Pet of the Year and Howloween Pet Photo Contest: How Voting Works & How to Win

What the Howloween Pet Photo Contest is and who runs it

The Fish & Bone, a pet business serving the Portland, Maine area, runs the Howloween Pet Photo Contest on its own website. The contest page opens with a question that sets the tone: "Is your pet the ghost with the most, the cutest pumpkin, or the spookiest skeleton in town?" The invitation that follows is to "Show off their best Halloween look for a chance to win big!"

The program name on this site pairs two titles, Pet of the Year and Howloween. The page on file describes the costume contest. It does not describe a separate Pet of the Year judging, so a reader looking for that should check the live page. The contest is hosted at thefishandbone.com, which makes the store both the host and the final authority on prizes and rules.

For a pet owner in the Portland area, the store setting makes the contest feel like a neighborhood event. A shop that sells to pet owners is hosting a gallery of its own customers' animals, and the page's playful questions about ghosts, pumpkins and skeletons set a light tone. The goal is a smile, not a competition between professionals.

Pets appear in costumes, and the page lists prizes without detailing them in the text on file. The facts that the page does state are collected in the table below.

The 2026 timeline and the confirmed years

The page prints a three-stage online timeline for 2026, and it is one of the clearest on any contest of its kind. Submissions run first, voting follows for a short week, and winners are announced on Halloween. Confirmed years are 2025 and 2026.

The two-year history is short but clear. The 2025 contest used the same page, and the 2026 page presents a refreshed timeline with fresh dates. A repeat contest from the same store tells an owner that a good costume photo this year could be reused in spirit next year, with a new outfit and a new caption.

The stages do not overlap. A photo cannot collect votes until submissions close, so every entry starts voting week on equal footing, with the same voting dates in front of friends and family. The text on file does not print a vote limit, a category list or the prizes' values; confirm on the live ballot each cycle. Because winners are announced on October 31, the day after voting closes, the contest ends on Halloween itself, which suits the theme.

How the entry and voting steps work

Entering is simple: snap a photo of your pet in costume, then upload it with your pet's name and a fun caption. That is the page's own three-part instruction, and it asks for nothing else in the text on file. Entries are accepted from October 1 to October 22, 2026.

The costume is the story. The page names three examples, a ghost, a pumpkin and a skeleton, which shows the kind of Halloween look the store is hoping to see. An owner with a pet that tolerates a costume has a clear advantage, since a relaxed animal makes a better photograph, and a good photograph is the first thing a voter sees.

Voting is a separate stage, from October 23 to October 30. The page says that once voting starts, owners should encourage friends and family to vote. That line tells a supporter what the organizer expects: a personal campaign among people the owner knows. It also tells a voter that the entries are meant to be viewed and shared, not hidden behind a login wall.

The page does not state whether a voter must create an account, how many votes one person may cast or whether a vote can be changed. A supporter should check the live page before sharing. Because the timeline is fixed, the best preparation is to have the photo and caption ready before October 1 and a list of friends ready before October 23. The caption is a small advantage, since it is the part that makes a voter smile before choosing.

How The Fish & Bone contest compares with other Maine ballots

Maine's other ballots on this site include athlete-of-the-week polls, readers' polls and a music predictions poll. The Howloween contest is a pet photo vote run by a store. Siblings are the Aroostook County Athlete of the Week, Best of the 207, the Central Maine Athlete of the Week, Best of Maine, the Kennebec Journal Readers' Choice and the Best Bluegrass Album Grammy Awards Predictions Poll.

The comparison clarifies who the voters are. An athlete poll draws fans of a school or team, a readers' poll draws people who read a newspaper, and the Howloween contest draws pet owners and the friends of pet owners. A voter who follows Best of Maine for restaurants may never see this page, which is why the owner's personal sharing carries so much weight here.

Unlike the weekly sports polls, the Howloween contest runs once a year, in October, and its ballot is a gallery of pets rather than a list of people.

Building support for a pet entry

The simplest plan has three posts: one when submissions open on October 1, one when voting opens on October 23 and one near the close on October 30. Each should link to the store's contest page, so a friend can find the entry in a click. A photo that has a clear caption, as the page requests, is easy to remember and easy to describe in a message.

A pet entry wins by being shared in the right week. Voting runs October 23 to October 30, so a photo shared on October 22 may be forgotten by the time voting opens. Owners can post the link when voting begins and remind friends near the close. The store's page is the authority on limits.

Our guide to getting more votes online covers outreach for public ballots, and buy votes online describes the paid service. The store has published nothing about outside help in the text on file, and a win cannot be promised.