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SEOUL, July 23 (Reuters) - A greyhound named Khan sniffs at a spread of tarot cards at a fortune-telling shop in the South Korean capital of Seoul, before placing a paw on one.
Across the table, his owner, Ahn Hye-joo, waits anxiously to learn the meaning of the card, which depicts a dog chasing its owner.
Hwang Soo-kyung, a tarot reader who runs the Ace Sophia fortune-telling parlour in the city's upmarket Gangnam district, said the image indicated anxiety related to the five puppies fathered by the pedigree animal.
"These feelings Khan experiences are something vets or dog trainers don't know, since it doesn't manifest as a major issue to them," said his owner Ahn, whose eyes lit up as she listened.
A growing niche offering among fortune-telling shops, "pet tarot" is driven by a surge in pet ownership as fewer South Koreans choose to have children, deterred by costly housing and education.
Government surveys show 29.2% of homes in South Korea, which has the world's lowest birth rate, were raising pets this year, up from 17.4% in 2010.
Hwang, who opened her shop in 2014, said demand for pet tarot has grown as owners increasingly view the animals as family, or sometimes a sole domestic companion.
No clients have ever limited themselves to just one session, she added, at a cost of 20,000 won ($14) each.
"They come back because once you start asking what your dog is thinking, you can't really stop."
She designed a deck of the cards for pets, who sometimes include turtles and reptiles, in response to customers' queries whether she could discern their animals' thoughts.
If a pet chooses a card featuring swords, for example, that can signal the animal is physically unwell, perhaps suffering from joint pain, Hwang added.
Some owners feel the readings provide more than entertainment.
Ryu Su-mi brought in her rescue dog, E-seul, who has been skittish around anyone dressed like a paramedic ever since Ryu collapsed at home and was hospitalised.
Hwang said the dog's choice of card showed the trauma was still there, but healing.
"I'd have no way of knowing that on my own," Ryu said. "We look each other in the eye every day, but there's clearly a lot we're missing."
($1=1,476.8200 won)
($1=1,478.6800 won)
(Reporting by Jungmin Ryu and Hyeyoon Cho; Additional reporting by Daewoung Kim; Editing by Ed Davies and Clarence Fernandez)
