Pet Relocation Blog

Name: Meghan

Moving From: US

Moving To: Costa Rica

Question: Hi, I would like to move my dog to Costa Rica and I plan on staying there for 1-3 years. What will be the process like trying to bring her home? I know Costa Rica does not have a quarentine but will the US hold her on the way back home? Thanks for the information!

What exactly does the term quarantine mean in the U.S. (150 days) and for the 30day period in Australia? Can the pet be at home under "house quarantine" or is it in a government kennel all that time? Thanks, Shelley

A PetRelocation customer, Coreen, visiting her dog Missy in Australian quarantine!

PetRelocation.com is reminding travelers with pets and people moving with pets to Australia that all cats and dogs entering Australian quarantine on or after 7 August 2009 will be charged according to the new fees in the table below.

From the AQIS website:

Hi. I have two indoor, declawed cats aged 10 & 11. They have traveled from the US to Melbourne, Australia (lived there for 18 months) and from Melbourne to Tokyo, Japan (have been here for 18 months). In Melbourne they spent 48 days in quarantine, they were allowed to come directly to our house in Tokyo because they were moving from and island country to another island country. There is a great possibility that we will be moved to either Paris or Madrid in the beginning on 2010.

Just now we had a visitor come to our blog who utilized our live chat feature on the lefthand sidebar. They were trying to getin formation on bringing a dog into the United States -- Washington State to be exact -- from Majuro in the Marshall Islands. Their flight was going through Honolulu and they were traveling on Continental. They were particularly concerned about the live animal transit requirements for Honolulu.

This link, on page four, has the transit requirements which state that pets transiting through the airport will be cared for at the Animal Port provided by the Hawaiian Humane Society, as long as the layover is less than 24 hours. For layovers lasting longer than 24 hours, pets are required to be quarantined at the State facility.

I explained to our visitor that their dog would be cared for during their layover and then put on their second flight. Otherwise, they would just need to have their dog up to date on his rabies shot and also an international heealth certificate dated within 10 days of the flight. As long as they don't plan on going back to Majuro, it would be quite simple. As this was a one-way trip for the family, they will not need to worry about the Majuro pet import requirements (which is an entirely different blog post for another day!).

For more details check out:

US Pet Import Requirements
Hawaii Pet Import Requirements