different kinds of pets- NVR
Posted by Anonymous on Oct 26, 2007 · Member since Dec 1969 · 11789 posts
What kind of exotic pets have you heard of people having?
What I mean by exotic pets is that really we don't usually keep as pets.
I remember in the city somebody was caught keeping a tiger and another kind of an exotic pet which I can't remember the second one at all.
Llamas! Obviously not for the apartment dweller, but exotic enough in S. Spain...
Crocodiles and other large reptiles. I don't think you can actually bond with a croc, but maybe I'm wrong.
I would certainly not advocate someone trying to keep an exotic as a pet, well...not like wild cats and such. They almost always wind up in a sanctuary, let go or dead....especially in the case of wild cats. There's a reason they are called wild. However, that being said, I have known a couple people who had skunks (not all of which were de-scented! :o)
I once saw a van with the license plate "Lion" who had a little cougar in the back of it. I assume it must have been a pet.
I knew someone with a raccoon they kept in a cage in the backyard.
And my former neighbor had a giant 8-10 foot boa or python or something. It got out and into our rose bushes once. Although I wasn't afraid of it, it weighed a TON and there was no way I could pick it up to haul it back through his window. LOL I had to call him out of school to come get his snake. :)
Of my families more disastrous pets...we had a minah (sp) bird. It talked a little but mainly screeched. One day he was just gone. I don't know what my parents did with it but I hate to think. We also had a conure. They tend to hand upsisde down like bats from the cage. My dad had him for a long time then just got tired of him and let him go. (I'll never forgive him for that).
Oh yeah....when we lived in CA my family had a duck. We called her My Lady and then found out she was a he. LOL He was another one of those animals that just disappeared from our house.
Oh, and I had an iguana. Got him from a pet store. I think the lady there knew I didn't know what I was doing so she gave me the meanest one in the group. I tried my best to take care of him but he died after a few years. I was devastated. I swore never to get another lizard without doing my research first.
We feed rehabbed ducks and they are our current "pets", although they live in a sheltered pond behind our property and are free to come and go. They like handouts but they're wild, wild, wild.
Does it say much about my sense of humor that we call them Duckira and Sir Macks-a-lot?
(She does have much back.)
One of our rescuees was a starling that became a house pet. They're in the mynah family so the owners hoped "Peep" would learn to talk... oh, she never did, yet.
Wild parrots! Well, not so much as pets, but as outdoor visitors on their terms. I'm reading The Wild Parrots of Telegraph Hill right now (which is especially dear to my heart since I used to live there and feed the birds. ) Mark has an amazing relationship with those parrots. It's a really sweet story.
If anyone is interested: http://www.amazon.com/Wild-Parrots-Telegraph-Hill-Story/dp/140008170X/ref=pd_bbs_sr_2/104-3245317-4265517?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1193427577&sr=8-2
Oh, and my grandmother told her her father once adopted a skunk! :D
md...is this a documentary movie too?
i saw some of it...very cool!
we used to have two oppossums as "pets" in our garage. note: very loose term as pets, mostly, we fed them and ran away from them. but hideously cute hissing at us in the dark! :(
we currently have a tarantula, named rosie.
and we used to have a little anole lizard. i loved him, he was soo cute and used to flirt w/ me. i swear! he'd puff up his chin and start bouncing and showing off when i would blow up my cheeks!
i heard of some family having a civet cat.
thats sooo cool mdveg!! :o
My best friend's family feed Magpies and Willie Wagtails every morning and afternoon.
They now appear at the front door and have been known to 'knock' on the door as a gentle reminder it's dinner time. They are pretty cute, especially the willie wagtails, the magpies can get a bit scary during this time of year though (spring), swooping and protecting their babies.
Btw the Willie Wagtail is a native Australian bird.
A fellow in my hometown in rural Iowa had a lion that he used to put in the back of his station wagon when he went to town...nobody ever vandalised that car...but I think the lion had been declawed. :( The guy was a doctor and lived on Nob Hill (which means "rich gated community" in the US and something entirely different and most ironic in the UK). One time the gardener was mowing his enormous lawn and felt a "dog" lick his hand...turned to pat the "doggie" and almost went into cardiac arrest...it was the lion!
Apparently the lion lived happily with them. Not so the cheetah he acquired later. Which was fine with the kids, let them rest their heads on him when watching TV etc...until one fine day it remembered it was a wild animal. Doc came home to find his wife and kids locked in the garage while the cheetah occupied the trashed house.