Exotic Pets

The trade in exotic animals is a multi-billion-dollar industry. Across the U.S., millions of exotic animals – including lions, tigers, cougars, wolves, bears, monkeys, alligators, birds, and venomous snakes – are bred, bought, and sold for private possession. They’re kept captive in private homes as “pets,” in roadside zoos, and in menageries.

The exotic pet trade poses grave dangers to the animals, as well as to human health and safety. By their very nature, exotic animals are unpredictable and are incapable of being domesticated and are therefore inappropriate to keep as pets.

Between 1975 and 2005, an estimated 1.3 million African grey parrots were removed from the wild for the international pet trade. Due to the unreported illegal trade and high mortality rate in trapping and transport, likely twice as many African greys were captured. In just 3 years, from 2013 to 2016, its status went from Vulnerable to Endangered. (Source)
According to the IUCN Red List, the Javan Slow Loris is often caught for use in the pet trade and is now critically endangered. This species is one of the most common protected animals found in markets in Indonesia and has faced a suspected 80% decline over the last 24 years. SOURCE: IUCN Red List.

What’s Wrong with Keeping Exotic Pets?

Supports a cruel and unethical trade.

The exotic pet trade is a multi-billion dollar industry. Some animals are stolen from their native habitat; some are “surplus” from zoos or menageries; some are sold at auctions or in pet shops; while others come from backyard breeders. The Internet has dramatically increased the ease with which people can find and purchase wild animals for their private possession, as our 2016 investigation, Downloading Cruelty, revealed. Additionally, because they are cute, small, and easier to handle as babies, baby animals are often taken away from their mothers at very early ages to be sold to people who wish to keep them as pets. Taking an animal from its mother at too young an age robs the animal of the change to learn crucial survival skills. And, when these animals grow up, they are often discarded by their owners – abandoned or euthanized – or forced to live in deplorable conditions.

Inadequate care and conditions.

Exotic pets are rarely housed in conditions that are suitable and adequate to their needs. Most people cannot provide the special care, housing, diet, and maintenance that exotic animals require. Many animals who have become too difficult for their owners to care for, or who have outgrown their usefulness as “pets” or profit-makers, end up languishing in small pens in backyards, doomed to live in deplorable conditions, or are abandoned or killed. A very few lucky ones are placed in genuine sanctuaries to live out the rest of their lives.

“Two lions were kept in a very small, barren pen with a roof. The surface was made either of concrete or some other artificial material. A brick building was attached as a shelter. The only other item in the pen was a water trough. There was no enrichment whatsoever, not even a platform so that the lions could get off the floor.”

Born Free USA’s Report “A Life Sentence”

Poses a danger to both people and animals.

Every year, people are attacked and injured by exotic “pets” or exotic animals in roadside zoos; some of the attacks are fatal, and children have too often been the victims. In recent years, people have been mauled by tigers, attacked by monkeys, and bitten by snakes, just to name a few of the tragic incidents involving exotic “pets” and incidents involving exhibited animals. Compounding the risk to the public, many exotic animals are carriers of diseases, such as herpes B, salmonellosis, monkeypox, and rabies, which are communicable – and can be fatal – to humans.

By Richard from Canton, United States (Knoxville zoo – chimpanzee teeth) [CC BY 2.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons.

“I want everyone out there that either has a primate or knows someone who has a primate to know they are very dangerous, infectious animals… Not only is it unhealthy for the owner and a neighbor, but the animal itself is suffering. I’ve seen it with my own eyes, when I could see: Travis used to sit on the floor in a corner and rock. Now that is not a healthy chimpanzee.”

Charla Nash, who was severely injured by her neighbor’s pet chimpanzee in 2009.

Inadequate and inconsistent laws.

In many states, people are allowed to keep exotic animals in their homes and backyards without restrictions or with only minimal oversight. In Texas alone, there are more tigers in captivity than there are in the wild globally.

Exotic Animals Incidents Database

Wild animals belong in the wild — not in the confinement of circuses, zoos, aquaria, backyards, or homes. In captivity, wild animals are not able to perform their natural behaviors and many lash out in frustration from psychological and physical deprivation. This situation is dangerous for animals and humans alike. Search our interactive database of attacks on humans, attacks on other animals, and escapes by exotic animals in the U.S.