Well, Byron was a fish additct which the obit mentions, He struggled with cancer to which he finally succumbed, and the Obit mentions that. He is from Canada and it it a Canadian info site. So it would have to be an elaborate con job. And they sure had a easy to use set-up to make donations via CC or Paypal. I wondered if it might not be legit and decided the on that seemed pretty poor.
I made a decent size donation but not insane enough to change how I live as a result. I normally find a good cause, often an individual in trouble, to make my annual donation to. This year I did not wait for Xmas.
My family is not religious and we don't have funerals. When my dad passed we asked folks donate to our local hospice Org. They were here for oth him and my mother eventually. Byron never asked the members here for anything for himself, he just helped us all become better fish keepers and hopefully, better people. So My donation was insignificant compared to that. I have to assume that he was the one who requested those donation for a cause he supported.
The odd thing is that I got a nice thank-you email from the shelter with a story about a specific dog, the kind the donation would help:
I think anybody who can make even a small donation to the shelter will be doing two things, helping animals in need and honoring Byron's memory. It sure made me feel a lot better than just sitting around feeling sad.