Give Me Astoria readers, let me tell you about my favorite person in the world. Well. Not exactly a person.

This is Lola, or Loloo, or Lola Bunny…or Pepito. Not sure where that last one came from. As a pet owner, I’m always searching for new ways to keep my cat healthy, happy, and in top shape.

Astorians love their pets – especially their dogs. It’s rare to walk down the street and not see at least one person toting along their dog, or to walk through the park and watch frisbees being chased with wagging tails and woofs and yelps. We’re a very animal oriented neighborhood.

If you’re a fellow pet owner, I’m sure you strive to keep your pets as happy as possible, and if so, you’re going to love Treats and Tips. Co-owned by Thiago Lobato and Alex Mite, Treats and Tips was created to bring the best of dog and cat wellness to Astoria.

You can get your pets groomed at Treats and Tips, so that they look their best. If you worry about working all day and leaving your pets home, there’s a day care lounge – as well as boarding if you’ll be heading out for  few days and need a safe place for your pet to stay. Is your cat misbehaving? They’ve got behavioral management – and it’s helpful to even the most vicious of pets, or even just the hyper ones.

Where Treats and Tips really shines, though, is their food selection. We spoke with Thiago, and healthy dog and cat food is a huge passion of is. He tells us, “There are very few laws of regulations in the pet food industry. Manufacturers are free to put almost anything they’d like in their pet food, and it’s never healthy. They use fillers like by-products of rice and grain, which aren’t good for pets.” We did our own research, and a quick Google search of “Pet food regulation,” brings up the FDA website, which plainly states: “There is no requirement that pet food products have pre-market approval by the FDA.” Now…that doesn’t sound too great.

What Thiago and Alex have done is find healthier alternatives. This led them to bring in many product from Canada, a country that is harsher on standards for pet food in terms of ingredients and quality. Thiago tells us that good, high quality products can make all the difference in problems like pet allergies and diseases. “If your pet is having problems, such as excess shedding, the first thing to look at is their diet. See if the problem is there. We’ve had so many pet owners just change their cat or dog’s diet and see a complete fix in their pet’s problem.”

We loved how genuinely interested Thiago and Alex both are in pet problems – they work with you to find the best alternative. You can tell they’re truly animal lovers – and it shows in the work they do.

You can visit Treats and Tips at  45-15 34th Ave, or like them on Facebook.