Exotic pet suitability: Understanding some problems and using a labeling system to aid animal welfare, environment, and consumer protection

Warwick, Clifford; Steedman, Catrina; Jessop, Mike; Arena, P.; Pilny, Anthony A.; Nicholas, Emma

doi:10.1016/j.jveb.2018.03.015

Cited by 54 publications

(75 citation statements)

References 50 publications

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“…In addition, in our study the length of tortoise ownership is generally less than three years. This is very short when considering the long lifespan of tortoise species, and much shorter than for other pets like dogs or cats in Europe [61], but is in line with that of other wild pets, high percentages of which end up being abandoned or in animal care centers owing to their overly demanding requirements [62]. Moreover, there is almost a complete absence of tortoise veterinary care in Rabat and its surroundings, which contrasts with the frequent care of other domestic pets like cats, dogs or rabbits in, for example, North America [63].…”

Section: Animal Preference Welfare and Pet Knowledgementioning

confidence: 82%

Implications for Conservation of Collection of Mediterranean Spur-Thighed Tortoise as Pets in Morocco: Residents’ Perceptions, Habits, and Knowledge

Segura

Delibes‐Mateos

Acevedo

2020

Animals

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The trading and collection of wild animals as pets may be cause for concern regarding animal welfare and species conservation. These concerns can be exemplified by Mediterranean spur-thighed tortoise (Testudo graeca), a long-living species whose use as pets is long established. The human dimension plays a major role in the wildlife for the pet collection, and is particularly important in countries like Morocco, where this might pose a threat to the conservation of the species involved. This study, which is based on a questionnaire survey (n = 480 participants), documents the fact that many people in Morocco keep tortoises as pets: 55% of the participants in the survey and over two tortoises/person. Importantly, most captive tortoises, particularly juveniles, had been collected directly from wild populations by their owners (42%, n = 264). In general, the tortoise owners had limited knowledge of their tortoises’ habits and requirements, although rural people were more likely to acknowledge that the tortoise is a wild and threatened species. Our study reveals that non-commercial collection is a common activity in Morocco that may threaten wild tortoise populations and hence species conservation, and it could have consequences regarding the welfare of the animals. We were also able to identify the profile of people towards whom education campaigns should be directed in order to reduce the number of tortoises collected from wild populations. Additional field research should also be conducted to quantify the impact of pet collection on wild tortoise populations.

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Section: Animal Preference Welfare and Pet Knowledgementioning

confidence: 82%

Implications for Conservation of Collection of Mediterranean Spur-Thighed Tortoise as Pets in Morocco: Residents’ Perceptions, Habits, and Knowledge

Segura

Delibes‐Mateos

Acevedo

2020

Animals

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“…Ownership of non-domesticated animals, or 'exotic pets', has become increasingly popular across the world [1]. The exotic pet industry is a substantial part of the global trade in wildlife products, which is worth an estimated $30.6-42.8 billion USD annually [2].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The exotic pet industry is a substantial part of the global trade in wildlife products, which is worth an estimated $30.6-42.8 billion USD annually [2]. Reptiles comprise a substantial part of the live animal trade (>20%) [3] and are particularly prevalent as exotic pets in European and North American markets [3][4][5][6], for example, where around 0.9 million are kept in UK homes and 9.4 million in US homes [1,7,8]. The scale of the trade is likely to be even greater than current estimates due to incomplete record-keeping and widespread illegal activity throughout the industry [1,9].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Reptiles comprise a substantial part of the live animal trade (>20%) [3] and are particularly prevalent as exotic pets in European and North American markets [3][4][5][6], for example, where around 0.9 million are kept in UK homes and 9.4 million in US homes [1,7,8]. The scale of the trade is likely to be even greater than current estimates due to incomplete record-keeping and widespread illegal activity throughout the industry [1,9]. Increasing consumer demand for novel colour and pattern strains produced by artificial breeding selection is driving industry growth for the captive breeding sector [10].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Blind Trading: A Literature Review of Research Addressing the Welfare of Ball Pythons in the Exotic Pet Trade

Green¹,

Coulthard

Megson

et al. 2020

Animals

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Extensive numbers of Ball pythons are caught, bred, traded and subsequently kept in captivity across the world as part of the exotic pet industry. Despite their widespread availability as pets, relatively little is known about the potential welfare challenges affecting them. We reviewed the literature for research focused on the health and welfare of Ball pythons in the international pet trade. From a total of 88 articles returned from the search criteria, our analysis showed that very few actually focused on trade (10%) or animal welfare (17%). Instead, the majority (64%) of articles focused on veterinary science. There was a considerable bias towards physical health, with most studies neglecting the four other domains of animal welfare (behaviour, nutrition, environment and mental health). Furthermore, very few studies considered Ball pythons prior to resulting pet ownership, during wild capture and transportation or captive breeding operations. Our review demonstrates that our current understanding of welfare for Ball pythons traded as exotic pets is limited. We recommend that future research should focus on aspects of the industry that are currently overlooked, including the potential consequences of genetic selection during captive-breeding and the conditions provided for snakes prior to and during international transportation.

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“…Trade drives the collection of wild amphibians, directly leading to decline of some species (Natusch and Lyons, 2012;Alroy, 2015), and this is the justification for trade bans and/or restrictions (e.g., CITES). Trade is often injurious to the animals traded, either during transport (Ashley et al, 2014) or as a result of malnutrition and poor husbandry (Pasmans et al, 2017;Warwick et al, 2018). Trade carries disease (Fisher and Garner, 2007;Peel et al, 2012;Kolby et al, 2014;O'Hanlon et al, 2018) and specimens in trade act as reservoirs for disease (Spitzen-van der Sluijs et al, 2011).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Why Have a Pet Amphibian? Insights From YouTube

et al. 2019

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The desire to own a pet amphibian is growing, and with it a growth in amphibian trade and in negative impacts on native populations, including disease transmission and invasive amphibian populations. We know very little about how or why people choose amphibians as pets, but amphibian owners share large numbers of videos on freely accessible platforms, such as YouTube. We aimed to use videos of captive amphibians to determine which species are kept, their life-history stage and the types of videos uploaded. We watched and categorized 1,162 videos by video type, type of amphibian behavior and amphibian taxonomy (superfamily, family, and species). We used data on the amphibian trade from the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), on conservation status from the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) red list, and on potential environmental impact from published Environmental Impact Classification of Alien Taxa (EICAT) records, to determine potential conflicts of owning pet amphibians. We recorded 173 captive species in 847 videos with a taxonomic overrepresentation of salamandroids and pipoids, and an underrepresentation of ranoids and plethodontoids. When compared to videos of wild amphibian species, videos of captive animals featured disproportionate amounts of adults feeding, being handled and moving. The videos watched had a smaller proportion of threatened amphibian species, but a higher proportion of invasive species, than would be expected by chance, with the proportion present in CITES appendices (18%) being non-significant. We suggest that such data can be used to profile potential pets for trade and attempt to avoid conflicts with threatened and highly impacting alien species.

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Exotic pet suitability: Understanding some problems and using a labeling system to aid animal welfare, environment, and consumer protection

Cited by 54 publications

References 50 publications

Implications for Conservation of Collection of Mediterranean Spur-Thighed Tortoise as Pets in Morocco: Residents’ Perceptions, Habits, and Knowledge

Implications for Conservation of Collection of Mediterranean Spur-Thighed Tortoise as Pets in Morocco: Residents’ Perceptions, Habits, and Knowledge

Blind Trading: A Literature Review of Research Addressing the Welfare of Ball Pythons in the Exotic Pet Trade

Why Have a Pet Amphibian? Insights From YouTube

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