For those who feel like dissing instead of kissing a former lover on Friday—Valentine's Day—you can name a dead frozen rat for your ex or send a message that they should never procreate. As the AP reports, animal shelters and zoos around the country are encouraging cathartic methods of revenge—and raising money—with a slew of darkly funny fundraisers. Options include naming a feral cat after your old flame before it's neutered—or giving rodents or cockroaches your love bug's name before feeding them to bigger animals.
Teri Scott of Poulsbo, Washington, laughed out loud when she ran across a promotion for the "Love Hurts" fundraiser at the Bird Treatment and Learning Center in Anchorage, Alaska. She ponied up $100 to name a frozen dead rat after her ex, and it will now be fed to a resident raptor. "It just seemed like a beautiful way to give back," she says. "We do this in good fun," says Laura Atwood, the center's executive director. The money raised helps the facility pay salaries and care for birds—the nonprofit rehabilitated 580 last year. Just over $18,000 had been raised by the time the campaign closed on Wednesday. So many rats—more than 130—were purchased that the center at one point ran out of supplies.
Videos of raptors like Ghost, a snowy owl that swallows the rat whole, or a peregrine falcon named Breland, which keeps one talon on the rodent and pecks away at it until it's gone, will be emailed to donors. There's also a cheaper option: People can pay $10 to name a mealworm after their ex before it's fed to a crow or a magpie. The Memphis Zoo offers two options for $10 each in its "Dating or Dumping" campaign. If you're happily coupled, you get a digital card and a video of a red panda eating a grape to share. But those harboring a grudge will get a video of an elephant pooping, signed "Scent With Love." "This is the most incredible thing," says Caleigh Johnson, who's encouraging her friends to give in the name of her ex-boyfriend.
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