Tag: Exotic pets

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News/Blog

Exotic animals: wildlife, not pets

  • Exotic, non-domesticated animals are being caught, bred, and sold across Canada as part of the inhumane and risky wildlife trade.
  • These animals are then kept as pets, sold commercially, and used at events.
  • Captive environments cannot replicate exotic wild animals’ natural habitats, leading to welfare concerns.
  • The wildlife trade poses a risk to wild animal populations both at home and abroad due to poaching of animals for the pet trade and release of exotic animals into the local ecosystems.

Can you take action to speak up for wild exotic animals caught, bred, and sold in the wildlife trade?

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Issues with captive exotic animals

It’s estimated that 1.4 million exotic animals (non-domesticated, non-native animals) are kept as pets across Canada. This includes species like ball pythons, bearded dragons, red ear slider turtles, savannah cats, and crested geckos. Across the Canadian provinces and territories, British Columbia comes in fourth for exotic pet ownership.

Exotic animals may be:

  • kept as pets in people’s homes;
  • bred and sold commercially; or
  • used for public display or entertainment at events.

Welfare concerns

Regardless of whether these animals are wild-caught or captive-bred, they retain their complex social, physiological, and behavioural needs that they would have in the wild.

This makes it impossible to fully meet their unique needs when kept captive as pets, which can lead to significant animal welfare issues and suffering.

Public health risks

The exotic pet trade also poses public health and safety risks.

Stressed animals are more susceptible to disease and to spreading disease to humans. In fact, 75% of emerging infectious diseases are zoonotic (transmitted from non-human animals to humans).

Impact on wild animal populations

The exotic pet trade is also a major threat to wild populations, as a result of the poaching of wild animals to be sold into the pet trade.

The accidental or intentional release of exotic animals into the wild can also have a negative impact on native species and local ecosystems.

Exotic pet events

Exotic pet events, where animals are on display for public entertainment or are being sold, highlight many of the animal welfare, public health, and safety issues associated with the exotic pet trade. These wild animals are:

  • kept in cramped and unnatural containers;
  • transported to and from events; and
  • handled by adults and children in a noisy environment.

Will you help stop the suffering by signing up to receive action alerts? You will be contacted with key actions to help protect exotic animals.

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Opinion Editorial

We can’t afford to ignore the deadly wildlife trade

Article originally published on Daily Hive.

While the world is understandably preoccupied with the disastrous consequences of COVID-19, the global wildlife trade – the likely cause of the pandemic – is getting less attention. Scientists have raised concerns about the issue for years, but they were ignored. It’s an inescapable fact: we were warned.

Back in 2004, the Vancouver Humane Society (VHS) published a report titled A Disaster Ignored? The report, a review of scientific studies concerning the risks of disease from the wildlife trade, concluded: “There is a strong consensus of scientific opinion that the international movement of animals through the global trade in wild and exotic species poses a significant threat of spreading infectious disease to humans and other animals, both domestic and wild.”

Sixteen years later that scientific consensus is even stronger. It is estimated that at least 70% of emerging infectious diseases originate in wildlife. Yet, as COVID-19 has tragically proven, the opportunities to prevent a disaster have indeed been ignored.

While the precise source of COVID-19 has yet to be established, scientists who study zoonotic diseases (diseases that can be transmitted from animals to humans) believe it originated from wildlife sold at a wet market in Wuhan, where the pandemic began.

Unregulated wet markets, where wild and domestic animals are slaughtered and sold on the spot in unsanitary conditions, are common in Asia and much of the developing world. They are supplied by the global wildlife trade (both legal and illegal), which also involves the sale of exotic pets and animal parts for use in so-called traditional medicines or in-fashion items (skins, ivory).

Scientists, conservationists and animal welfare groups have long called for the wildlife trade to be banned or at least restricted and for stronger enforcement of legislation against the trade. Their reasons are clear: the trade spreads zoonotic disease, drives species toward extinction, and is extremely cruel.

VHS, which has long campaigned against the sale and keeping of exotic pets, recently launched a petition calling on the BC government to strengthen regulation of the trade and ownership of wild animals in the province. The petition urges the government to review its regulations to ensure species that could pose a risk of spreading zoonotic disease be prohibited. VHS has also joined with more than 200 conservation and animal welfare organizations in signing an open letter to the World Health Organization, urging action against the wildlife trade.

Action to curtail the wildlife trade is needed at every level – globally, locally, and nationally. There have been calls for Canada to do more on the issue, including a suggestion by former federal minister James Moore that “Canada should table a resolution at the UN General Assembly calling for the immediate closure of the deadly and irresponsible wild animal and wet markets in China; enforced by international inspections and economic sanctions for non-compliance.”

The federal government can take this critical opportunity to work with the international community to curtail the wildlife trade, devote more enforcement resources to stopping the illegal import of wildlife into Canada, and develop a coordinated plan among relevant federal agencies and the provinces to eliminate or restrict the sale and ownership of exotic and wild animals. The Vancouver Humane Society is working alongside World Animal Protection Canada and other groups to press the government to do just that.

The scientific evidence is clear: unless we end the wildlife trade, we will see species disappear, millions of animals will suffer, and there will be more pandemics in the future. These are all disasters we cannot afford to ignore.

Take action to combat the wildlife trade
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animal welfare Captivity Cruelty-free News/Blog Promoted wildlife zoo

Give your views on bird welfare at the Bloedel Conservatory

The City of Vancouver is asking for public comment on the future of the Bloedel Conservatory, which houses more than 120 exotic birds. The Talk Vancouver survey (for which you need to register) provides an opportunity to ask the conservatory to ensure that the birds’ welfare is a priority in future plans. (The Vancouver Park Board and the Vancouver Botanical Gardens Association are collaborating to develop a joint strategic plan for VanDusen Garden and Bloedel Conservatory.) The survey closes February 10.

Specifically, you can ask that when birds are caged (as some birds are when introduced to the conservatory) they are provided with an enriched environment that meets their species-specific needs (e.g toys, puzzles, novel items, opportunity to bathe) to enhance their psychological welfare during this stressful transition time. Your views can help make sure exotic bird welfare is not forgotten in the Bloedel Conservatory’s strategic plan.

It’s important to note that the Conservatory’s website states that all the birds there “have either been directly donated to the Conservatory from homes that can no longer keep them or have been adopted from the GreyHaven Exotic Bird Sanctuary.”