But what if you could adopt an animal, make its life better, without actually taking it home? Without spending more time with it than you want, without having extra responsibilities and difficulties. Very few people would say no, when a helping hand can be so easy to offer.

Fortunately, there is a whole array of charities offering precisely this: helping pets (not only dogs, but many more species), with giving only what you are really ready to give. Furthermore, most of these are actually quite cheap. Today I have collected 9 different species you can adopt (either for yourself, or as an ideal Christmas present for one of your loved ones) this easy way.

Adopt a pet.com is the new name of an old website 1-800-SAVE-A-PET. The site offers a wide range of shelters (from the United States) offering dogs and cats for adoption, and it also has breed-specific subsites as well. Beside adopting a pet “the classical way”, you can also choose “virtual” adoption, and donate a minor (or bigger) sum to the organization. They accept occasional donations, while their Life Saving Club requires a monthly $7 donation (less than 0.25 cents a day). “Donations from caring people like you are our only means of support. Your automatic monthly gift truly helps ensure that we’ll be able to continue helping homeless pets find homes,” they write. Your donation is tax-deductible.

You can adopt endangered animals with the help of the World Wildlife Fund. Adopting an endangered animal is one of the best ways to protect it, and the whole species. You’ll be providing help to an animal in great danger of extinction, and making a connection that lasts. Your donation (that can be as low as £3 a month) will grant you an adoption package consisting of a booklet, a plush toy animal, a print of your adopted animal, a greeting card and three issues of WWF’s Insight magazine. Species that can be adopted include polar bears, giant pandas, bengal tigers, orang-utans, asian elephants or black rhinos. Your 5 pounds donation to a Giant Panda, for example, could buy one fuel-efficient stove in the Minshan Mountains in China. These stoves can reduce firewood consumption by 30% and therefore help protect woodland and panda habitat. You can check how your donation could help other animals by browsing through the WWF Adoption website.

Adopt a Dolphin website run by WDCS focuses on virtually adopting various species of dolphins. Your donations can help dolphin research, conservation and campaigning against bloody whaling.

Well, Orca is another type of dolphin, but there is a website, focusing solely on Orca research and adoption. The Australian branch of WDCS runs this site. You can adopt an orca for yourself, or as a gift, and help protect whales and dolphins all over the world. You can have a special link with these orca who live along the coast of New Zealand. Your adoption will help WDCS protect these amazing animals.
Through a special link with an individual animal in the wild you will be helping to build a safer future for all whales and dolphins. The value of the adoption starts from $10 and it ranges up to $90.

With this program you choose a particular animal, and you can get regular updates on his or her activities. You can pick the animal by name on the Adopt an Orca website.

Okay, this might not be as personal as having an Orca on your own (if only somewhere in the wild seas), but it is definitely at least as romantic as that one: you can adopt an acre (or more) rainforest at different parts of the world at this website. Territories include Costa Rica, Brazil, Australia, Africa or Palau. The program is run by he Nature Conservancy — the leading conservation organization working around the world to protect ecologically important lands and waters for nature and people. Not only can you adopt an acre of rainforest, but you can also pick different natural reserve areas, such as the Appalachians, the Californias or the Rockies as well.

Contributions start as low as $50 per acre in Africa, for example.With your $50 donation per acre to the Adopt an Acre® program, you will receive:

If you have already done great things adopting everything we have suggested so far, you can give yourself a break and adopt a microbe. Drawn by 23-year-old Emma Lurine, Adopt a Microbe is a funny looking blog focused on different types of viruses (the analogue ones). While the pictures are fun to look at, the site remains serious and informative.

Back to business. If you prefer colder waters, you can adopt a penguin, too. You can choose your own penguin, give it a name and you’ll get pictures and reports of your penguin’s life. You will also receive a digital copy of Mike Bingham’s book “Penguins of South America”. The adoption fee pays for the monitoring of your adopted penguin, so that you (and the researchers) can learn how penguins live, and help protect them. You will see from other pages on this web site that the penguin research is internationally acclaimed, and that your money will be put to good use. Adopting a penguin costs $50, that you can pay with credit card or through PayPal.

Similarly to the other species mentioned before, you can adopt a sea turtle here. Run by Watamu Turtle Watch, a Kenyan marine conservation organisation committed to the protection of sea turtles and the marine environment, through hands-on conservation, research, education, campaigning and community development the site offers information and adoption of these animals. The involvement of local communities is an essential part of the project with the aim of making it sustainable for the future. Applied Research & Conservation Ltd. in Leeds, United Kingdom, handles adoptions requested through their website. You can choose between nest adoption and release adoption, both for $25.

Okay, not exactly a pet, but you can adopt a Christmas tree with the help of The Adopt-A-Christmas Tree Crew. In the name of tradition, many people still chose to desecrate the Earth and chop down a live tree for a mere two weeks of display, then throw the decomposing tree in the garbage which is destructive, wasteful, and highly unfriendly to the environment because they are such a profound source of organic waste. Have you ever stopped to think about the environmental impact of the estimated 32 million Christmas trees sold in America each year? Dying trees release greenhouse gasses when they decompose and overcrowd our landfills. Most of California’s cut trees are trucked in from Oregon or Washington which also wastes fuel and emits CO2.Adopt a Christmas Tree sells locally grown trees (in the San Diego area), that you can plant after Christmas. It is both nice and eco-friendly. At their website an 5-6-feet tall Christmas tree (Deodar Cedar) sells for $159, a 3-4 feet tall Aleppo Pine costs $89, and you can add sexy elf-delivery to your purchase for an additional $45. (This last one is, albeit eco-friendly, not a charity organization. It’s a for-profit company with an environmental friendly business model).

Do you have other ideas of adopting (or supporting) a pet without taking it home? Share it in the comments section. And if you liked this article, pleas use a social media site, such as Facebook or Digg, to share it with your friends. Or simply drop them an email with the url. Thanks!