Monday, July 06, 2015

Wheel of Exotic Pets



So, I was reading a link roundup at The Toast a while back, which included an article about efforts to tame foxes.

And the article, originally on the Popular Science website and strongly reminiscent of one I remember reading in National Geographic a while back, contained odd tidbits like this:  "Indiana has three classes of wild animals. Class 1 is mostly squirrels". And it linked to this:

Wheel of Exotic Pets

Go head and copy and paste that address into a browser.  I don't know why I found it so fascinating; probably all the little keys in the bottom, like "Pees in the House" and "Difficult to Feed".

So no, I don't want a koala or a slow loris or an otter for a pet.  But it's fun (and dismaying, tbh) to read about the nutcases who do.

5 comments:

~~Silk said...

I followed your links, and yeah, I am dismayed at how much you see "Oooooo, I want one!" on YouTube videos of any and all cute baby wild animals. One video recently disclosed that you can buy a tiger cub for a mere $2,000, followed by discussions of how that's less than many purebred dogs cost, so consequently there are herds of teens saving up their lunch money to buy one. Sigh.

Spoilsport me - I responded to several with yeah, buying one is one thing. Feeding, housing, and insuring it is another. Take my word for it, you can't afford it.

rockygrace said...

A lot of insurance companies won't even write you a homeowner's policy if you own certain breeds of dog. I can't imagine the look you'd get if you put "tiger" down on the "Pets" section of the application.

Of course, the same mentality that would want to own a tiger prolly also doesn't worry about things like homeowner's insurance.

~~Silk said...

According to that wheel, skunks look like the easiest exotic to own if you can get the right foods, plus they have all the good characteristics - except "badass". I dunno - I personally think having a pet skunk is pretty darn badass!

Somewhere in the dim recesses of my blog I wrote about skunks. My cat when I was in high school had a skunk best friend.

~~Silk said...

Stranger in my living room.
Skunk wanders around corner.
Stranger: OMG, a skunk! Is it fixed?
Me: No. Don't make any sudden moves.

Badass!!!!

rockygrace said...

My cat Rocky got "skunked" once and I let him back inside before I realized what had happened. He ran around rubbing against EVERYthing, trying to rub the smell off, I guess. The entire apartment stunk of skunk for WEEKS.

Yeah, they're badass, all right!