Quote Originally Posted by borzoimom
or worse- the people that buy a wild animal as a pet.
Well that happens to be me, and my Tamandua is very healthy and happy, thank you very much. It's also tons of my friends who have all manner of critters big and small who are also happy and healthy beings.

It's also impossible to have a "wild" animal as a pet. A wild animal is just that living in the wild. they are non-domesticated, exotic, and or tame but not wild. Most exotics are born and bred in captivity for many generations. Hamsters for example are exotic and have been bred as pets in the US not nearly as long as say fennec foxes have been.

As far as most owners and "roadside zoos" taking poor care of their animals, where do you get that? Where are the statistics and the study that generated them? Bad cases make the news good cases don't and it skews the public image. USDA regulates all mammal exhibition to the public. By Usda definition San Diego wild animal park is a roadside zoo. any stationary animal exhibit is. It's not like "puppy mill" where it automatically means something bad.

Most have standard conditions or better since they have to keep usda standards. I fail to see how a private owner or a smaller business than a zoo is automatically a bad owner. How are they worse? They tend to be more hands on and interactive with their animals. AZA Zoo's mostly have hands off policies now and the animals actually suffer for that. Having to be sedated for simple procedures because they try to keep them "wild" where as one kept more hands on is used to being handled and is less likely to need sedation for simple things and so avoid the risks and extra stress.

The only difference between an AZA zoo and any other is a slip of paid for paper. AZA is not a government agency. It's best classed as a guild like the screen actors guild. Big AZA zoos have special problems of their own. You have the zoo vet, nutritionist, keeper, and the money guy all arguing over what is best. Improvements are hard to make because you need all to agree. The keepers who work closest with the animals rarely get listened to. I know this from talking with keepers.

For the record a bobcat and domestic cat cross is impossible! There has never been a proven case. Not a single proven case with DNA. That would be easy if it were true. There's actually tons of hybrid cats but a bobcat/domestic is not one of them. A Pixiebob is just a nice looking bobtailed domestic.