Pet owners make dying wish to be buried with fur family

The 68-year-old lost her travelling companion Bella just before Christmas, a West Highland white terrier that would sit in the front seat of her van as she drove around Australia, resting a furry chin on her knee and joining her for work when she was a nanny.

Before Bella there was Sasha, her Maltese shih tzu who died about nine years ago. Her grandchildren's little "doll", Sasha was often dressed in a pink coat and diamante collar and pushed around in a pram.

"They just loved her to bits, and then the same thing happened when I had Bella," Ms Matthews said.

"The love is just unconditional with your animal."

The dogs' ashes sit side-by-side at Ms Matthews' home in the Victorian coastal town of St Leonards, out of sight to avoid heartache but ready to one day be scattered into the ocean together with her own ashes.

She believes people should also be allowed to be buried with their pets at cemeteries.

"When I do die, I want them to be with me because they are a huge part of my life," Ms Matthews said.

"They're family."

As more people view their pets as family members, the push to allow humans and animals to be buried together at cemeteries has intensified.

University of Melbourne cultural anthropologist Hannah Gould says the practice is not currently permitted in Australia.

"We have this kind of hangover from Judeo-Christian legacy, this Catholic idea of, 'only things with souls should be buried'," Dr Gould said.

"How do we have more inclusive death rituals that respond to the emotional shock that is the loss of a pet?"

Alicia Kennedy, a veterinarian of more than 35 years, set up Cherished Pets in Victoria's Ocean Grove in 2015 in recognition of humans' evolving bonds with their animals.

The joint clinic and charity offers palliative care for pets, at-home euthanasia and guidance for owners after the death of a pet, along with subsidised veterinary care for animals with vulnerable owners.

The service represents a massive departure from the attitudes of decades gone by, when vets would bury dead pets en masse at the rubbish tip, Dr Kennedy says.

In 2024, about 70 per cent of her clients opt for private cremation of their pets.

Owners collect the ashes and invest in commemorative keepsakes like jewellery, paw prints and fur clippings.

"Pets matter more now than they ever have," Dr Kennedy said.

"We need a whole systems change to better support companion animals because of their value in health and wellbeing for people."

Australia's pet death industry is experiencing rapid growth with grief counsellors, funeral services and "pet death doulas" who give owners spiritual and emotional guidance, Dr Kennedy says.

Australia's biggest funeral operator InvoCare has branched out into the sector, recently acquiring several pet cremation services.

Dr Kennedy predicts that in 20 or 30 years' time there will be greater recognition of the human and animal bond, and joint burials will follow.

Select Australian cemeteries have designated animal burial sections on their grounds.

Some pet cemeteries allow humans' cremated remains to be buried with animals, such as the Animal Memorial Cemetery and Crematorium at Berkshire Park in Sydney's west.

However, people connected to the death sector know pet owners already lay their animals to rest in human graves, whether it is allowed or not.

Animal Memorial Cemetery and Crematorium owner Shane McGraw recalls having to exhume one woman's pet after she demanded it be relocated to her plot at a human cemetery.

The pet's name didn't appear on the headstone.

He estimates there are dozens of people's ashes at the cemetery, established in the 1960s in western Sydney suburb Berkshire Park, which he bought about 23 years ago.

"I remember one of the very first human ashes I placed out here was a lady's," Mr McGraw said.

"One day, her husband was walking up the driveway with two eskies in his hands.

"(He said), 'I've got all my dogs here in this esky and my wife in this esky. I want them both in the grave, put a headstone up, leave a spot for my name, and then when I go, my kids will come and bring my ashes out'."

Victoria's Cemeteries and Crematoria Act authorises that only human bodies can be buried in public cemeteries.

But as attitudes towards pets change, so too does the demand for governments to revise legislation.

People who took part in a recent consultation for a new cemetery opening in 2026 in the outer Melbourne suburb of Harkness called for companion plots to be included, along with a dog park and a pet cemetery.

The Greater Metropolitan Cemeteries Trust plans to advise the Victorian government about the growing community interest and recommend it review existing laws.

Pushing for joint burials is the life work of US-based cultural anthropologist Eric Greene, who founded the Green Pet-Burial Society.

Whole family "eco-cemeteries" are the answer to ensuring humans and their animal companions are together in eternal rest, he says.

While conventional cemeteries occupy land, in eco-cemeteries nature reclaims developed land, with human and animal remains buried there and native plants placed on top of them, Mr Greene says.

The eco-cemeteries are then protected in perpetuity.

"Conservation cemeteries actually protect land from being developed," he says.

"The bodies in the ground will nourish the plants, which in turn feed and shelter animals - it's all part of a larger circle of life.

"It doesn't feel like a dead place ... you hear the birds singing, you feel the wind going through the trees and they're not manicured, they're left wild."

Mr Greene argues joint human and animal burials are not new as historical records show many ancient sites where both remains have been found together.

For him, allowing people and their pets to be buried together is about giving them comfort and embracing nature in death.

"My mother taught me wonderful lessons about nature - I am a human being in society, appreciating nature," Mr Greene said.

"My dog taught me that I am nature. I am part of nature, just like he is."

Australian Associated Press