Living With Creatures We claim some creatures, mainly animals can be trained to live with us and indeed it certainly looks that way. The dog is almost always used as the best example. They have been living with us since the caveman days. Maybe they have trained us to live with them, I only say this because people who have dogs seem to act a little different than those who do not. There are several things that separate dog owners. They get more exercise than many of the rest of us. Dogs have to be walked many times. This means they probably spend more time outdoors with their pets than the rest of us do. They don’t seem to take small problems as serious as the rest of us. Then there is the fact, for some reason it seems their immune systems are stronger. Dogs are not the only pets people have. Yes, there are cats and plenty of them, but what I am going to talk about are unusual pets and there are some people who will take almost any animal, fish, bird and yes even an insect as a pet. A lot of rodents are being kept as pets. Mice, rats and rabbits are more of the usual ones, but there are many other types. Take the prehensile-tailed porcupine. They don’t smell very good, but some people overlook this because they look cute. They have to be kept in a large enclosure. There are plenty of people who have birds as pets. The common ones are parakeets and canaries. There are plenty of other species which people keep as pets. One type of bird which is very appealing is the bird which can talk. There are a few species of them. The one type which we think about when we hear about talking birds is the parrot, but it is not the only talking bird. Some of the others are the Myna, the Macaw and the cockatoo. Birds are not housebroken material, but they do sell bird diapers. I was always amazed by stories about people who keep lions and tigers as pets. It seemed to me they were just flirting with death, but many of them never seem to have a problem. There are actually breeders in some states where they can be purchased. I for one never intend to give them any business. In the 1970s a family in the Soviet Union had three lions in their small apartment. It started when the father took a zoo up on an offer to take care of a lion cub which was rejected by its mother, so he brought it home. When it grew to full size the family got movie offers and went all over the world with the lion. On one trip the lion was kept in a school while the family was in a hotel. Two students snuck into the room where the lion was and started making faces at him. The lion had been trained to put his paws on the shoulders of an actor acting like an ape and mistook the student as acting like an ape and put his paws on his shoulders. His girlfriend began to scream and the police came and shot the lion dead. The family was devastated since they all loved the lion. So, dad decided they needed another lion. He got a lion and then a mountain lion. Eventually the father died from a heart attack. A neighbor began to throw lighted material at the balcony making the animals very nervous. The lion attacked the wife and when the son came to help the lion killed him. Gorillas do not make good pets. They are very strong animals and have large canine teeth. But of course, there is always an exception to any rule and Koko the gorilla was an exception. A gorilla requires a certain diet and large amounts of vegetation. One of the problems with keeping a gorilla as a pet is they are social animals and live in groups and when they are separated and kept alone it can damage them psychologically. Some might think a chimpanzee would make a better pet since it is smaller and less powerful, but the truth is a chimp is so strong it can rip the arms off of a human and they also have powerful teeth. Why would anyone want to have a bear for a pet? I believe of all the dangerous animals a bear is one of the most dangerous and can turn on someone in a second. They are also very hard to kill. There are stories of bears being shot in the heart many times but living long enough to destroy humans. One family decided it would be a good idea to have caged black bears in its back yard. Along with the bears, the owner had lions, tigers, and wolves. The owner would make money by letting people wrestle his bears. It just shows you how crazy people can be. The owner had hired keepers for the animals and one of them had put food in the bear cage and was playing with the bear when it killed him. It turns out 16 states have no laws prohibiting exotic pets. Other deadly animals which should never be allowed to be kept as pets are Alligators or Crocodiles. There are many cases where pet owners had alligators and other pets such as dogs and expected the dumb alligator not to regard the dog as food. One man decided it was a good idea to have a pet alligator, but it escaped. Alligators sometimes get loose and look for dogs to eat and put humans in danger. They are not the only dangerous lizards. Another guy decided monitor lizards were cool and kept buying them until he had six of them in his small apartment. One of the lizards bit him and he was not at work the next day. His coworkers got worried and called the police who knocked on his door, but there was no answer. The police had a hard time opening the door because something was against it, but managed to open it. As soon as they did, they screamed to get back. The man’s body was against the door and the lizards were eating him. The doctor said he was alive when the animals were doing this. If there was ever a reason not to keep dangerous pets this seems to be one of the biggest. Why risk life and limb by keeping wild dangerous animals in the home? Why in some cases put your family at risk? I just don’t get it.
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