “This is my first time in Texas.”
Moving lower on the spectrum of dog-related things, passersby encountered a booth titled: “Scoopy Doo Pros.” Yep, that’s what they’re talking about — plain old dog poop.
Jennifer Spencer of Killeen said she has been in business all over Texas since November 2023.
“We do dog poop cleanup, sanitizer, deodorizer and turf corrector,” she said. “Next year we’ll probably move into livestock cleanup.”
They don’t clean up inside the house, she said, only outside, in front yards and back yards and commercial properties.
“I love dogs,” she said. “It’s about helping people who want to work for a great cause. I know a lot of people who need to work remotely. They do a great job and they deserve to be paid fairly and have an opportunity to move up in their career. So I created a very simple business model that is scalable, which will allow us to employ more people.”
These include technicians (the ones who actually clean up the poop), sales people and managers, she said.
“We cover the state of Texas,” she said. “We are still very young in the industry. Most people laugh at us.”
People who need the service care a lot about their pets, she said.
“There is always going to be poop,” she said. “Just in Central Texas alone there are over 50,000 dogs. It’s like health care. Dogs aren’t going to go away — and it’s fun.”
No cleanup problems were visible at Addie’s Petting Zoo, and the visiting children seemed to be having a good time with the llamas, Nigerian dwarf goats, Kunekune piglets and chickens.
“They just pet and love them,” said owner Addie Martinez of Kempner. “We also do pony rides.”
She has about 250 animals on a 10-acre farm in Kempner and has been in business for about three years. She travels within about a 2-hour radius. She said the llamas get shorn twice a year and don’t seem to mind the Texas heat.
Chyanne Brake of Gatesville was promoting her book, “Lizzie and Axel: Forever Friends,” which she dedicated to Second Chance Farm in Granbury. The book is written to help children understand losing a pet, she said.
“The dogs in the book were our dogs,” she said.
Rescue Magazine had a cameo about the book several months ago, she said, and it was also featured on a Waco television station.