Nathalie Cote hugs ring neck parakeet in her home Wednesday, December 23, 2009 in St-Etienne de Beauharnois, Que. When the economy took a dive and job losses _ or the possibility of unemployment _ became part of the bleak picture, some families began to see pets as a household luxury item. For more than a year, there have been reports of pets, mainly dogs and cats, being abandoned in greater numbers than pre-recession times, especially south of the border in the United States. But the same doesn’t appear to apply to our feathered friends. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Paul Chiasson